Separate Your Breeders.  Some rainbowfish keepers run their adult breeders together all the time -- just as some killifish keepers do.  Their spawners crank out small numbers of eggs on plants or spawning mops on a daily basis.  If you separate your sexes before breeding them, you will prime the pump for a larger egg yield.  Their interest in breeding goes up a couple notches.  

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Pair Irian (reds) rainbowfish not in breeding colors.  Males (bottom) get very red (and big).

Conditioning Menu.  Not picky eaters, your rainbow fish will eat whatever you give them.  Give them their basic diet plus dessert -- a live or frozen food treat to encourage their little hormones to hum.  More important than the specific food, is its frequency.  You function better on three (or five) meals a day.  So do the tiny bellies and digestive systems of your rainbowfish.

Cleanup Crew.  Add corys or mystery snails to clean up any excess food that hits the bottom.  Provide good filtration.  And use your gravel vacuum cleaner.  Clean quarters play a big part in pumping them up.  By the way, you needn’t separate your breeders from all other fishes -- just from other rainbowfish.

Water Conditions.  Rainbowfish can adjust to nearly all water conditions.  We’re not spawning cardinal tetras here.

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We caught this young Irian rainbowfish in a spawning mood.

Lighting.  Few critters want to spawn in the spotlight with the exception of some humans (and they get paid for it).  Reduce the light on your rainbowfish breeders.  Wrap some newspaper around part of your fluorescent tube.  Or float some watersprite, anacharis or duckweed on the surface.  Or add some black water additive.  Or D, all of the above.

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Older Irian males.

Spawning Media.  Plant-spawning fishes such as rainbowfish spawn on ... um, ... let’s see ... oh yeah, plants.  Feeling just a bit techy?  Build a spawning mop.  Feeling more of a free-range type personality?  Toss in a bunch or two of hornwort.  Rinse it well to get rid of those darn loose leaves hornwort 
continually sheds like a 12-year-old Persian cat.

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Choosing Breeders.  Perhaps we should have mentioned this first.  You need
at least one male and one female.  The more rainbowfish the merrier.  You may think that great big show specimens will produce the best results.  Unfortunately lots of large specimens have retired from the ring.  And the ones you buy from 
the store are usually still in the training wheel stage.  For optimum output you 
want breeders in the mid-60% of their bell-shaped breeding curve.  But, if you can tell the sexes apart at all, give ’em a shot.  They’ll enjoy the practice, too.

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You'll have less success with overly large "burned out" breeders. 
     

  LA
The darn Irians never did spawn for me.  Back to the drawing and quartering board.

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Irian rainbowfish really catch your eye.

Summary:  Rainbowfish make good additions to nearly any tank.  They seldom bother smaller fish.  Their speed makes them good mixers with rougher fish – even some of the cichlids.  LA.

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