Breeding plecs to cover costs

[matubula]

Due to some rather large electricity bills I've been informed I need to cut back or start paying towards the bills. So my question is, is it possible to breed plecs to cover annual bills of around £500?

Im a complete noob to any sort of fish breeding. I could probably spare a 300 litre and 70 litre tank.

My initial thoughts from what I 'know' would be to try Hypancistrus zebra. I think that these would fit my needs. So realistically, how many fry could I expect to raise per year from 1 pair? Time to grow to a saleable size? Price I can expect per fry? Difficulty/ease of selling them?

Any thoughts and experience welcome.

 

[VickiandKev]

Due to some rather large electricity bills I've been informed I need to cut back or start paying towards the bills. So my question is, is it possible to breed plecs to cover annual bills of around £500?

Im a complete noob to any sort of fish breeding. I could probably spare a 300 litre and 70 litre tank.

My initial thoughts from what I 'know' would be to try Hypancistrus zebra. I think that these would fit my needs. So realistically, how many fry could I expect to raise per year from 1 pair? Time to grow to a saleable size? Price I can expect per fry? Difficulty/ease of selling them?

Any thoughts and experience welcome.

Hi, Im no expert at breeding myself but have bred a few different bn's and moving onto hypans now. Do you already have a pair of zebs? As a pair of zebs ready to breed will be around 300 pounds. You will also prob need more than a pair as it is said that they need competition to breed. Also zebs require very specialist care and can be quite sensitive (thats no insult to your abilities). Once breeding they will breed around 4 times a year and have around 8-10 in a typical clutch. They will take around 9-12 months to get to 1.5". You can expect around 70-90 pounds per fry (depending on demand). The fry will be fairly easy to sell again depending on demand.

This will be very slow starting and you will need to foot the bills for the first year at least before your zebs will.

Can I suggest that you breed (to start with at least) bristlenose, longfin and common as the common can go to your LFS for store credit (to help fund the hobby) and the longfins can be sold quite easily to the public. They have around 80 to a clutch every 3months and are very easy to breed. The fry can be sold for around 4.50 for 2" longfin and prob £1.50 store credit for the commons. You could then move onto calico which are slightly harder to breed or albino longfin which the fry would fetch slightly more.

If you need any more help let me know

ps. I'm not an expert lol

 

[matubula]

Thanks VickiandKev, thats just what I'm looking for.

I did think that starting with 'easier' species would be better in order to gain experience but what (I think) hinders me, with say Ancistrus, is the batch sizes. I thought that they would be too large for me to handle. Also with a fish like Hypancistrus zebra, if for some reason it didn't work out I wouldn't lose much, as selling adults should be easy enough.

 

[RobHarrison]

I belive Zebs are one of the hardest to spawn!
What about L340s? Pier have some in and there adults, or L270s L199s if you can get hold of some nice ancistrus you would do well with those L183s L309s etc Also VickiandKev have some Peckoltia you could try

 

[VickiandKev]

its true we do have some peckoltia for sale, tocatins tigers are stunning fish or the candy stripe pleco?! Have a look at our add. All are wild caught so F1 babies would sell for more. Also you would only need a 2ft tank for the fry (well filtered and 3day water changes) We also have some plywood tanks that really increase the breeding success Also with ancistrus you could buy sub adults very cheap and only have to wait 3 or somonths before first fry, also fry take only a few months to reach a sellable size.

Starlights are actually quite hard to breed, not impossible but one of the harder ancistrus.

 

[scatz]

in short matt, yes, it is possible to breed enough to cover the running costs.
but i wouldn't be looking at zebs in particular (unless you can get a cheap enough colony).
i'm going to be trying exactly what you are thinking of, i want to make enough purely to cover the leccy bill and cost of running the tanks.
My geo's already do me fairly proudly, i limit them on spawns to 2 a year, but i will make about £1k from each spawn, and these basically fund most of my fish spending.
the set up i am looking to run now will house lots of smaller plecs than i have been keeping recently with sp. that i am more confident about selling easily, including to shops, so things like BN's, L066, L183, L270 etc, plus a few cory sp. and apisto's.
i'm hoping that they will be able to make up the rest to be able to clear the bills, but will have to see i guess

 

[Irene0100]

I breed L270 and they have approx 40-50 young a year, this helps towards costs.
I also breed and sell marbled BNs and just started on Long-fin bns. these will help cover elec costs between them all and maybe some of the fish food anyway.
I have started breeding zebs but will be a long time before I cover the costs. I bought some at 6 months old, and it took over 3 years before they started to breed. I lost a few of them on the way.
At the moment , the one breeding male (I have nine adults now in two tanks) he is on his fourth lot of eggs and I only have 4 or 5 young surviving they are now growing up and will not be able to sell until they are 6 months old. so risky financially. I do it cos I love them!

