Thoughts on breeding fish for sale?

[TheSwissAquarist]

Hello Nerms! I’m going to be a vendor at an aquarium event in march, organized by the Lausanne Aquarium Club, and I really want to turn up with some good stock to sell. I have about 10-15 guppies and most of your standard Tetras (neons, X-ray, etc).

What other species could you recommend? Please say how to breed them.

 I’m only in high school but I want to give it my all and turn up with decent fish and plants to sell.

Thanks!!!

[Guppysnail]

What size tanks do you have available to breed and raise young in. The world is your oyster on this limited only by space, availability  and initial investment.  You will want to select things not common to your area but not rare. There is limited market for rare expensive fish.  Moderate priced fish that are not common sell very well for me. I try to stick to those for breeding. What are your parameters or are you willing to “make water”. I have a mile long list of future “want to breed” fish that are not complex.

[AllFishNoBrakes]

I would say you have 2 options. 
 

1. Breed the fish that you know sell well in your market 

2. Breed fish you enjoy breeding and hope they sell 

I guess you’d also have a third option of a mixture of the two! 

[TheSwissAquarist]

I have already done a sort of spreadsheet, by noting which species sell best and are always in stock in my LFS and online.

Guppies seem like the best thing, but I’m after something with a bit more… pazazz

[AllFishNoBrakes]

For my personally, I keep the fish I like in planted community tanks. When they breed I enjoy trying to hatch the eggs and raise the fry. When they’re at the right size I hit up my LFS’s and see who wants em. I’ve had great success with this system. The only thing I’ve been stuck with is like 30 Kribs as I kept the whole first couple spawns and flooded the market… Other than that I’ve been lucky, and I only raise 15-20 of each fish. Way easier to move that small number than, say, 200 angels, and it pays for what I need moving forward (fish, food, hard scape) 

[tolstoy21]

On 9/28/2022 at 12:44 PM, TheSwissAquarist said:

noting which species sell best and are always in stock in my LFS and online.

 

My approach has been to try to breed fish that seem like they should be more common in stores, but that I can't ever seem to find anywhere, in any LFS near me.

Like if all the FishTubers are talking about something that seems cool, like multis, for instance (everyone was doing YouTube species profiles on multis a few years ago).  If they have convinced me that I gotta try them, and then I drive all over looking for them and find nothing but the same typical fish in every LFS . . . that to me is a good fish to breed for sale.

This might not be the best approach if you're trying to sell to stores. But it works if you're selling outside of a store, like at a club auction or swap, or online.

Edited September 28, 2022 by tolstoy21

[TheSwissAquarist]

Shell dwellers do seem like a fun choice, @tolstoy21, seeing as they occupy the bottom half of the tank, maybe I could try breeding clown killis on the top.

[tolstoy21]

Multis are Lake Tanganyikan cichlids, so they require pretty hard water and a Ph at or above 8 to breed. I don't know much about killifish, but they'd have to do well in that kind of environment to be able to house and breed both in the same setup.  

[TOtrees]

What about furcata rainbows? When properly conditioned, they are prolific egg layers. Egg survival to hatching isn't the greatest, but once they hatch they are fairly robust. New-hatched babies are too small for live bbs (seriouslyfish disagrees here, maybe my bbs are large) but powder foods work and a few plant clippings will provide some infusoria (or do vinegar eels or infusoria cultures). 

I spawned them using DIY floating artificial spawning mops (green yard, cork or foam at the top, tons of youtube vids on how) and collect eggs daily by hand. Remove eggs to a hatch jar with methylene blue. You'll want to collect eggs for at least 1-2 weeks from at least 2-4 females to get decent batch, but the low end of those numbers will work if you're only looking to raise say a couple dozen. They take 3 weeks to hatch. They grow fast once they're on bbs. 

I think the timeline you're looking is a tight. It's almost October, and you're looking to have product in March. Anything you buy now will need a few weeks to get settled, and more for optimal conditioning. So you wouldn't see eggs till say November and babies till almost December. Maybe I'm being pessimistic and adding a few weeks, but maybe not. That only gives 4 months to grow to a size that will sell. Furcatas can do it in that time, I think. And maybe the clown killis. Small guppy types also (I'm thinking of my tuxedo kois). Angelfish are pretty fast growers too for that matter; while most of our nano fish will only sell when the fish are 1/2-3/4 their adult size or larger, angels will sell at only 1" body size. 

A few bright neocaridina strains might also work. 

Shellies are absolutely a fun choice, but I don't think the timeline will work. The best you could do would be "starter kits", you could put say 8 small fish (all unknown sex at that size) per bag and include a dozen escargot shells in a separate bag as part of each lot/batch. It might improve interest, but I've found that africans (including shellies) go for relatively low prices at auction-style events (you didn't say in your post if this is auction sales, or if you get to display your items at your table at your price). It might be good for your brand, but you will return a lot less on shellies at an event than you would by selling them privately or to stores. 

What are your fish shipping options like there? You might have good success for your brand/business if you invest in really good large attention-grabbing photos of the fish you sell, and just give out your phone or email to possible buyers. On the plus side, large-format (like 2-3ft in size) color photos hanging above or at the rear of your booth/table will be a lot more visible and show off your products better than how things appear in bags on a table. 

[gardenman]

Timing might be a challenge for you. Wanting sellable fry for March when it's almost October makes things a bit trickier. Most fish you'll buy are young and may need a while before they're ready to spawn, then you'll need to raise the fry to a sellable size. You've got about a five-to-six-month window in which to achieve your goal and that's not very long. You'll need to find breeding sized fish (not that easy) and then get them in condition, have fry, and raise the fry to a sellable size in a pretty narrow window. You can pretty much rule out most of the more exotic, or even common plecos. If you can find adult cory cats, they'd be an option. Most livebearers would be an option. It's a pretty narrow window though between now and March.

[Patrick_G]

With that timeframe I’d try flashy livebearers for sure. Who could resist something like this? 😁

 

 😁

Edited September 29, 2022 by Patrick_G

[Guppysnail]

I know you said no liverbearers but since others are making those recommendations I will. 
 

Least killifish are fabulous and fast. They mature quick and reproduce with little to no effort on your part yet are small and have a moderate reproductive rate so won’t overwhelm a tank. I now have about 40-50 I. A 10g. I started with 20 around 3 months ago. It stays stable and low nitrate even with those numbers. They are not super common so you can still make a profit because care is so easy. 

[TheSwissAquarist]

First of all: thanks everyone!

I thought I'd try:

Breeding White clouds and Hillstream loaches in a 20 gal

Rearing fry and breeding shrimp and snails in a 15 gal

Clown Killis, ricefish, and least killifish/endlers in a 20 gal.

Taking Cherry Barbs, Marbled Corys, neon tetras, and fancy guppies shall be kept in my 63 gallon and brought out to breed in a 5 gal aquarium.

Any thoughts?

 

[TheSwissAquarist]

Thought I might also do a couple of prints like these for sale:

It's a sort of tanks on tables and everybody walks around and buys stuff event.

 

[Ken Burke]

I’m with @tolstoy21 here.  If they can buy the fish at the lfs anytime, you’ll have lots of lookers.  But not so many buyers.  Rare fish are too expensive, and are a niche market.  But uncommon fish with big curb appeal are the sweet spot.  
 

I think the pictures are another good idea.  You’re not selling fish as much as a story.  People like having a story about how they came by their new prizes, and the pictures really add to that.

 

good luck!