breeding oscar

Question
Hello,
I have 3 Oscars and i i believe one of them is about to lay eggs.  They cleared a spot on the bottom of the tank where they moved the rocks and now you can see the glass.  They are also locking lips and looking like they are fighting but i know that that means they are bonding.  how do i tell which one of the fish is going to lay eggs and what do i need to do to same them so the Oscars don't eat them.

Answer
Hi Cory,
  Actually you do not need to do anything. Let them do their thing.  You only need to provide food for the kids once they are free-swimming.  Up until that point, the fry feed off their yolk.  The parents might eat the eggs but that typically occurs if the eggs were not fertilized correctly. You can tell this happened if the eggs start going really white (though keep in mind that oscar eggs are normally rather whitish, moreso than other cichlid eggs).

 As far as telling the sexes apart, there is no way to do that. There are no telltale marks that differentiate male from female oscars.  Basically, if an oscar lays eggs it is a female.  One last thing: sometimes two females will get together and lay eggs (which will not hatch of course) so just because you find eggs, that does not mean that you necessarily have a male oscar.

-- Ron Coleman
   rcoleman@cichlidresearch.oom
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