Breeding Kribs

Babies of Kribs:


Male Krib Guarding The Fry:


Female Krib Guarding The Fry:


I found my newly bought Kribs digging a cave underneath a rock one day. The next thing I spotted was dozens of eggs sticking on the rock. In a few days, I found something moving inside the cave. Due to poor visibility inside the dark cave, I thought it was caused by the heat generated from the light. Eventually, I found out they were fry of the Kribs.

After 2 days, my wife told me all the fry had disappeared. To my disappointment when I checked them out, I found majority of them missing too although I could see a few of them still moving inside the cave - I thought there were less than 5 of them. I thought the parents had eaten them. Days later, I found the cave collapsed (poor engineering skill of the adult Kribs). I thought "There goes all my Krib babies!". After careful inspection, I found a big group of fry swimming along with the parents. The parents were indeed taking turns to take care of their babies. All the intruders were chased away. They even stared at me when I photographed them thinking I was an intruder too. They attacked the other pair of Kribs sharing the tank till they ended up with broken tails and fins.

Now it makes me wonder how I am going to keep the fry when they grow up if they're so aggressive.

The Kribs are indeed very good parents. I have never seen any fish taking care of their fry in my tanks prior to this. Who says fish has no feeling? They care for their young ones the same way human and other mammals do.