African Butterfly Fish Breeding Guide

How to breed the African butterfly fish (Pantodon buchholzi): sexing by anal fin, soft acidic surface spawning, floating eggs and the difficult fry.

Overview

Pantodon buchholzi is a surface-dwelling predator that spawns at the water surface among floating plants. Home breeding is documented as not easy but possible, with the main difficulty lying in raising the fry.

Sexing

Sex is read from the anal fin: it is straight in females and convex in males.

Conditioning

Condition breeders on a high-quality diet of live and frozen foods. A large surface area is important; a tank around 48 by 15 inches with plenty of floating cover such as Indian fern suits the species.

Breeding Setup

Provide soft, acidic water with a pH of about 6.0 to 6.5 and a temperature of roughly 25 to 27 degrees Celsius, with abundant floating plants. Spawning can be triggered by lowering the water level to only a couple of inches for a couple of weeks, then topping up with fresh water.

Spawning Behavior & Trigger

Spawning takes place among the floating plants, the male clasping the female between his fins. Pairs spawn over several days, often depositing over a hundred eggs daily. The eggs are clear and transparent when laid but darken completely within a few hours, and they float at the surface.

Egg & Fry Care

The floating eggs hatch in three to four days. The parents give no care and may eat the eggs, so they should be collected. Raising the fry is very difficult: they take newly hatched brine shrimp at first and are very sensitive to changing water quality, requiring frequent small water changes.

Common Challenges

Fry sensitivity to water quality is the chief obstacle. Removing eggs from the adults and maintaining stable, clean water through the earliest days are essential for any survival.