Amphiprion Chrysopterus: A Breeding Pair - Page 5

JHardman · #**101** 03/23/2007, 05:52 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Ron Popeil
ok, first water change done in day old fry tank. i didnt understand why anyone would need to make that siphon/filter thing described in wilkersons book...until today. there are just so many tiny tiny fry. i did my best to remove all of the dead fry and eggs, naturally sucking up a bunch of living ones in the process. i used an eye dropper to replace them as best i could. after that, i set in my 53 micron sieve container and just siphoned water directly out of that. i added rotifers and some isochrysis to start them off.- -

Take a piece of rigid air line and put a section of nice air line (you know the nice flexible kind) and use that to spot siphon. It is very easy to stop the flow if you do get one, and reverse it to flush them out, then start sucking again.

And yes, using the sieve is an excellent way to do water changes. I also would use it to sieve/defuse the replacement water.

If you get to the point where you are going to get really serious about raising these, send me a PM and I will share a rearing system design that may save you some time and head ache.

Ron Popeil · #**102** 03/24/2007, 12:48 AM

so the brine shrimp i added a day ago are mostly gone now. so i added some thawed cyclopeeze. the fish reacted very excitedly, swimming about as if they were eagerly awaiting to gobble whatever was just added to the water. but...they meticulously ignored the cyclopeeze. except one...he targeted, struck, and consumed. but then upon encountering another little pod, decided against eating it. but the potential! i added the sponge filter. im confident these last six will grow to size. i am pleased. as of today they are 14 days old.

the second tank of fry however, proceeded like marinas: inexplicable large mortalities. at around 30 hours after the second part the nest hatched, several hundred were dead. these were quickly removed with a rigid tube attached to a length of airline tubing as john mentioned.
24 hours later, another several hundred were dead. water quality tested great. i cant explain what happened.

around 25 fry still remain and all appear to be eating well.

JHardman · #**103** 03/24/2007, 01:14 AM

IME massive die off like that is from the air on the nest.

If you can rig it up, without sucking up fry, use a pump to move the nest instead of air. I had pretty good luck using a small MJ on a sponge filter like aquatic eco sells. It did not suck so much that it stuck fry to it, or beat them badly after hatch, but you definitely want it off first thing in the AM.

I got my best hatch rates by using a rearing system, with a gravity feed tank with the flow "fluffing" the nest, then draining into a sump with lots of bio filtration. I kept a lot of air in the sump and made sure I had lots of water fall from the over flow on the header tank to keep the O2 up. You can use 53µ on the drain to keep the rots in the rearing tank._

Ron Popeil · #**104** 03/26/2007, 09:44 PM

thanks for the insight john, ill work on the next nest using water flow instead of air flow the night of the hatch. and i assume your thread on the tank rearing system is what you were referring to up above, which sounds exciting to construct. im moving shortly, and need to gather some income, but i look forward to incorporating your ideas into a future system of my own. thank you for putting that thread together. so far the excitement and challenge of raising these fish hasnt waned, so i suspect ill be doing this for a while.

its now day 16. my six little clowns got their stripes over the weekend. very exciting. im absolutely thrilled by their recent appearance, reminds me what i am raising. im working with them and cyclopeeze and they are almost getting the point. some will eat certain morsels, and then ignore others, and some of the clowns just havent understood the cyclopeeze are food. but any day now i think they will subsist on them completely until i can get them onto pulverized flake. using the sponge filter in the tank has been a blessing, as the water quality has stabilized and doesnt require as frequent or as large of water changes.

Baalz · #**105** 03/27/2007, 12:47 PM

I never worry about my bubbles hitting the eggs and I have done it both ways for years. When I don't move the eggs enough they usually get fungus and don't hatch. When your doing it right you should be pulling them eggs the night of the hatch so the bubbles are not gonna be to much of a factor if they hatch an hour or two after you move em.

But still every so often I still get massive die offs on hatches just like you described. I honestly think its something else going on. Probably with moving the eggs over.

