Amphiprion ocellaris variegata - "Snowflake" Ocellaris Clownfish

[Siapin]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6582007#post6582007 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by coraldude
this i just my opinion. but wiggawam, u are a rude idiot.

let me run down to petco and grab some snowflake clowns. some of those ones with 3 eyes and 2 tails . lol
ps i have a pair of those , juck snow flakes and they are the best junk i ever had

Dude man, you're hillarious!!! :lolspin:

that's cool to hear you got a pair of junk snowflakes. how much did you pay for that junk? Does your junk pair spawn?


I love that I started this forum to learn about these interesting var of ocellaris, and I get entertainment at the same time.

argue on...

 

[Wiggawam]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6582007#post6582007 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by coraldude
this i just my opinion. but wiggawam, u are a rude idiot.

let me run down to petco and grab some snowflake clowns. some of those ones with 3 eyes and 2 tails . lol

ora dose not produce these snowflake clowns , so y call them about it. duuu

but realy these dude in here have bin doing this for a long time and know what they are talking about .

good luck trying to learn about clown fish .

ps it all ways good to be nice to the people that could help and teach u.

ps i have a pair of those , juck snow flakes and they are the best junk i ever had

I think you are an uncultured fool who can't spell correctly. If you like your snowflakes good for you, I personally don't. I have no problem I'm admitting I was wrong, not a big deal to me. I just don't feel I need to be treated like I'm a child and need my abc's taught to me. I was wrong, the snowflakes are not produced at ORA, I did confuse them with the Picasso's. So I think you should keep your opinion to yourself because it just adds junk to this thread.

Oama sorry for being a jackass, it was a rough monday. Hope you understand.

 

[oama]

We all have bad days.

I was just trying to get the correct information out there to dispell wild speculations.

 

[Wiggawam]

Glad you were because I had the wrong information but I stand corrected.

 

[coraldude]

here they are. i have had them for a few weeks . they take some getting used too. but they are fun. they swimm all over all the time. ,, sorry my pics are so bad. the glass need some cleaning.

 

[oama]

Frank
Well and good, but what if you knew that the F0 of snowflakes were "normal" A. ocellaris? No "traits" on them at all? Like Fishboy stated, I feel clownfish don't follow the recognized rules of genetic inheritance when applied to barring/coloration. It is an area that is under investigation, by several labs/peoples, but all the questions have yet to be answered.

 

[Siapin]

What is it about clowns that they are different from other families and genera that they don't comply with the norm?

Is there some kind of unique genetic variability that they have that sets them apart from other fish?

I'm kind of confused by some of the comments so far. I might be in over my head, so can someone let me know anything about some kind of special circumstances when it comes to breeding these things?

 

[maww]

If I remember correctly, I saw a thread not too far back discussing misbarring in captive bred clowns. The gist of it was that bars are formed at a couple of different ages during clownfish development, and that environment can affect bar formation at each of these stages. So it could be possible to produce the exact type of misbarring you wanted if you were able to appropriately control environment through development. Did some searching and found the thread:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=733154&highlight=misbarring

 

[Siapin]

That doesn't necessarily mean that the frye will have the barring you want. I dont think the environment is going to change the genetic makeup of the barring. That would be called evolution, and (although I think it is false) if it was true, it would take many many generations to cause the barring to be in the ideal formation/color/etc.

 

[Frank Mularo]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6598942#post6598942 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by oama
Frank
Well and good, but what if you knew that the F0 of snowflakes were "normal" A. ocellaris? No "traits" on them at all? Like Fishboy stated, I feel clownfish don't follow the recognized rules of genetic inheritance when applied to barring/coloration. It is an area that is under investigation, by several labs/peoples, but all the questions have yet to be answered.

I think if the pattern of a clownfish is dependent on environment and genetics, it's even that much easier to get what you want. All you have to know is the environmental conditions that give you a greater proportion of a trait you want (such as wide/broken/missing bars), start with a pair that shows a trait you want (I would suppose if you wanted to produce something like these snowflake clowns, you would try to find and pair up two "normal" fish with somewhat wider bars), then backcross slected offspring with the parents or each other under the conditions that favor your desired phenotype.

If someone's selling them, someone figured out how to make them, right?

