Interesting Article On Temperature...

Er.... here's an interesting article on temperature...

http://www.seriouslyfish.com/whaddaya-mean-too-hot/

Hmm, it is interesting.

When I first started reading about tropical freshwater fish, I looked at the asian biotopes. It suggested that it was the colder temperatures that triggered breeding in a lot of cases. This is because a large increase in cooler water mimicked the change from the dry to the wet seasons. In the dry season, the rivers dry out and therefore the water level drops and the water temperature rises. When the rains come, the water levels quickly increase with lower temperature water. This also co-incides with a significant increase in insect life and therefore tends to be when the breeding season for most fish occurs.

I have tried to test this theory in my tank, though not rigorously. Every so often, I do a larger than normal water change. I try to get the new water that goes into the tank a few degrees cooler than the tank water, so the resulting temperature is a couple degrees cooler than it was before the water change. I then feed the fish on frozen, meaty foods for a couple days. I think I read about this technique for encouraging gouramis to spawn, but I no longer have gouramis and the corys seem to cover the tank in eggs over the following week.

I have scuba dived quite a lot on both the Carribean and Pacific reef systems. And the water temperature there is a pretty consistent 27-29 degrees. Obviously this is only relevant if you have a marine tank - which I don't actually know anything about!