Black / Darwin OC Clownfish (Amphiprion ocellaris "Darwin") Breeding Log!

[mwp]

1-14-07 - So I've made some changes and regrouped. A trip to RPI and Joe's extreme generousity have helped me with a replacement "male" for my female. After finding both the "male" allardi and a mandarin in the filtration this morning, the "female" allardi has been banished to a breeder net for a much neeeded "cool down" period. That's the news...maybe Tuesday I'll get some pics of the new mate. He was one of the largest Joe had, hatched Oct 5, 2006, perfect bars, very nice black. It's my understanding that likely, this male and the female are from DIFFERENT captive lines, which means potentially stronger genetics than the original pair. At least, that's the optimist's point of view

FWIW,

Matt

[mwp]

BTW, I shoudl note that when introduced, the female ran up to him, nuzzled his abdomen, and has now pretty much left him alone (although he likes to hang out with her). So far this looks like a pretty straightforward introduction without incidents. He's maybe 1/2 her length, 1/4 or less of her mass. While we're definitely "set back" from the original timeline, things hopefully will be back on track soon, and in the next couple weeks they should have their own dedicated love nest (aka "tank").

Matt

[keefsama2003]

Great Matt maybe we are at the same point now. my pair love the 30cube they seem to explore more and more and i think they finally realized they are the only ones in there. they are eating flake nicely when i feed them now i have to get them back to eating my fish mush concoction. im hoping they get to it soon they both live in the crease of the tile i have in there and the female has been seen by myself and my brother in law passivly mouthing the tile then going over to the male then back to the tile.

nothing intense yet but its a start

[mwp]

So I have to post an update relating both the Allardi and Black Ocellaris pairs that are currently housed with my Mandarins and Seahorses. It's been a few days now that the clowns are battling a serious case of what I'm 90% sure is ICH, but it may actually be ICH, Brook, or Oodinium, or a combination thereof. I'm leaning towards two possible causes - nighttime temp drops (I let my house get down to 65F, but the tanks *should* be staying up) - OR - the big bruhaha I made in the tank when the Male Black Ocellaris disappeared. In the process of ripping apart the tank, I KNOW I stirred up a lot of sediment / detritus + it was a stressful event. I'm thinking I may have stirred up DORMANT CYSTS and VIOLA, OUTBREAK. The original female Black Ocellaris has yet to show ANY symptoms, and the pair of Barbouri, the MALE Mandarin and the pair of Rusty Gobies seem unaffected. However, the female mandarin is LOADED...she probably has it the worst.

I'm doing EVERYTHING I can in my power to bring this under control, but I'm afraid things are going well. Yesterday I put down our "spare" male Barbouri Seahorse rather than have him die in the tank (and thus have all those parasites LEAVE his body to reproduce / look for a new host). In a nutshell, here's the rundown of steps I've been able to take (remember, this is a REEF and ALL my tanks are currently occupied).

1. A spare, brand new UV (9 watt internal) was thrown into the tank.

2. Daily dosings of Marine Max (probiotic bacteria + vitamins)

3. Daily dosings of Reef Plus (vitamins).

4. Two FW dips with Methelyne Blue (one a couple days ago, one this evening).

5. Large daily water changes, on the order of 50-80% (to help "dilute" concentrations of the free swimming parasite stage).

6. Daily cleaning of all mechanical filters.

7. Removal of chemical filtration media (which I theorize simply adds "surface area" for reproductive stages of the parasite. They also aren't needed with DAILY water changes on the magnitude I'm performing).

8. Focusing on Selcon Enriched Foods (to up the caloric content). Feeding OFTEN (appetites are diminished, but not gone at this time).

9. There is a Cleaner Shrimp in the tank. I've seen the "female" Allardi visit it once....otherwise not doing much or so it seems.

When I had the outbreak in my OTHER tank (do to stupidity and a non-functioning UV) these methods helped stave it off and ultimately the fish recovered. However, NONE of the fish ever got as bad as the clowns currently are, ESPECIALLY the condition of the Allardi pair (and especially the much smaller MALE within that pair).

That's the news for the moment. I'm at the point where I'm considering breaking down and locating a reef safe medication (i.e. Greenex)...ultimately all the coral life in the tank is REPLACEABLE if it came to that.

Any other thoughts, I welcome them! My hope and optimism are slowly being erroded. It's been a rough couple weeks here!