Ron Popeil · #**106** 03/29/2007, 07:58 PM

day 20.

they eat the flake! today i pulverized (such an intense term for merely squishing flakes up) some formula one and OSI spirulina into powder, and over the course of three seperate attempts today, i finally see them eating it regularly. this past week they have reacted so excitedly to any food i add to the water, regardless or not if they know they can eat it. its great. they definetely swim like clownfish now. pictures will come soon.

as of right now they dont have any color on them, just black with the white stripes. next to feeding copepods, i dont know what else i could do to bring out some color in them. but if i remember correctly, most chrysopterus juveniles ive seen have all been very muted in color anyway. seeing calvins yellow allardis have made me question my methods however....

another nest laid last night. the male mauled another chromis. bringing the original 8 down to 3 now. i suspect eventually the clowns will just not tolerate anyone else in their tank. which is fine.

Elmo18 · #**107** 03/29/2007, 09:01 PM

Great job Jordan! I like the Formula 1 and OSI Spirulina mix. IMO, you get the immunal combatants from spirulina and the trusted Formula 1 mix.

Best,
Ilham

Ron Popeil · #**108** 04/02/2007, 10:06 PM

day 24.

the little babies are almost completely fed off flake foods now. i add baby brine just to make sure they stay full every three days or so. of the five babies i have from this nest, there is one that is visibly dominant and chasing the others frequently. i finally got some decent pictures. in the next week or two i hope to add them to a 10 gallon tank with some liverock and a small bubble tip anemone.

top down shot

the clearest shot i was able to get

the little hungry group

as for the second batch, i dont know if i just got lazy or complacent, but im down to just three. regardless, another nest is just a few more days from hatching. i think ill have enough time to really dedicate myself to it.

illcssd · #**109** 04/02/2007, 10:12 PM

That is so cool jordan! Congratulations. I think your home free for those first five. Good luck on the next batch, lets see 50 little guys make it lol!

Rossini · #**110** 04/03/2007, 08:04 AM

AMAZING!

Well done!

Keep up the good work.

Slakker · #**111** 04/03/2007, 02:15 PM

Lil babies are looking real healthy, Jordan...congrats!

kerusso316 · #**112** 04/04/2007, 06:07 PM

I use two types of bubbles to hatch a nest.I use a wood air stone for a sweeping air flow.Then I use ridged air line on about 2 or 3 bubbles a second.I use these at the same time.This sweeps the small bubs away.The tile is angled so the bubles hit below the nest then move over it.I get a 95-100% hatch rate useing this method.There are several ways to hatch a nest.This one works for me.

crjennin · #**113** 04/16/2007, 01:19 PM

Any updated pics?

Calvin

Ron Popeil · #**114** 04/18/2007, 12:06 AM

day 39

wow. hard to believe its already been this long! it went by so incredibly slow the first two weeks. i took some pictures tonight, i tried diligently, but the quality is poor. these fish never sit still. they recognize me as their food source, and so move about excitedly any time i come to see them. i try to feed them three or so times a day. i mashed up some cyclopeeze flake and spirulina flake, and this is what theyve come to enjoy. again, forgive the poor photography.

as i hope you can see, theyve really developed a lot more yellow than i expected. i sort of convinced myself they would turn out as bland as the parents have become, but they are attractive little clowns! two of them are very dominant, butting heads often and chasing each other and everyone else around frequently.

GENERAL UPDATE:
of the three subsequent nests following the five little guys i have now, i have failed. one nest made it some 13 days with some twenty individuals, only to mysteriously die. following nests would hatch in extreme numbers, but withing 48 hours, most if not all would be dead. i dont quite know whats going on, but as always i hope the next nest yields better results. im sort of in the process of redesigning my hatchery closet at the moment for maximum efficiency.

i am concerned about the parents as well. over the course of this last month they have become increasingly shy. they never leave the anemone, and on more than one occasion, ive had to feel around in the anemone for the female because otherwise i would have considered her dead behind the tank somewhere. they appear to be stressed, yet still lay eggs regularly. the female appears to be the most stressed, showing marbled sleep color like pigmentation, and as said earlier, just buries herself deep within the anemone.

any ideas?

stykthyn · #**115** 04/18/2007, 01:16 AM

too much lovin can do that

ezhoops · #**116** 04/18/2007, 01:36 PM

Its a tough spot, of course you always wanted them to spawn and now she seems over worked. I'm sure if she is tired she will stop and hopefully we can figure out what happend to the previous nests

WetSleeves · #**117** 04/18/2007, 03:03 PM

Just found this thread. Very cool. Thanks for sharing the particulars of your setup. I have a pair I hope to breed. This may prove to be useful information.

