Rainbowfish Breeding at DSS Aquatics
Rainbowfish are an active part of the DSS Aquatics egg-layer breeding program, with juveniles currently being raised in the fish room.
Active Juveniles
- Millennium Rainbowfish — active juveniles; brood count and age details are being documented.
- Kamaka Rainbowfish — active juveniles; brood count and age details are being documented.
Breeding Records
As these groups develop, we will document parent groups, spawning method, approximate hatch dates, juvenile counts, growth, feeding, and maturation. Exact details will be added as they are confirmed.
Future Breeding Journals
Major rainbowfish projects can develop into individual breeding journals and species profiles with photographs and video from the DSS Aquatics fish room.
Back to the Breeding Program
Our Breeding Project
We breed Australian and New Guinean rainbowfish at DSS Aquatics, with Millennium Rainbowfish (Melanotaenia herbertaxelrodi) and Kamaka Rainbowfish (Melanotaenia kamaka) currently active in the fish room. We focus on rainbowfish because they reward good husbandry so visibly: juveniles color up dramatically as they mature, males spar and display daily, and a well-conditioned group spawns almost continuously. That makes them ideal both for hobbyists learning egg-layer breeding and for the detailed breeding journals we publish. Our project is notable for its documentation standards — rather than raising anonymous batches of fry, we track broods from egg collection through juvenile development, recording hatch dates, counts, growth, and feeding, so each group builds a repeatable record other breeders can learn from.
Breeding Methodology
Our rainbowfish breed in 20- to 30-gallon species tanks with tight-fitting lids — these fish are enthusiastic jumpers. Each tank has a mature sponge filter, a few hardy plants for cover, and several acrylic yarn spawning mops suspended near the surface, which mimic the fine vegetation rainbowfish prefer. We keep water at pH 7.0–8.0, moderately hard, and 74–78°F, with weekly water changes of 25–30 percent; a fresh water change often triggers a burst of spawning activity the following morning.
Rainbowfish are continuous spawners, laying a few adhesive eggs daily among the mops rather than in one big event. We pull the mops every one to two days and pick the tiny, clear eggs off with our fingertips, moving them to hatching containers of clean tank water. Eggs hatch in 7–10 days. The fry are small but hardy: first foods are infusoria and powdered fry food, transitioning to newly hatched baby brine shrimp within the first week. We move fry to larger grow-out tanks as they size up, sorting by growth rate so slower individuals get a fair share of food. Males begin showing adult coloration at around two to three months, and we select the best-colored, best-formed fish as future breeders while documenting the development of each brood.
Current Status
We currently have active juveniles of Millennium Rainbowfish and Kamaka Rainbowfish growing out in the fish room. Brood counts and age details for these groups are being documented now, and parent groups, spawning method, approximate hatch dates, juvenile counts, growth, feeding, and maturation will be recorded as each group develops. Major rainbowfish projects will grow into individual breeding journals and species profiles with photographs and video from our fish room.
