Introducing The Happy Couple

After conditioning, the female can be place in the chimney.  There should only be around 6inches of water in the tank and the chimney should be high enough above the water level to prevent either fish from jumping in or out.  Believe me they can jump quite high when the opposite sex is nearby lol 

The sponge filter is now turned off.

The female should be left in the chimney for 2 days and you should continue to feed as you have been doing.  During this time the male should start building his nest.  He will also spend a lot of time checking out the female and flaring a lot. 

The female should be quite eggy by this point and when she is ready she will display vertical breeding bars.  These are easy to see on darker females but not so easy on pale coloured females.  She will also start positioning herself with her nose pointed downwards when the male is around her.

After a couple of days if the female is looking ready you can release her into the tank with the male.  At this point…..please do not panic.  It is perfectly normal for there to be fair bit of aggression from the male.  This is all part of their courtship process and perfectly normal behaviour.  All our females have had varying degrees of nipped and torn fins and these will heal fine after she has been removed.

It can take a day or even more sometimes before they actually start spawning and you must keep a close eye on them to make sure the female isn't being too severely beaten up.  What we have also tried is releasing the female for a couple of hours in the evening, putting her back in the chimney overnight and then releasing again the next day.  This method seemed to make them spawn much quicker.