How long to give Male ?

[Alight]

I have a pair Discus that paired off on their own at 8 months of age, and started to spawn on a regular basis. They have spawned 6 times so far.

So far, none of the eggs have hatched (water parameters are 2 dGH, pH 6.4, and I have tried both my tap water mix with RO and reconstituting with RO right.

They are now 9.5 months old.

How long should I keep trying with this pair before I give up and conclude the male is permanently sterile? and replace the male.

[troyclark]

Alight,

From what I understand, males don't usually become fertile until they are 12 - 18 months and sometimes longer. I would leave them be for awhile and see what happens. I had a pair of red turks (2 years old) that I had all but given up on. They laid eggs frequently but no wigglers. Just as I was going to seperate them after 6 months together, they spawned and are now taking care of their babies. I takes a while for them to get it right. JMO

Troy

[RyanH]

I have a pair that spawned 30+ times before they finally got wigglers. And another 10-15 times before they would take care of them. They were nearly a year and a half old by the time they got things figured out.

[Alight]

Thanks, much Troyclark and Ryan. Gives me some hope. The last time I had Discus (10 years ago) I had some Turqs that had wrigglers the first time they spawned. I don't know how old they were, though, since they were clearly stunted when I got them, and never got that big. I eventually had three spawning pair that had wrigglers everytime, and 1 pair that raised young.

The current pair are nice in size, and still getting bigger by the day, it seems.

I have 6 more BD, Red Melons, and Royal Pigeons that have not paired up yet, though there has been some head shaking from time to time. They are not quite as large as the pair, yet, but are as large as the pair when they first paired up. So, I believe I'll get at least one more pair out of these somewhere down the line. From what I understand, the BD don't pair up until they are quite a bit older.

[Alight]

Thanks for the encouragement. This last spawning, 5 eggs actually hatched.
Looks like the male is coming on a bit. Looking forward to some more wrigglers!

[Carol_Roberts]

Congratulations - they will have a bigger batch next time :)