Hi! I planning to breed Pimephales promelas. It is not a common fish in Sweden so I would like to breed them. I found some that my LFS could bring home to me. I figure that they breed just find if I keep them alone and provide some caves and a lot of plants. I wonder if I have to remove the fry’s or if I can leave them in with the parents. I use coconut caves as I have some I didn’t use. I haven’t got the fish jet.

Just so happens I picked up a group of these guys last night, my goal is to breed these guys too and see how they can look if well cared for.

So I can't tell you from personal experience but I can tell you I have been reading up on breeding. From what I have learned the male will claim his cave and defend it from everyone else in the area, after the female enters his area she will drop the eggs and the will defend them until the hatch (4-5 days). After that he leaves the area and the fry are on their own. People are comparing the male to cichlids until the eggs hatch. After the fry hatch the info is kinda mixed some places say the adults will eat some of the fry but you will have some make it and other places say they leave them alone.

One source said how he breeds them and gets great results is setup a 5-10g breeding tank with a few fake plants and small rocks. The main tank of adults would be feed pretty heavy for a few weeks and get the females full of eggs. Once they are conditioned one night pull out 5-6 fat females and 2-3 bright colored males put them in the breeding tank and keep the lights off for 10 hours, then turn the light on and they will start to spawn for 20 mins after that you can put the adults back in the main tank. The eggs get pulled to a small rubbermaid container and treated with anti-fungal meds and a air stone, 4-5 days they hatch and 3-4 days they are free swimming start feeding baby brine. Then just need to raise them up.

When I get to that point I'm going to keep the fry in the main tank I know some fry will get picked off but if I have enough hiding places some should make it. I'm a few weeks out before I will be at that point but I will post how it goes if you are still interested.

I'm always surprised how some places a fish is looked down at and in other places the same fish is sought after. Here you can get these guys for $0.15 each or even catch them from local streams.

Years ago I saw a male fathead guarding eggs in a local pond full of bluegills.  The male fathead at only about 2 inches aggressively fought off numerous 6 to 8 inch bluegills sending them running with unrelenting nips and chases up to a couple feet from his nest (the entire perimeter was a couple layers of softball or larger round rocks).