 

[dw1305]

Hi all,
I think you will struggle with Plecs, they are not a majority interest, they mature very slowly and aren't very productive.

Like Scatz I sell my "spare" Apistogrammas to cover costs, it isn't very lucrative, but they are much quicker to mature than most L numbers, and you get fry mature in the tank without having to expend too much time on them. The only downside for me is that locally only the red ones sell very well., so it limits you to A. agassizii, A. hongsloi, A. macmasteri and A. cacatuoides.

I've had some stunning blue Apistogrammas, but eventually I gave up on A. trifasciata as it just didn't sell. I think the reason for this is a washed out red fish is still attractive, but a drab faded silver one isn't. Once you factor in that A. trifasciata is a smaller fish than the others mentioned you begin to see why they don't sell.

Cory's would be another possibility, again ones that are a little bit different, but not so unusual that they have a big price tag that puts the average punter off. I'd go for something with a strong pattern.

If I was trying to make money I'd probably go for Discus, Angels or Rams, but then it would mean spending a lot more time on it.

I should have said a bit more about "not very lucrative", what I mean by this is that I'll get a credit note for about £3 or £4 for a sexed sub-adult pair/trio of well coloured Apistogramma cacatuoides. It doesn't seem a lot, but wholesale prices of fish are much lower than you might imagine.

cheers Darrel

 

[VickiandKev]

in short matt, yes, it is possible to breed enough to cover the running costs.
but i wouldn't be looking at zebs in particular (unless you can get a cheap enough colony).
i'm going to be trying exactly what you are thinking of, i want to make enough purely to cover the leccy bill and cost of running the tanks.
My geo's already do me fairly proudly, i limit them on spawns to 2 a year, but i will make about £1k from each spawn, and these basically fund most of my fish spending.
the set up i am looking to run now will house lots of smaller plecs than i have been keeping recently with sp. that i am more confident about selling easily, including to shops, so things like BN's, L066, L183, L270 etc, plus a few cory sp. and apisto's.
i'm hoping that they will be able to make up the rest to be able to clear the bills, but will have to see i guess

WOW! What geos do you have???

 

[thegeeman]

Breeding fish is never a sure fire hit, Ask the majority of people on here what pain they go through. I have bred tons of stuff and cover my costs and pay for a family holiday BUT I have spent thousands on getting things right. You will be far better off just helping to pay towards the leccy bill IMO, Maybe take up a paper round or a spot of pole dancing IF you do have results in breeding plecs then most LFS will only offer credit which is no good to you.

That said Matty if you have any 65,s you might want to swop for a breeding pair of something then pm me

Cheers

thegeeman

 

[FF MkII]

I used to have a regular income of about £50 a month from selling BN's. if you can find a lfs to take them you are laughing as most wholesalers dont have common BN's and they are a popular fish. I sold mine for £1 a fish......a mature pair would have around 100-150 fry per spawn, possibly every month but you could restrict how many times they spawn just by separating them. I think BN's are the quickest and easiest way of getting some dosh, providing you have an lfs that will take them!

 

[Bigjohnnofish]

i have about 50 tanks... and make anywhere between 30-50k a year from fish sales.... more than enough to pay the bills and have some spending money to buy new stock....

bread and butter fish are important as they turnover on a regular basis...
and some exotic stuff is great for the occasional cash boost....

 

[Phenomena]

i have about 50 tanks... and make anywhere between 30-50k a year from fish sales.... more than enough to pay the bills and have some spending money to buy new stock....

bread and butter fish are important as they turnover on a regular basis...
and some exotic stuff is great for the occasional cash boost....

50!:thumbup: Is this on top of your full time job?
What fish do you breed? Thanks.

 

[Brengun]

50!:thumbup: Is this on top of your full time job?
What fish do you breed? Thanks.

Read his profile. Occupation: fish breeder,keeper,seller
I don't think he has the time nor the inclination to have a wages job.
Rather like me actually but I only have 28 tanks and not breeding many fish yet.