German Blue Ram Journal 8-8-2010

I have been reading allot on GBR (german blue rams) So I decided I would give them a go a few months back... To my surprise I found them very eager to reproduce! Really very simple, I purchase a few males at first, waited until they got a nice size to them, and found a female... introduced her to both of them in a community discus tank.... Everything seemed fine, and a pair developed very quickly.

I moved the new couple to a 20gal soil substrate planted tank... PH about 6.8, water soft, KH very low, and below 10ppm nitrate.... Feeding purely frozen bloodworms, and keepin temp in mid 80's, it was only about a week and I got my first spawn. The female had laid about 20-30 eggs.... Unfortunetly she is very small and very young mother and ate all the babies.

After the eggs had been eaten the pair seemed to seperate... I put in the male from the community tank to spark the flame again... and sure enough the pair immediatly teamed against the male visitor and chased him around... I removed him from the tank about 24 hours later so I wouldnt loose him to stress. About a week had passed and the pair did not seem as happy with eachother, so I placed everyone back in the community tank.

That week I found another female... this one was twice as large as mine, and her colors where gorgeous! i purchased her for far too expensive and placed her in the community tank. What happened next shocked me the most. The male from the original pair took allot of interest in this new female... He followed her everywhere. The female from the pair tried to come in and boss the new female around and her ex-man was not having it... He chased her away from his new friend. So pretty cool... my male is shallow! He dumped his female fishfriend to go with the HOTTIE new girl. lol

I put the new pair in the 20gal 2 days ago... today I come home to a bunch of eggs... Too many to count... looks like 50-60+ eggs! So the new female is more fertile than the other evidently! lol.... Lets just hope she is a better mother and doesnt eat all the eggs. after observing them for awhile, I figured out there routine... The male would guard the eggs while the female would circle the tank, either lookin for food or enemie?? Then she would come back to her eggs, and the male would do his rounds... very nice team work!

I will keep everyone updated day to day on the progess... From what I have read it should be 40 - 50 hours until they hatch.