Labidochromis caeruleus
Electric Yellow
By: Joe Huisman
The electric yellow Labidochromis caeruleus is a peaceful Lake Malawi cichlid. This species is found throughout most of the northern half of the lake. It likes deeper rocky regions of the lake. This fish is a mouthbrooder and will eat most flake foods. I feed my fish O.S.I. Vivid Color as a staple flake. I also use Bio-Blend cichlid small. The fish I have I bought at an ACA Convention in Cleveland Ohio. At the action that was held on Sunday. This auction was the largest auction I have ever seen. The auction started at 9:00 AM on Sunday and finished at 2:00 AM on Monday. It was unbelievable to say the least. From 9:00 PM till the end fish were sold cheap at this time a bought my fish. I bought 2 bags in each bag there was 10 fish. I paid $10.00 for each bag. The fish came from a breeder out of the state of New York. I think I got a good deal.
When I got home I placed them in a 55-gallon tank. The fish are still in this tank but I had to sell sum of them because there was too many in there. I now have 12 fish in that tank. 9 males and 3 females. Yes there are too many males so I will have to get rid of some of the males. The fish did spawn in this tank even with that many males. The fish were about 20 months old when I got my first spawn. The dominant male was about 2 ½” long and the female was about 2”. These fish were feed flake food (O.S.I.
Vivid Color). When the fish spawned the male picked a spot over a flat rock. There he would sit and shake his body trying to attract a female. When a female finally showed interest in what he was doing the male started to chase the female till the female was over the rock. At that time he started to go in a circle over the rock. He then placed his pelvic fin on the rock to show the female were to place the egg. Once the female did this male followed the female right behind her tail. So both fish were tail to tail. When the female came back to were the egg was placed. She then picked up the egg in her mouth where she would brood the eggs. They did this for a couple of hours before they were done. When I saw that she was caring eggs I marked it down so I would when to remove the Fri from her. I waited 10 days and then striped the Fri by using a Q-tip swab to open her mouth and dunked her in a bucket while her mouth was open. At this time the Fri came out. There was 9 Fri in the first spawn. At the time I striped the Fri. They still had an egg sack.
So I placed the Fri in a small container with an airstone and let them in there for about 15 days. Once I saw the egg sack was gone I started to feed the Fri crushed flack food. They ate this right a way. All 9 Fri made it to 60 days after eating or free swimming.