MP

[keefsama2003]

Good luck with that hope they all pull thru. i added a good amount of live rock in my 30 for the black/white pair and a friend gave me a deal on a green bta with nice purple tips so it went in also. things are looking good tonight i will pull apart the canister filter and take out the filter floss and replace it with new leaving the sponge in the filter for bacterial reasons.

Temp is stable now at about 82 degreeseven when it gets a little cooler in the house its staying about there. i also added a seio pump 620 to add a little extra flow as the canister filter only does 240gph

The fish all look excellent and are starting to slowly eat more and are a little more aggressive during feeding time also. im going to try and get a canopy built so i can add my T5's to that tank and take the glass top off for a little more air circulation and what not but thats going slowly

[kerusso316]

The only thing that I think helped my fish was the hypo.I,on Joe's orders,droped the salinity to 1.009.Then and only then did my fish start getting better.

[mwp]

Hypo can work, but it's a problem of tank space at the moment, and well as a problem of fish I can't get without tearing the tank apart again (which, as I mentioned earlier, may have been what caused this whole outbreak in the first place).

I'm on the road after work today to track down Greenex and Kick Ich...both have been shown to be at least reasonably "reef safe" in so much as they didn't kill Xenia in trials. I've pretty much given up on the various "homeopathic" attempts as this morning, things were worse, not better. All the clowns only accepted live BBS as food.

MP

[mwp]

Well, FWIW, the Allardi are now in a QT along with the Black Ocellaris (and the FEMALE CONTINUES to be ICH FREE)...moved the 17 day old percs to a breeder net. Things haven't gotten worse, but they haven't gotten any BETTER either. I'm going for HYPO salinity for starters (so far down to 1.017...will probably drop to 1.014 tomorrow and *maybe* go a little farther, we'll see how they react), will probably combine with daily 50% water changes, still up in the air on meds. Also up in the air on what I'm going to do with the rest of the fish in the tank, but I DO plan on continuing with the Ruby Reef Kick ICH dosings.

For what it's worth, at the time of posting, the fish look better than I've seen them in weeks. I believe most of the ICH dropped off them today, but again, I'm not talking about "looks" as in physical appearance so much as "looks" in terms of behavior....they're alert, active, so far the move to QT has been a good thing (surprise surprise).

The battle plan keeps changing by the day as things progress (or don't!).

MP

[mwp]

After a lot of research and discussions, I went for some medication. Quick Cure (Malachite Green / Formalin) was ultimately what I chose. Let's hope this was the right decision.

Matt

[mwp]

One last update...FWIW my gut is telling me, "boy, they did NOT like that". The Allardi's and Black OC's took some frozen brine and mysis, but only the unafflicted Black OC female showed any gusto in her feeding.

The big change is that the Allardi's and male Black OC showed VERY PRONOUNCED white spots only a couple hours after the introduction of medication....they weren't like this when I put them in the tank. I can only wonder if this is basically a sign of the parasites being irritated or attacked by the meds and looking to fall off or something, but again, even just a simple 1 drop per gallon dosing of Quick Cure had a noticeable negative impact on the behavior of the fish. I went with Quick Cure hoping that this dual formulation of Malachite Green and Formalin would handle any secondary infections, because in my honest opinion, while this started as ICH, it looked like things had progressed to the point where I may have also had Oodinium or even Brooklynella going at the same time. I also hoped that because it's a dual-med formula, the levels of each medication might be a bit lower than a "Malachite Green" or "Formalin Only" type med...they both have some negative effects, but nothing as drastic as copper (the last thing I want to do is STERILIZE my broodstock, which as it turns out in my reading / research seems like a very REAL possiblity).

FWIW,

Matt

[DivaMan]

OOH, man thats rough, I feel for ya. I have noticed, when i do formalin baths, I do not do them in my house. I help the LFS i go to for an hr or so every time im there, and I do baths there, that formalin is exceedingly stressful. Hope everything turns out OK

[mwp]

Razor bladed the tank surfaces this evening, let it settle and followed up with a 50% water change. In another hour or two they'll get the 2nd dosing of quick cure. Honestly, I'm again feeling optimistic.

Matt

[Allin14]

I think the black ocellaris clowns are my favorite, I bought a pair from saltwaterfish.com. If anyone wants some check it out

[DivaMan]

swf is a good site, and theres some breeders there, the forum is nice as well. But their live stock is good, however, I have vowed never to order any fish from an online store, except if I cant get it at my LFS

[Kmiec123]

DivaMan.." I have vowed never to order any fish from an online store, except if I cant get it at my LFS."

Or local Breeder, of course. >