Breeding Tilapia help

[JCO]

Take a look at these on eBay. I use the biggest ones regardless of the size of the FT. If it is 55 gal or above I use two and on up according to size. 4 for 250 gals is fair unless the fish load is very heavy. The water can not be pumped to the GB with fry present. You can build you own foam filter with a little imagination. It also helps aerate the water.

[Easy]

I used a small plastic soda bottle, maybe 12oz, drilled with lots of small holes, cut one of my fish dip nets apart for netting. Wrapped that around the bottle and put my filters suction pipe into the bottle. I used a single nylon tie to hold the netting around the bottle and drilled a little hole through the neck of the bottle into my filters suction tube, putting a little piece of the nylon tie wrap through.
You will have to clean the netting every couple days or it will clog and the suction will crush the bottle. After a couple weeks if you keep the temperature up, the lights on and the fish well fed they will be to big to fit in the holes. Remove the netting but leave the bottle on till they are big enough.

If you are having troubles getting them to breed and your temperature is already in the 80's, keep the light on for at least 14 hrs. You will have more fish than you will know what to do with.

[fishkis]

Hello! First post! Ok so pink, golden, marbled, etc tilapia are hybrids. So most hybrids are crosses of two different pure lines and most are male. The male hybrids grow super fast, and females average. so when a male is 4-5" the female is 3" and he will stress her till she dies. if you had many deaths around the 3"-4" range they were your females. Also Hybrids are the most aggressive of all Tilapia. You can not breed the hybrid offspring with same gene pool, or you will get many deficiencies and slower growth.
Blues need 75F minmum, preferably 85F.

If you put clay pots in, most females will not hatch eggs if they SEE another fish. some will hold eggs for a day or two, some several days, most will eventually swallow the eggs. if you get a rare one that hatches the eggs, the fry will either get eaten by other fish, or sucked by your filter. they are so small you may never realize it.

Best way is to get a 55 gallon breeder tank. put 10 fish in with 3 clay pots. Now make sure its new. even new ones may have iron in them which can kill the fish. no fertilizer. The males will move the pots around. the dominant males are the ones guarding the pots. doesn't mean there are no other males, just that these are the dominant. if you take those out, you will see in a couple hours others guarding the pots. When you see a female holding eggs, take her out and put her in a 10 gallon with fry filters. Cover the tank (they like to jump) and the sides too. if u peak in too much, or turn lights on and off you may scare her and she will swallow eggs. I cover with newspaper. I check to make sure she is carrying eggs after 3 days, and than the 5th day, 6th day etc, till I see fry. once I see fry, I remove her quickly, she will eventually eat the fry if kept in more than a day or two.
The golden and pink tilapia are unfortunately hybrids. mostly male. I am 99% sure. you may want to grow them out and than try either BLUE or Mozambique pure strain next time.

best ratio is 5-6 females, 3 males, two clay pots and the males smaller than the females so they don't stress them too much. The one male without a pot will be fighting with the two with pots over territory, which will relieve the females of being stressed. Plus the more females, the less chance one will get picked on. One male will be left to stress and wander all over the tank. two is great too but put the pots on either side of the tank. PVC piping also is great and the females can hide in there too. you can buy the caps for one end, for the males, leave a few open so they can escape if needed.

some people have told me the basically covered the top of the tank with water hyacinth (edible and tilapia love it) and the fry are able to hide between the plants and they can scoop them out and grow them out.
best way is to separate the males and females. the females will grow faster, because they are not laying eggs and losing protein. when you want fry, put a couple males in the female tank and three days later, you will have dozens holding eggs. Take the females out and put them in ten gallon tanks. IF YOU HAVE PURE LINE TILAPA.

[Lordshandyman]

About 6 months ago I had the same question about what's taking them so long to breed. What are they waiting for? I had gotten 11 blue tilapia about 3" long to start my system. At first, I put 6 in the fish tank and 5 in the sumptank. After they reached about 6", I was hoping for babies... Raised my water heater to 70 - 75, and put several 12" long 4" PVC pipe pieces in the tanks, as well as some 3/4" pieces hot glued together in a pyramid shape. . Nothing. Finally forgot about babies and started chasing other squirrels. Anyway, about a year after putting them in the system, I noticed a swarm of babies in the sumptank. The fishtank is way to deep to see babies if there was any. I got so excited. Had some more squirrels to chase, got back to the babies a couple days later, and they vanished. So I took all but two tilapia out of the sumptank. Not even sure if I had one of each sex. Way to many squirrels to chase with a new business and newborn baby in the house. Fast forward a month, and more babies. Yeah! My day time temps at the start of the first babies were around 95 and night temps around 75 - 80. A few more squirrels later, I check in on the babies. I now had babies of different sizes. Lots of them. Life is good.

I guess the point of this story is... wait, ... not sure if I even have a point.
Sadly, I have lost all but one of those babies in the last 4 weeks and the breeding male died today. I guess this officially makes me a seasoned AP'er now.

Oh yeah, I remember my point now... I did find babies in the fishtank as well. Not very many of them, but a few survived in the IBC tank with nine adults swimming around. They are actually around 6" now. So even in crowded conditions, they will still breed. How many fry will survive is another question for another day.

[foodchain]

Be careful with misinformation.

There's a lot of people who read things, and repeat as fact with no actual first hand experience. Your problem with breeding was due to temperature. It simply wasn't warm enough. Keep the temps up, and they will breed.

