32 Breeding Strategies: "How do fish make babies...and can I watch?"
Description
This article is from the Aquaria: Good (and Bad) First Fish; Breeding FAQ, by Dean Hougen and Elaine Thompson
32 Breeding Strategies: "How do fish make babies...and can I watch?"
Fish breed in many ways, and yes you can watch. In fact, watching fish
breed is one of the great fascinations in the hobby because there are
so many interesting breeding strageties among fish.
There are two main strategies that fish use: egglaying and
livebearing.
Livebearing fish do what the name suggests. The female gives birth to
fully formed, free-swimming young. The female fish is internally
fertilized by the male fish, and carries the fry for about a month
before delivering them. Upon delivery, the babies swim off, hide, and
begin searching for food.
Livebearers include the popular mollies, platies, swordtails, and
guppies. Other livebearers are halfbeaks, anableps, and fish in the
Goodeid family. They are easy to sex, as the female is larger, and the
male has a rod-like anal fin called a gonopodium that he uses to
internally fertilize the female. After fertilization, the female can
produce multiple batches of babies without a male present.
Egglaying is also what the name suggests: the fish lay eggs instead of
giving birth to little fish. As the fish grow, they hatch into fry
with an attached yolk sac, and then mature into fish. The process
usually takes around a week to 10 days, although it can vary widely.
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