65 Gallon Bluespot & Clownfish Home

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
I was going to name this chronicle "65 Bluespot Jawfish Den" but I could not resist keeping a few clown fish too :D

TANK
This aquarium is a collection of leftovers from my years of raising marine fish and has a history of different uses over the last several years including successful seahorse propagation, clownfish growout and now as a bluespot jawfish breeding. It has collected a few scratches, dings, and extra holes (patched with acrylic) along the way but still holds water just fine. The dimensions are 36" (long) x 18" (deep) x 24" (tall) which gives a good amount of height for bluespots to 'flash'.
It is drilled with an overflow box and plumbed with simple 1.5" pool hose (very flexible).

SUMP
Leftover 20 gallon high aquarium is used for the sump. Right now it only has a filter sock to help clean the water and a Mag3 pump for the return. I have 4 skimmers in the barn that I have to choose from for this small area. I expect it will have to be the Euro-reef since it has the smallest foot print. I'll add it within the next few months.

PURPOSE
This aquarium's main purpose will be to comfortably house a pair of bluespot jawfish (opistognathus rosenblatti) that will hopefully spawn and allow me to try my hand at raising them. One of the bluespots I have had for several years and the 2nd one I recently purchased from Diver's Den, put it through several formalin dips and a copper treatment in my QT, then added it to this display.

The three clownfish in it are the last A. percula fry leftover from years of breeding designer & Snowcasso clownfish. There is nothing special about their coloration; two are normal stripe and one is a semi-picasso with a cute white spot on its cheek. I expect I will eventually end up with a bonded pair and will have to re-home the 3rd but we'll see how that goes.

SUBSTRATE
There are several long tunnels of 1.5" PVC buried under the sand/crushed coral bed for the jawfish to use if they want and also to give support to any tunnels they build. One uses a 14" long PVC for its home but I do not think the other does.
I am slowly adding substrate and currently am up to 3-8" of sand/crushed coral along with larger crushed coral pieces that the jawfish can easily carry in their mouths to build tunnels and use for their 'doors' each night.

LIGHTING
I have a simple 6 bulb T5HO fixture with mostly actinic bulbs. I can't remember the brand name and they have been discontinued but it works great. It has two switches to divide the bulbs into two groups that allows a dusk & dawn feature. The total photo period is on at 7am and off at 9:30pm.

CONTROLLER
Digital Aquatics Reef Keeper Lite controls everything. I just ordered another PC4 so I can add more devices on it.

FLOW
Water flow is created by two Korallia 1150 powerheads. I love these powerheads!

TEMPERATURE
The goal is 72 deg f (give or take a few degrees). I will not add a chiller so the clamp on fans will need to do all the cooling.
 

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
Not much to look at but the fish are really happy :D

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710Reefer

Member
Awesome post!! I should have added the pvc too. I thought about it but wasn't 100% on getting a BSJF. I regret it now, but the little guy will just have to build a home of his own..
 

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
I thought for sure that "Luey" was gone. I did not see him for almost 2 full weeks and his door stayed closed (small rubble over his tunnel). I was so sad... BUT, this weekend he finally decided to open his door and do some house cleaning. I saw him blowing out sand all day Saturday. :D He ate like a champ also and gobbled up 2 large pieces of homemade mush.
I was SOOOO happy to see he was okay :D
 

BigAl07

Administrator
RS STAFF
That's awesome news Doni!

Is it normal for them to go into hiding like that for 2 weeks? That's a long time w/o feeding. Do you think he was coming out at night to feed or can you tell?
 

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
That's awesome news Doni!

Is it normal for them to go into hiding like that for 2 weeks? That's a long time w/o feeding. Do you think he was coming out at night to feed or can you tell?

I do not know if that is normal or not. He was flashing just before he went into hiding. Maybe it is some type of breeding/brooding/incubation response? I will start to document their behaviors and see if it is a pattern.

I often look into the tank during the night hours but not every night. I've seen the female out of her hole and swimming around after dark before but never the male.
 

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
Not much to report. Both eat great. The female is much bolder than the male. She comes out of her tunnel a lot. The male is VERY shy. Here is a picture of him peeking out of his tunnel.... He looks just like a frog. LOL
2014-08-18_20-21-29_147.jpg
 

Woodstock

The Wand Geek was here. ;)
RS STAFF
Here is the female. She is always very interested in the male. She can see him from her tunnel and makes goo-goo eyes at him a lot :D
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Snelly40

Well-Known Member
definately the first fish going in my new setup... i was thinking about temp around 76? is that too still high for them?? @Woodstock good to see you still bouncing around here :)
 
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