The Flame Hawkfish Mating Journal

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
So as I'm sure many are well aware I have and adore my flame hawkfish (Neocirrhites armatus) and that I recently restarted the tank and am back at only having three fish in the tank. One thing I've always adored is the look of a pair of hawkfish (espcially longnose hawks!), combine this with the need to buy new fish and create a little bit of busyness in the tank I decided that I'm going down the route of getting my flame hawk a partner :)

Flame hawkfish are sequential hermaphrodites, meaning that they all start life as females and the largest and most dominant become the males. Given that my flame hawk is now two years old (at least in my tank) and fairly fat and happy I'm rather certain that he's male. So I started chatting to Dave at Deer Park about it and pairing them up, he didn't have much experience with it nor seen anyone but said he'd get me in a cute little hawk (who is tiny :D lol), that little beauty arrived last night and I have picked her up this morning! (I may have bought an acro as well though :rolleyes) so a big thanks to Dave for getting me one so promptly and so healthy :worship

Now comes the tricky part lol, the pairing of the hawks!
My plan is to keep the new female in a small seperation container for the next week in the tank for Hawk Hawkins (my flame hawk named after the smart casual song lol) to adjust to the presence of a new flame hawkfish and hopefully I will be able to tell during this time how he will go with her in the tank :) Once that week is up and I'm satisfied then I'll be opening the container but not removing it so she still has it to retreat to and for an easy catch lol.

With any luck I will be able to have these two pair up for life over the coming months as they do pair for life in singular pairs and sometimes harems :) If anyone has any experience with this please chime in!! I'm not aiming to breed but simply to get them to become a mated pair and hopefully even mate too :)
 

Pat24601

Well-Known Member
My flamehawk is probably my favorite fish and I like all of my fish a lot.

I never even thought of pairing them.

I'll be watching this closely!
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
My flamehawk is probably my favorite fish and I like all of my fish a lot.

I never even thought of pairing them.

I'll be watching this closely!
There's just something about the completely neurotic behaviour and their colours that I love! I can hand feed mine which is the best! lol

With any luck I'll have a Hawk & Hawkette Hawkins in no time! :)
 

Pat24601

Well-Known Member
There's just something about the completely neurotic behaviour and their colours that I love! I can hand feed mine which is the best! lol

With any luck I'll have a Hawk & Hawkette Hawkins in no time! :)

Same here. I love the completely neurotic behavior. I posted in your other thread, but colors looking really good already. Looking healthy. Good start. :)
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
Same here. I love the completely neurotic behavior. I posted in your other thread, but colors looking really good already. Looking healthy. Good start. :)
I certainly won't ever have a reef tank without a hawkfish now :) I originally planned on a longnose but when I saw the flame hawk in store I bought it! I have not regretted that since :D
My lfs certainly got a great specimen in for me!!
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
Really cool idea Dom, great little fish that look at you like you're the one in a tank lol. I hope everything goes smoothly mate :)
Me too! He's showing a lot of interest and no aggression (from what I can tell lol) so hopefully it's a good sign! She smashed the frozen food mix I feed when I feed the tank tonight which is excellent news :)
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
Update Day 3:
She's killing the flake now which is excellent, hand feeding already too :D It's all good signs that she's going to adapt really well to tank life with me, colour are still going really strong!

Hopefully with regular frozen mix feedings everyone will not only get nice and fat lol but also give her enough energy to be able to spawn but we'll see if that does happen given the tank is only 2ft deep, it would be awesome though!

They seem to like proximity to each other though. Every time he perches on the frag rack she swims over to the tank side of the box and waits there :) All good signs I think!


So I haven't been able to find anything on rearing the larvae, it seems that complete starvation of the larvae occurs at day 10 and starts at day 4ish. They're also pelagic spawners which will make for a fun time of catching the fertilized eggs lol I may run into issues as they will need a little bit of height to mate and 2ft might not be tall enough.
I'm going to have a look at other hawks to see what has been done for them, especially feeding larvae/young.
For the moment though, I don't care about spawning or breeding the main aim is to simply not have any aggressive behaviour that ends badly. I'm in no rush but having them pair would be what I'm after, whether they spawn or not is secondary but it would be a really nice occurrence :) As to what I do after that will depend on how frequently they spawn, if there's certain conditions and things like that. Also what potential foods there are for them to consume to make it past the 10 day mark.

Hopefully all goes well though!
 

Pat24601

Well-Known Member
So, ideally, you'd like to captive breed some new fish? Obviously, I don't know anything about it, but it would be amazingly cool.
 

Oxylebius

Well-Known Member
Hi Dom, cute little hawk you have there. Just came across this thread for the first time. The specimen container is the way to go, I've used it many times with success when introducing new fish to my tanks. If you add a tiny rock, size of the fish, to the specimen container I'm sure the little hawk would appreciate a perch (help to ease stress of an empty environment for it). It is a good sign that it swims over to the larger hawk, but I'd pay closer attn to the larger hawks behavior as the week goes on. Has the larger hawk swam up to the container at all?
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
Hi Dom, cute little hawk you have there. Just came across this thread for the first time. The specimen container is the way to go, I've used it many times with success when introducing new fish to my tanks. If you add a tiny rock, size of the fish, to the specimen container I'm sure the little hawk would appreciate a perch (help to ease stress of an empty environment for it). It is a good sign that it swims over to the larger hawk, but I'd pay closer attn to the larger hawks behavior as the week goes on. Has the larger hawk swam up to the container at all?
I'm really liking the opportunities the specimen box allows, hand feeding, observation and separation :)
I've been paying very close attention to him and there doesn't seem to be any aggression, it's mostly curiosity. He knows she's there and spends a lot of time perched on the frag rack just looking at her :)
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
So, ideally, you'd like to captive breed some new fish? Obviously, I don't know anything about it, but it would be amazingly cool.
Ideally it would be amazing if I could captive breed them! :) the aim for the moment is simply to created a mated pair of them :) if they do begin spawning I will do everything I can to captive breed them! :)
 

Wrangy

Acropora Nut
RS STAFF
PREMIUM
He usually sits on the frag rack watching and she'll swim over to that side and sit close to him which is a good sign :)
Sometimes he gets himself stuck between the boxes and the tank wall haha but I haven't seen any aggressive behaviour and he likes to sit there and watch :) when I feed her he tries to pick the food through the container lol but doesn't show aggression when she comes over to eat it like he's trying to deter her so good signs all round :D

Thanks Di :) hopefully this is a story of success!
 
Top