Pots/cover is nice, but not required. I keep my breeders in completely empty, bare bottom tanks. ONE pair or reverse trio at a time. No jumping, no aggression beyond typical mating. I use one IBC tote as a grow out to about 2-3 inches long, then out to the pond outside they go. There the growth explodes. $10 will buy you a filter sponge on amazon for up to 120 gallon tank. Completly fry proof.

My breeding tanks are in my garage, with open glass sides all the way around. They are not like discus and angels that spook if they can see out. I am building furniture, etc in my garage and running tables saws, blowers, etc and they are fine. So the noise and comotion doesn't bother them in the least.

I have 2 foot long channel cats that feed on them, witnessed it this fall. They still breed in the pond, so predator presence is not a case for non breeding. Those catfish literally chased the tilapia out of the water.

[Roger L.]

These fish breed in the wild all the time or they would be extinct. Why do we have to go to such great lengths to breed them. Why can you not just put some cover in the tank and let nature take its course? I know animals in captivity are different but I just don't know why.

[Apollo]

foodchain,

What is your take on Hybrid Pink Tilapias...will they breed...will they be normal, at what size or age do they breed and what temp is best?

The guy that sold them to me Sept. 1, 2013 (40 @ 1 inch) said that they breed just like all the other tilapia do. If not will the males breed with another breed...not sure what I need to do in order to raise them as a continuous food source.

I HAVE NOT FAILED. I'VE JUST FOUND 10,000 WAYS THAT WON'T WORK. Thomas A Edison

[foodchain]

I don't think my opinions are mainstream.

I have "pink" tilapia, had for years. I made them from mosambique, and I suppose they still are as I haven't crossed them with anything. I simply kept breeding the orangish pink ones back to each other and culling the grey/black ones out.
The reason is simple. Pink/orange are easier to see than grey and black ones. And in my pond, I want fish I can see. Seeing them makes them easier to catch with a net than seining the whole damn thing over and over and always missing some.

When yours are three inches or so, flip them over and look at the vents, that will tell you gender. HEAT and FOOD is what makes them breed. When they won't breed, go back and check, which one of the TWO issues are you missing?

When nothing else works, change 50% of the water in breeding tanks, every 2-3 days. Simulates rainy season, and kicks them off.

What a lot of people claim to be new strains and hybrids, etc are nothing more then color variations. Very very common in the ornamental trade. And unfortunately true in edibles as well.

Every one wants to claim something unique.....be special in someway.
The purpose of the hormone treated ones, and the true hybridized ones was to produce more yield per fillet. However, I personally don't see it as being worth it in yields. IF you manage your stock, and cull they ones that don't perform you can direct the genetics where you want to.

Line breeding though, is NOT hybrization. Not all "pink" are hybrids. Buyer beware. Hatchery I know of here in TX sells "pinks" specifically for AP. And charge more for them. But they are just colored Mozambique. But grey/black ones are not as pretty...so the market is willing to support the colored ones.

I have some that are almost red...completely. Does that mean they are a hybrid.....by some people yes. Bioligically speaking NO...definetly not.
BUT, they are unique, and as a result IF I wanted to sell them, I could charge more for them. End of the day mine are mosambique, and provided the right conditions will breed with any other mosambique.

[Apollo]

Thanks foodchain,

Your opinions may not be mainstream, but I'm so glad to hear them...one of the best post response that I have ever received. One last bit of information, what's the best temp for breeding?

[foodchain]

Depends on condition of the fish...and what your goal is. All the pics I saw above, the fish are way to small to even think about breeding.

I prefer to breed mine about 82-84 degrees to answer your question. Now, let's look at the context here as I am sure someone is gonna flame me.

I don't breed during the winter...if they do, it's on them, but I don't push it. I use the winter, fall, and early spring to fatten them up, and grow what fingerlings I had left from summer.

The bigger they are, and the better condition the larger and stronger the spawns. 5 fry in a spawning take as much work as a 100. And I am lazy, so I am not about to dick around with 5 fry.

So, to my point. Winter is "off" time for them. Eat, get fat and be happy. Come late spring usually about End of April/Mayish I start looking to move them back outdoors. And I breed the crap out them till end of summer. Then cull heavily and what is suitable for breeding is retained, the rest is freezer, smoker, or table bound. If too small to eat, but clearly a cull, they become catfish and bass food throughout the year.

My Tilipia, and most my aquatics work like a farm. It's about production/yields. Everything must produce, or it goes away. "Put out, or get out" I have not the time, nor the patience or space for free loading.

What works for me, doesn't work for everyone. What I do is what I do....for me.
I have been flamed for walking to my own beat before, and quite frankly don't care. No one has yet to show me a better way of doing it, and so this is what I do. It doesn't mean you have to do it this way, or anyone else.

Now with that said I am always trying to push the limits. This year I am expanding once again. Mostly as I have found a demand amongst friends and coworkers for my jerky. And therefore need more supply from my ponds. So even though this is the end of Dec....I am building again. I am in the process of fighting with 4 more 55 gallon barrels now that don't seem to want to cooperate. Cut in half these will/should yield 8 more GB.

Now. Most people run their system for a combination of greens and meat. Reality is, for me anyway....meat costs more than greens. So the greens are an after thought. They are necessary as they remove the nitrates/nitrites in the cycle. But none the less, an after thought. I treat the grow beds as filters and concentrate on poly culture production.

Example. I grow freshwater Malaysian prawns. These can go for $20/lb. And achieve market size in 4 months. Lettuce doesn't come close per price per lb. In the same water/system I can grow channel catfish, and tilapia. So in the same system, from the "meat category" I have 3 types of product. Hope that helps clarify.