 

[maww]

no, environment won't change the genetic makeup of the fish. But that doesn't mean that phenotypic outcome (how you look) is controlled 100% by genetics. If that were the case, every frag of a given coral would have the same coloration and growth form in every tank. We all know that isn't true. And according to the experiences of a few people in the thread I sited, barring can be affected by rearing conditions- that is, if you rear one clutch from the same parents under different conditions you can selectively see different misbarring. I'm not trying to say that it is always the same for every frye each time, just that a component of bar formation is responsive to environment. That may be why you see so few "snowflake" occellaris- even if environmental manipulations during development are just right, you don't see the same misbar patterns coming through on all frye. If the snowflake color morph were a simle genetic trait, all or most frye from a clutch would show the pattern. Their scarcity suggests otherwise.
Perhaps it is a combination of the two in this case, and TMK ain't talking.

 

[Frank Mularo]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6602706#post6602706 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Siapin
That doesn't necessarily mean that the frye will have the barring you want. I dont think the environment is going to change the genetic makeup of the barring. That would be called evolution, and (although I think it is false) if it was true, it would take many many generations to cause the barring to be in the ideal formation/color/etc.

Environment can definitely change the genes that you pass on to your offspring. That's not what is being talked about here. Some genes require some sort of outside force to become active or inactive. The function of certain genes is regulated by environmental forces. However, if you don't believe in evolution, the point is moot for you, anyways.

 

[Frank Mularo]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6602926#post6602926 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by maww
That may be why you see so few "snowflake" occellaris- even if environmental manipulations during development are just right, you don't see the same misbar patterns coming through on all frye. If the snowflake color morph were a simle genetic trait, all or most frye from a clutch would show the pattern. Their scarcity suggests otherwise.
Perhaps it is a combination of the two in this case, and TMK ain't talking.

Or nobody has dedicated that much time to trying to produce them.

 

[Siapin]

If there are two odd colored clowns (snowflake in our case), then does that mean that their frye will have that same odd coloration? Or is that just merely a coloration based on phenotype?

 

[MarinaP]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6602834#post6602834 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Frank Mularo

If someone's selling them, someone figured out how to make them, right?

Maybe not. Pure luck?

Look, we are speculating about the outcome here, and speculation has never been a scientific method. Let's give breeders some time to figure it out and leave guesses (and wrong info) out of the breeding process.

 

[Fishboy42]

We could sit here and argue until the clowns come home, but I think the problem here is that we don't actually KNOW enough about clown genetics and the histories of the varieties available. Hopefully some of those studies oama mentioned will help us to better understand this when/if they are published.

As far as the mis-barring, all I know is what I have experienced myself--that I can take a batch of clowns from the same pair, split it in two groups, and deliberately grow one half "normal" and one half "misbarred," which suggested to me at least some environmental component to barring patterns. There is a limit to how much of the striping pattern I can change (that head stripe is hard to get rid of on ocellaris, I have a bunch of o's that look like tomatoes!), but I'm always experimenting...

 

[Fishboy42]

Sorry Marina...posted at the same time--at least we share the same sentiments.

-Matt

 

[imbuggin]

snowflakes

snowflakes

I read through and could have missed it. There is one and only one place breeding snowflake clowns. They are in England. So far very few are around and nobody else has
a producing pair that I know of. A pair runs about $500 and your LFS may be able to order them. Here is one more picture.

 

[Frank Mularo]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6604348#post6604348 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by MarinaP
Maybe not. Pure luck?

Look, we are speculating about the outcome here, and speculation has never been a scientific method. Let's give breeders some time to figure it out and leave guesses (and wrong info) out of the breeding process.

Why not discuss it? What harm is there in that? If we're not fish breeders, we can't talk about the process? Please.

First off, I'm not speculating about any outcome, I'm discussing how it's likely done. Secondly, it looks to me like they've alraedy figured it out and are looking to cash in. Good for them.

Look, it's not rocket science. Breeding for desired traits is something people have been doing with plants and animals for a thousand years. If you like your clownfish mostly white, shell out the exorbitant amount of cash they're charging for these things. You aren't getting anything all that unique, IMO.

Now, cross two different species of clownfish to make something completely new, and that would be something.

 

[Fishboy42]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6605720#post6605720 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Frank Mularo
Why not discuss it? What harm is there in that? If we're not fish breeders, we can't talk about the process? Please.

I think we should just be careful how it is discussed to make sure that people aren't misinformed. Discussion is fine, but speculation that is interpreted by others as fact could be dangerous.

Breeding for desired traits is something people have been doing with plants and animals for a thousand years.

Probably more like 10k years The problem is that we've only been working with clowns for a few generations.

Now, cross two different species of clownfish to make something completely new, and that would be something.

This phenomenon has been reported on RC several times. One of note is the tomato x ocellaris cross. Also maroon x ocellaris, ocellaris x percula, and frenatus x melanopus, among others.