100 Clown Fish Fry!

[caitrina]

Life is funny sometimes, today when I fed the 65 tank I did my normal survey of the tank, nothing unusual. I went to a memorial service for one of our guys who passed away a day before Christmas and I come home, look in the tank and what do I find? Clown eggs, my clown laid eggs! I know perhaps there isn't a correlation to some of you but remember this is my healing gift, my tank of life, hope, and a daily reminder of what was, there is, and is going to be and again it has been brought to my attention through the signs of birth , even if it is in the form of eggs. Anyway, here are the pictures of the eggs laid on the shell that the xenia is on.





SO what do I do??????????????????????????

OMG> I am a mommy...oh wait I am a grandma...hmmmm, let's find a different term. A noni!

[boozeman]

Noni

[ReefGuy69]

HA HA HA what the heck did that link have anything to do with clown eggs? I dont know i would try to get the eggs into a quarentine tank with the clown if possible and see if they will hatch. Im sure someone else will chime in with experience on if this can even be done. but they probably wont last in your main tank.

[Dentoid]

Couldn't have happened to a nicer person!

[BarbMazz]

Just beautiful, Cat. After reading the beginning, and then seeing the pictures of the eggs I had chills up my spine. How right you are, Noni!

I'll be waiting to hear what you do... I wish I had something to tell you, but I don't have a clue!

[Royalscott]

Congrats! This is very cool.

I do know that they hatch at night and I think incubation time is 5-9 days if memory serves correctly.

When they hatch, they are teeny tiny and not even fish yet. It takes them a few weeks to turn into actual fish and again, they will be small.....fish food if left in main tank after hatching!

[boozeman]

you see that tiny one to the far right.... name that one NEMO!

[boozeman]

It Finally Happened!

[Craig Manoukian]

Wow Cat, that is fabulous! Your tank must be in excellent condition and is a testimony to your animal husbandry skills!

[caitrina]

Thanks guys! Ok, Booze, the one to the far right has been dubbed Nemo!

Thanks Craig and hey I had an idea which I got from reading another thread. You know we were talking about the possibility of putting the little guys in the 24, but had the concern about the filtration. If I go to the fabric store and get some real fine netting material and double it, I can put it right next to the slatted openings of the overflow so that the little babies couldn't be sucked into the filter system. In the 24 they will have nothing to hurt them and would just be a matter of keeping them out of the filter system. Something to think on tonight.

[lcstorc]

How cool!
What a great way to bring life back to the 24.
Elmo breeds clownfish all the time. You may want to send him a PM for advice. Not sure how often he checks. I'll look around the net and see what I can find for you.

[Craig Manoukian]

That's a great idea Cat. I will do a search to see if I can find anything for you as well.

[Craig Manoukian]

False Percula clownfish are the one of the first marine aquarium fish to be successfully raised in captivity. They helped lead the way in the development of the commercial marine ornamental aquaculture industry. In nature A. ocellaris occurs in a wide range in the Indo -Pacific region including: Australia, the East Indies, Melanesia, the Philippines and the Ryukyus islands.

False Perculas are one of the least aggressive of the clownfish family, and usually tolerate other members of the same species in their tank. A. ocellaris are easy to maintain in aquariums, they adapt well, and will accept a wide variety of aquarium foods. They prefer the carpet anemones as host species, usually H. magnifica, S. gigantea or S. mertensii

Mated pairs of False Percula Clownfish typically spawn every 10-14 days and the eggs hatch in about 7-8 days. The female is generally the larger fish of the pair. As with some other marine fish, clownfish are protandrous hermaphrodites, meaning they exhibit sex reversal from males to females. The average nest size for A. ocellaris is about 250 eggs.

The True Percula can lay up to 600 eggs in a nest, but average nest size is about half that. They typically spawn only about once a month.

All of the Maroon Clownfish bred at ORA are of the Gold-stripe variety. Normally, Maroon Clownfish vary in color from bright red to dark maroon with three narrow white stripes. The fish found in the area of Sumatra have gold color stripes, and the ORA broodstock are from this area. The gold color of the stripes sometimes will not develop until the fish are about 9-12 months old. ORA fish are shipped at about 6-7 months, so they are showing the juvenile white stripes. They all will develop the gold color in time, starting at the head stripe.

These very popular fish are easy to keep in aquariums, although they do not get along with each other. Unless a hobbyist can get a mated pair, it is best to keep them one to a tank. It has been observed that the gold-stripe variety seem a little less aggressive that the white banded type. One of the largest clownfish species, adult females can attain a size of over 6 inches. In nature they are found in association with the Bubble-tip anemone ( E. quadricolor).

With the aggressive female guarding her nest, and her much smaller male mate fanning the eggs, Maroon Clowns have some of the largest spawns ever recorded for clownfish. A typical spawn may contain 1,500 eggs, and spawns of over 6,000 have been observed. This species also seems the most likely to show mis-bars, and has a higher percentage of incomplete striping than other species.

RECOMMENDED READING

Conditioning, Spawning and Rearing of Fish with Emphasis on Marine Clownfish
By Frank H. Hoff

Anemone Fishes and their Host Sea Anemones
by Daphne G. Fautin and Gerald R. Allen

Clownfishes - A Guide to their Captive Care, Breeding and Natural History
by Joyce D. Wilkerson


Information copied from the ORA farm raised clown fish website:

ORA | PRODUCTS | FISH | CLOWNFISH

[caitrina]

Thanks Craig...I had found a little more and after reading almost expected to wake up to having no eggs on the rock through parent consumption. That didn't happen, but I read that lack of protien will cause parents to consume the eggs. I still have the same amount that was there when I went to bed. I also thought about pulling the xenia / egg rock from the tank and placing them in the nano with the Koralia slightly waving above the eggs to duplicate the fanning process of the parents, but had second thoughts about this so as not to stress the parents.

I have decided that I will allow the eggs and the parents to stay in the tank until they hatch. This is day 2 that the eggs have been in the tank and parents are keeping watch over their eggs. They are not being real aggressive to the others unless they get real close. I see that they act like shelties, herding the others away and only nip when they swim closer, but no one really seems to be interested in the eggs. They are just swimming around like they usually do, chasing little food particles and unseen things.

My plan is to wait until they actually hatch which I understand should be at night. I will continue to watch the tank and when they hatch I will scoop up what I can and plop them in the 24. I am going to go to the fabric store today to see what I can get to cover all filtering systems in the 24. My idea is to take a really fine piece of netting and cover all slots in overflow. THis will allow the water to be filtered but will prevent the little guys from going into the system.

I am going to do what I can to keep these little guys alive when / if they hatch, but I am not going to tamper with the nature of the tank at this point. I believe that the success in this is to allow things the way they are. I may be wrong, but IF the tank were not healthy I don't think I would have eggs and since it was a natural spawn , why mess with the nature of the tank environment at this point. Nothing is bothering the eggs, the parents are taking care of them, they aren't eating them, they fan them and have happy little smiles on their faces so we shall see as time progresses.

[lcstorc]

How exciting. Have you investigated what to feed the newly hatched babies? They may need baby brine shrimp so you want to be prepared.
See you later.