Breeding Lionfish.

tyler1503 · Jan 26, 2014

No, I'm not here to claim I've done it

But I am wondering why no one has been able to?
We all know about how the volitans are invading waters and breeding all over the world. It makes me think if they can spread, survive, breed and grow from fry in all these different bodies of water, with varying parameters, why can't we do it at home?
We've all seen those HUGE tanks that have several large lions in them, chances are there's a male and a female in at least one of them. They're obviously not too picky about water conditions being exact if they can breed in different environments all over the world in the wild. And we've all heard of people breeding clowns, seahorses, pipefishe, angels, butterflies and whatever else, so it's obvious we come so far in raising different species from fry. So what is it that makes lions so difficult?
So if getting a male and female together isn't a big issue, water conditions aren't a big issue, raising fry (of many many species) can be done, what is it that's holding us back from breeding these awesome little fellas?

jl283467 · Jan 26, 2014

Bring on the designer lions. I have 3 adults in my tank i have never heard of theme breeding

miamiangler · Jan 26, 2014

In Miami there`s no need to breed them . I just do a quick snorkel trip in my boat and catch a few

.

tyler1503 · Jan 27, 2014

Designer lions would be awesome! I'm not big on the whole designer corals or clowns or whatever, but lions would too good! Wait, to think about it, it would be terrible. My wallet would suffer way too much! I'd want a pure white one.
I wish I could just go out and catch them. Around this time if year there are some about, but mainly larger specimens that came down south in the warm currents. No babies for me! Plus the waters down here are too open to actually have a good chance if netting them, you'd need a line and hook or speargun to get one.

miamiangler · Jan 27, 2014

tyler1503 said:
Designer lions would be awesome! I'm not big on the whole designer corals or clowns or whatever, but lions would too good! Wait, to think about it, it would be terrible. My wallet would suffer way too much! I'd want a pure white one.
I wish I could just go out and catch them. Around this time if year there are some about, but mainly larger specimens that came down south in the warm currents. No babies for me! Plus the waters down here are too open to actually have a good chance if netting them, you'd need a line and hook or speargun to get one.

I usually find to small ones in the bay 5ft of water . May is a good month down my way . smallest I caught so far is 1.5 inches .

tyler1503 · Jan 27, 2014

That's a perfect size! Small enough to watch him grow, but big enough to not worry about if he needs foods we can't provide readily. Too bad I'm a bit further south than you

So no one here in R2R has a theory as to why we can't breed them?

tyler1503 · Jul 15, 2014

Bump from way back

miamiangler · Jul 16, 2014

NO , going out to catch a few for dinner ! Good tasting fish !

tyler1503 · Jul 17, 2014

That's not really an option for me lol.
I heard they're amazing to eat though

I find it hard to believe not a single person out there has an opinion on this!

miamiangler · Jul 18, 2014

#1 well it would be hard to do because of the way they mate . the eggs are in a jelly like mass when the female lays the eggs .Then the male swims up to the mass and does his thing . in a small aquarium the eggs would have been all taken into the filters by then . from what I have seen the mating pair need lots of room for their mating dance.

tyler1503 · Jul 20, 2014

But if we had tanks specifically designed to accommodate them, I don't believe it should be too difficult. I don't know much about the biology side of it though.
In my mind it would be low flow, very open space, minimal rock etc. There's plenty of tanks that are 10x3x2 and similar sizes. That's gota be big enough!

tigerdragon · Jul 20, 2014

Why breed these? Fla is overrun with them they are killing off the reef fishes, and they can live in almost fresh water soon they will adapt and move into freshwater areas.

fishroomlady · Jul 20, 2014

that is very interesting that they are tasty. what do they taste like in terms of fish? I mean like a similar tasting fish....

tyler1503 · Jul 20, 2014

tigerdragon said:
Why breed these? Fla is overrun with them they are killing off the reef fishes, and they can live in almost fresh water soon they will adapt and move into freshwater areas.

Because they're expensive fish that not everyone has easy access to. For instance, I could buy a $60 two inch wild caught baby, or I could go to a mates house and get a cheap or trade for a tank bred one. And with selective breeding we could entirely wipe out the instinct to eat smaller fish and they could potentially turn into the perfect community fish. And to say I have a captive bred Lionfish is way more awesome than having a wild caught one.
Plus it's more about breeding them for the sake of breeding them. We could progress a lot further along in terms of breeding other fish by learning from the Lionfish. We could learn how to breed fish who's wild numbers are dropping. Who says we can't use Lionfish in order to save the species ironically being killed off by Lionfish? Just because there's too many in the wild it doesn't mean we have to give up on the idea of captive bred ones. Especially when it has the possibility to open up doors to save other more threatened species.
Maybe it's a legal thing over there in the states, but if Lionfish are as much of a menace as people make them out to be, maybe they should be commercially fished. That's nearly wiped out entire populations plenty of times before. It worked then and it could work now.

mfinn · Jul 20, 2014

tyler1503 said:
And with selective breeding we could entirely wipe out the instinct to eat smaller fish and they could potentially turn into the perfect community fish. .

Do you have any examples of how this has been done before?

tyler1503 · Jul 21, 2014

mfinn said:
Do you have any examples of how this has been done before?

Not with fish, but we do it with dogs and cats on a regular basis. My theory is (keep in mind I have almost no knowledge of biology or genetics so I may be completely wrong) if mummy Lionfish and daddy Lionfish rely on hunting small fish to feed, so will baby Lionfish because it's all it's been programmed to do. Every now and then we get lions in the hobby that have no interest in smaller fish, if we get a male and female who share this quality to breed, surely the babies (or atleast some of them) will share that quality. It's like when 2 blonde people have a child, the child will most likely be blonde.
Clownfish are a related example, (although that's a visual thing not a temperament thing, but to my knowledge the science is pretty much the same). We breed all these fancy patterns into these fish because of traits the parents have, so surely the temperament of the parents will be passed on too.
Like I said, I may be wrong, but it's my theory and for the time being it makes sense to me lol

tyler1503 · Jul 21, 2014

fishroomlady said:
that is very interesting that they are tasty. what do they taste like in terms of fish? I mean like a similar tasting fish....

I haven't eaten them before, but being a relative of the Lionfish I imagine they would taste like white cod

tyler1503 · Jul 21, 2014

Oh, and ORA. Their captive bred mandarins are far more likely to eat frozen foods supposedly. I can only assume that's a genetic trait that was passed on from the parents