I spoke with Frank Baensch breifly about his Centropyge efforts, his comment was that the culture of the copepds used made it near impossible for a home breeder, and economically unfeasible even for a large aquaculture facility like RCT. Loving a good challenge, I ask him for more details on the copepods used, and their culture method.
He said to be successful, they had over thirty 60 gallon tubs to seperate enough larvae from the broodstock to feed three batches of fry. I bet with one batch, and a lot of hard work, it could be done. I'm sure you're not doing it expecting financial gain, you might be dissapointed if you are
I wanted to do Flames just for the chellenge...problem for me is getting a pair that won;t kill each other. At $50+ a pop, I quit trying after a few.
Being as you live near the ocean, it might just be possible for you. I had an idea for a multi-stage plankton tow, with filter screens graduating from large to very small. The larger pods would get filtered out in the early (large screen) stage, leaving only the nauplii in the last (smallest) stage. Frank thought that was a good idea, but it's 6 hours to the sea from here
Here is a copy of the last email, I should still have the others, but can't locate them at the moment. He did say the centropyge fry were "very similar" to the "larger angels"...kinda vague, but maybe it will help you some. Good luck, and DO keep us posted!
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Hi Jason,
Sorry for the late response.
The copepods we use for rearing Centropyge larvae are collected from the wild.
The larvae feed on the nauplii of two species in the early stages (the critical stages) up to about day 20.
One was identified as a Clausocalanus species, the other as Oithona sp.
I wrote several articles on the subject back in 2002-2003.
Hereรฦรยขรยข"ลกรยฌรยข"ลพรยขs a reference to get you started:
Baensch, F. 2003. Marine Copepods and the Culture of Two New Pygmy Angelfish Species. Freshwater and Marine Aquarium Magazine. Vol. 26. No. 7: pp 156 รฦรยขรยข"ลกรยฌรยขรขโยฌร
โ 162.
My best recommendations to you would be to try and do some near shore plankton tows if you live close to the ocean and see what species you get.
Best of luck.
Frank
- and tank height.