Ron Popeil · #**118** 05/26/2007, 12:13 AM

alright so not entirely an exciting update. but an update nonetheless.

day 77

i have three of the original fry left. about two weeks ago, during the course of 12 days i lost two of the five little guys. the only thing i can think of for their sudden demise was aggression. there is one fish who is growing far more rapidly than the others, and i suspect this fish bullied the other two to death. so i separated the weakest of the three, and so far, no more tattered fins or aggressive behavior from the largest guy. sort of bizarre really.

forgive the photography, but theyre impossible to take pictures of. this is the best i could do, but at least the mass and shape of the fish is easy to discern in comparison to previous pictures.

growth seems to have picked up a bit these last two weeks. theyre only getting flakes at this point, a mashed up composite of cyclopeeze and spirulina. the three of them are between 1/2 and 3/4 of an inch at this point.

beyond that, i took about a four week hiatus from the active rearing process. surprisingly enough life got in the way of my hobby for a bit. and after two nests with a 100% mortality in the first few days, i put it all on hold.

however, as of now i have about 20 fry who are about 8 days old now. i decided to add an established sponge filter to the tank, and it has helped tremendously with water quality. the next nest hatches wednesday evening, and i will try a sponge filter/1.025 salinity combo to see what happens, instead of lowering the salinity to 1.020 on the second day as ive done in the past.

so there you have it. any suggestions on foods or any other aspect of this im neglecting?

thanks again everyone for your help.

WetSleeves · #**119** 05/26/2007, 06:28 AM

I know you're looking for advise here, but I hope you'll give some too. I have a few pairs I'd like to breed (crys, leuc, sand, occ) I'd love to know more about your setups, whether you bought a mated pair and how long it took them to get frisky.

WetSleeves · #**120** 05/26/2007, 06:29 AM

DP

MarinaP · #**121** 05/26/2007, 09:26 AM

J, don't feel bad. You are doing a wondreful job. Chrys are difficult.

Keep on going

shred5 · #**122** 05/26/2007, 09:42 AM

I know I found this thread a little late but congrats and well done. As time goes by you will find what works best for you and your success will increase. keep us updated.

Dave

Ron Popeil · #**123** 05/26/2007, 11:58 AM

thanks for kind words everyone.

wetsleeves - the pair was collected together as a "colony" ie. anemone and clowns as they were found in the wild. they were together six months before they spawned. their set up is a 45 gallon cube, 400w halide over the top. two 3/4 sea swirls feed about 1200 gph into the tank. temperature fluctuates between 78 and 83. salinity 1.025. photoperiod with halides is about 10 hours, probably closer to 14 with natural light. they are fed typically twice a day an entire range of foods from frozen mysis, squid and brine to flakes from numerous companies. the only other fish in the tank are a school of chromis, which the clowns have whittled down from 6 to 2, and a bicolor blenny.

hope that helps!

Elmo18 · #**124** 05/26/2007, 04:22 PM

Jordan, you rock!

Keep it up! Please let me know when we can trade

Best,
Ilham

WetSleeves · #**125** 05/26/2007, 07:05 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Ron Popeil
thanks for kind words everyone.

wetsleeves - the pair was collected together as a "colony" ie. anemone and clowns as they were found in the wild. they were together six months before they spawned. their set up is a 45 gallon cube, 400w halide over the top. two 3/4 sea swirls feed about 1200 gph into the tank. temperature fluctuates between 78 and 83. salinity 1.025. photoperiod with halides is about 10 hours, probably closer to 14 with natural light. they are fed typically twice a day an entire range of foods from frozen mysis, squid and brine to flakes from numerous companies. the only other fish in the tank are a school of chromis, which the clowns have whittled down from 6 to 2, and a bicolor blenny.

hope that helps!

Thanks!
That was more than I would have thought to ask and some of it you already mentioned. You're doing a great job so far. Good luck with the rest.