How to breed your goldfish?
Breeding goldfish is not difficult but needs patience and also some money is always needed.
Buying / caring for goldfish
To get started, you need to buy about 6 or even more young goldfishes to be sure of having at least 1 female and at least 2 males.Afterwards you will need to grow the goldfishes till the age of 2 years old (1 years old goldfish do spawn but the amount of egg produce and the fertility rate will be very low). To know more on growing and rearing for goldfish, please contact another site for information on how to care for or rear goldfishes.
Stimulating goldfishes to breed
You will need to breed your goldfishes in the spring time or summer time. Lets say you planned to breed your goldfish in summer, you will need to subtract 6 week from the breeding date to start stimulating your goldfish to breed. First of all the temperature of the water should be somewhere around 18 - 24 degrees Celsius and you must start feeding your fish with high protein food such Brine Shrimp, Daphnia, Bloodworm (can be either live or frozen), high protein pellet food, etc...
Bloodworms
Brine Shrimps
Daphnia
One week before breeding you'll now need to separate the male goldfish from the female ones. Male goldfish will develop white pimples (breeding tubercles) on the gill plates till onto the pectoral fins, males also have slightly thicker pectoral fins than females whereas female goldfish will become rounder and and will have larger vent just before the anal fin, swollen with eggs. Moreover females have softer vent near the anal area, try applying little pressure on the female's anal area be it should be soft. Continue to feed goldfishes on high protein food. Regular water changes should be done to aware the goldfishes that it is breeding season. Replace between 20 - 25% of the water every day, try not to stress the goldfish by changing the water more than 25% or also by shaking / agitating the water too much.(*Water replaced should be chlorine free/ De-chlorinated/sterilized)
Preparing breeding tank
The breeding tank should be at least a 90cm x 40cm x 25cm (length x width x height) or bigger tank. Inside the tank there should be a spawning medium, it may be artificial or natural plants, spawning mop or breeding brush.(To learn how to make homemade spawning mop click here.) There should be around 3 - 5 spawning mop, depending on the size of the tank and the amount of females to be bred at the same time. The water level not exceed 6 inches(15cm) as too much of pressure on the eggs can damage them. If the room water temperature(in summer) in your country is below 20 degrees Celsius then a heater is needed in your aquarium. A very gentle filtration and aeration is required for newborn fry. The aquarium should be cleaned and filled with sterilized water several days before the fish are transfered in it.
Choosing goldfishes
To get healthy and larger amount of fry you will need to chose males and females which are the most healthy and under perfect breeding condition. Males must have good chasing ability, and this is indicated by the presence of lots breeding tubercles (the more is the breeding tubercles the better it is). Females in the other hand must be heavier, rounder in shape and protruded on the left of her body, this indicates that the female is swollen/full with egg. Bear in mind that there should be more males than females for better fertility, about 2 males for every female.
Spawning/breeding process
First of all make sure that the water temperature of the breeding tank and the other tanks water are the same. Late in the evening introduce firstly your female/s, after some 30 minutes when the female/s seems to be at ease in her new environment, introduce the males.
