Apparently, I am running a brothel...

So, yeah..my convicts. The humping machines that they are, seem to have 4 clutches of eggs in various spots around the tank right now.

Wow you must be, I've never had mine have more than one batch of eggs/fry at a time.. Did you drop a couple little blue pills in there.. Lol

thats pretty ridiculous.

ha rabbits of the freshwater aquaria grats either way looks like there might be something in the water

Well atleast you will have plenty of food for your other guys lol

It's crazy, one clutch hatched and she has moved them all under a rock she dug all the gravel out from under. There must be a few hundred in there. The other clutches are still gestating. When I feed, all my fish usually rush the food, but now all the females stay with their eggs. I see them trying to get out to grab some food, but they get a few inches from the eggs and turn around..poor things look hungry! So I have been target feeding the females with a turkey baster and some blood worms. They seem to appreciate not having to leave their eggs.

And they will defend them to the death. I had Convicts until just a little while ago. I kinda miss the little terrors. But my tank , 75gal., was becoming heavily overcrowded. I bought 2 to start my tank. I gave a way many, sold a few and finally sold the last bunch of 15 a couple months ago. they were in with my Malawis, but they didn't seem to care. They are always very busy and great fun to watch.

Update time!

There are 4 spawns going on right now. I'm calling them group A, B, C & D.

Group A: First group to spawn. This group consists of the dominant male, a large black and white striped male and a white and pink female. They chose the big slate cave in the middle of the tank. The eggs were laid on a slate wall, easily 200 eggs. I didn't see any white eggs, looks like all were fertilized. Once the eggs were hatxhed, they moved the fry to the hole they dug under a big rock that makes up one of the walls of the cave, that was about a week ago. The female keeps a close eye on the little guys, shuffling them out of sight into the hole she made under the rock. I catch a glimpse of them if I sneak up on the tank. There are a ton of them. Soon they will be too big to hide under there and they will fill the cave!

Group B: Second group to spawn. This group consists of a black and white male and female. They chose to dig out a cave of their own under a flat piece of slate that was just laying on top of the gravel near a very large river rock. The female in this group is the same one who spawned the very first time months ago. She is a beautifully colored little fish. Awesome patterning and a red bellt and blue flashing on her fins. The eggs are laying on the glass bottom in the cave. She only comes out to chase away other fish and to get a bite to eat while he covers the entrance for her. Looks like a huge number of eggs in there. They should hatch any day now.

Group C: Third group to spawn. This group consists of a black and white male and an almost all white female. They chose to dig a big pit on the other side of the large river rock from Group B. They dug their pit in the front corner of the tank. My tank has black silicone and they laid their eggs right in the corner, below the plastic trim. The eggs were laid 2 days ago. This group works real well together. He watches the perimeter and she basically dotes over the eggs all day. I may be crazy, but I can swear he brings her a mouth load of blood worms when I feed the tank and spits them out so she can eat without leaving the pit. Their egg clutch is massive.

Group D: Fourth group to spawn. This group consists of a white male and a white female. They chose to dig their pit in a 3" space between a granite rock cave wall and the far right glass of the tank. Again, these guys dug a pit in the front corner of the tank. They laid their eggs last night. They have an odd group. They are paired up, for sure, but my lone, unpaired, female seems to hang around their spawn site with impunity. They chase away any fish except her. She is allowed to stay remarkably close to their spawn site without being chased.

It's going to be an ineresting next few weeks. I have a fry tank all set up, just waiting for these little guys to get big enough to net out and live on their own. I've got a pack of "First Bites" and "Micro Pellets" ready for when they are on their own. I think I will have a large number of fry available in about a month or so..lol.

And all it took for the spawning to explode was adding a new, more efficient heater. That's the only thing I can think that I changed. When rattle72 was at my house getting the Ornatum from me, he mentioned my water was a bit on the cold side, so I changed out heaters. Next thing I knew, there was spawning activity all over the damned place.

Group A's babies! They came out from under the hole she dug under the rock to the left.

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Those little white dots are all fry..tons of fry..lol

It's Spring. and I think they know it. Even though mine live in a dungeon, and get only artificial light they still seem to know. Convicts make great parents. I don't have any now, but they are a great family to watch. Congrats on the spawns

Group A is free swimming and well guarded. There are a TON of them.

Group B has hatched and are free swimming as well, though much smaller then Group A right now.

Group C hatched this morning, they are still in a big cluster, I guess they are still wigglers, feeding off their yolk sacks.

Group D is still incubating.

I may have to rehome my Festae and Cory's..lol

Well, that's convicts for you.

I got rid of all the convicts..lol. They were stressing out my Festae..and that can't happen! So I moved the parents to another tank temporarily, removed all the decorations from the tank..and let the Festae eat all the fry..lol. It took them about 3 days to polish off all 1200 of them, but they did it. I gave the convicts away to someone off CL who wanted them.

My tank is much happier without the convicts.

Conicts... Chicken of the Sea!?! lol..