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Hi,
I have recently set up a 3 tank system with 3 zebra colonies, all three are running off one central sump filter. I have had my first spawn with this system and have about 5 wrigglers just hatched in one of the tanks.
My question is, now one of the colonies has bred, will there be any release of hormones into the water and will the other plecos in the other tanks recognise this and not breed because they can 'smell' a dominant male? I am considering making the three tanks seperate but as its running nicely, I dont want to alter it if its not going t make any difference.
Any comments on this would be most welcome.
Thanks
Ben

Hi bengranger80
Congrats on the spawn.

I always thought that hormones from other fish help to promote fish to breed,females especially.

IMO. I would be more worried about the fact you are using a filter sump to filter all 3 tanks and the threat of a disease ,infection in one of the tanks will almost certainly transfer to the other tanks,and medicating could be a problem especially with fry in any of the tanks.

The risk of a wipe out to me is unthinkable.

I would leave them as they are but change the filter and tank arrangement for sure so they are all separate from each other.
And only then if you know that there is no problems in the tanks and feel absolutely safe to do so you could use the water and the hormones from the tank they are breeding in an introduce to the other tanks if needs be all tho this runs a big risk but better than what you are doing now.

Hope it helps
Jerry

My breeding block is run as 8 separate tanks on a central system each tank has different hypan groups all breeding but at different times of the month it certainly does'nt put them off water changes are super easy empty each tank fill at the sump always run a secondary filter in each tank like a good sized sponge filter so each tank can be isolated if needs be.