Anyone successfully breeding ORA black ocellaris?

[sonofgaladriel]

I have a 3 year old mated/bonded pair of ORA black ocellaris clowns. I've been waiting for the past year for them to spawn. No luck so far. They are very happy in my 240 and have 3 rose BTAs that they 'nest' in.
Anyone out there having any luck with them?

 

[Juck]

Mine took nearly 2 years before they spawned. The ovipositor on female Darwin Occs is black and easily seen ,,, in the weeks running up to the first spawn, you will see it protruding slightly from her underside,,, on the day of the spawn it will be sticking-out a good 3 or 4 mm.

Of course some pairs never spawn,, it;s a crapshoot. One can try to induce them to spawn by raising the temperature of the water to 80-84f,,,,, extending the light cycle to 16 or so hours,,, and simulating a serious plankton bloom by adding large amounts of live baby brine to their tank.

A disco ball and Barry White on the stereo may also help.

 

[sonofgaladriel]

Thanks Juck! Great info.
I'll order that disco ball right away. I've already got the Barry White CD

 

[Juck]

Do you have anything in the tank that bothers the clowns? They won't spawn if they don't feel secure. Mine began spawning a couple of months after I took a snowflake eel out of their tank,,,,, the female was always wary of the eel,,, I caught her slapping his head with her tail a number of times. I think taking the eel out had a lot to do with them finally spawning.

 

[Raibaru]

I can't contribute anything to the discussion at hand, but I do have a question for you. I've been told differing things from different people and since you've got a pair that have reached maturity you sound like the guy to give me the best answer!

Do your Black Oscellaris still have any orange on them? Like the tip of their nose or bottom of their belly?

Also, are yours the Australlian or the European ones?

 

[sonofgaladriel]

Juck- I do have a lot of fish in the tank with them. Several angels and another pair of orange ocellaris. The orange ocellaris have their own rose BTA on the far side of the tank and the two rarely intercede in the other's territory, but now that you mention it, I can see this being an issue.
I'm having a small, 30x30x16 tank built for a separate hadonni tank and I'll most likely move the orange pair into that tank. Maybe this will help alleviate some stress with the black pair. I had considered putting the black pair in the anemone specific tank, but heard that hadonni will ocassionally eat ocellaris. I sure don't want these beauties munched on, although they would look really nice with a red or blue hadonni
Raibaru- My pair are totally jet black with mis bar markings, no orange coloration at all. Unfortunately, I don't know their origins other than they were ORA originally, sorry.

 

[traveller7]

My ORA pair spawned regularly in a 300gal system with a few other pairs of clowns, triggers, tusk fish, eels, etc.

Male with eggs:

The orange chins have come, gone, come back without me determining the cause.

Great pair and very defensive of their space. Held off a pair of skunks and nigripes while protecting eggs from a vast number of predators in the tank.

They have been moved to isolation to see if some larvae can be raised, we'll see if they start spawing again.

Cheers.

 

[sonofgaladriel]

That's great news Scott! Thanks for sharing. I'm jealous, but there may be hope for my pair yet.
Would it be a mistake to move my pair to a hadonni specific tank to see if that will coax them into spawning?

 

[traveller7]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8104823#post8104823 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by sonofgaladriel
That's great news Scott! Thanks for sharing. I'm jealous, but there may be hope for my pair yet.
Would it be a mistake to move my pair to a hadonni specific tank to see if that will coax them into spawning?

IMHO most long term pairs that are not breeding:

1. are not fed enough.
2. have not established a comfortable breeding location
3. are not fed enough.

I am shocked by the fact, every pair of clowns except one has bred in this 300gal within 12 weeks of placement. This little nigripes fathered his first clutch 16 days after arrival:

This tank gets 1+oz of PE mysis, 1+oz of Gamma Lancefish, a gram of Cyclopeze, and a few cubes of VHP per day. It is much more like a FOWLR set up which just happens to be overtaken by anemones ;>)

Water conditions are much less then SPS quality, but feeding is over the top and they breed well, in my book that means feeding is the golden rule

Your mileage may vary.

 

[Juck]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8104622#post8104622 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Raibaru

Do your Black Oscellaris still have any orange on them? Like the tip of their nose or bottom of their belly?

Also, are yours the Australlian or the European ones?

The parents are completely black. The juveniles have orange faces but when they are removed from the other juveniles to a seperate tank, the orange face starts to disappear pretty quickly.

I really don't know the origins of either fish. The male came from saltwaterfish.com and I just assumed he was an ORA fish. The female is relatively old and may even be a W/C, I got her from a local reefer who broke down his tank,,, he got her from a LFS and had her for 3 years,,, and I've had her for over 2 years,,, she is the biggest Ocellaris I've ever seen.

 

[Juck]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8104823#post8104823 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by sonofgaladriel
Would it be a mistake to move my pair to a hadonni specific tank to see if that will coax them into spawning?

I think that's a very good idea. I believe the risk of a mature ocellaris clown being eaten by a Haddoni is small. My occs absolutely love their Hadd.

 

[sonofgaladriel]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8105075#post8105075 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by traveller7
IMHO most long term pairs that are not breeding:
1. are not fed enough.
2. have not established a comfortable breeding location
3. are not fed enough.

Hmm. I do feed a little bit of formula II flake twice a day, and a little cube of mysis once a day. But the portions are rather small (it was an predominately SPS tank for the last year), so maybe the clowns weren't getting enough to eat. Now that I've gone back to more softies, I can up the amount of food.

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8105184#post8105184 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Juck
I think that's a very good idea. I believe the risk of a mature ocellaris clown being eaten by a Haddoni is small. My occs absolutely love their Hadd.

So you think this mature pair of ocellaris would fair well in the carpet specific tank? With luck, I'm hoping to have at least two hadonnis in this tank.

 

[sonofgaladriel]

Here's my pair. Boy is it hard getting a good pic of them together!
Female:

male:

 

[Juck]

>>So you think this mature pair of ocellaris
>>would fair well in the carpet specific tank?

Sure do. Though I think anything more than one anemone could be a distraction for the smaller clown. Two well fed Haddoni's would fill a 30x30 tank in no-time.

Nice looking fish,,,, interesting mis-bars. Which one is the female?

 

[Juck]

Sorry,, I just noticed you labelled them as male and female. You're a bit out-of-luck because your female is missing the lower part of her middle stripe,,,, with a white underbelly, the ovipositor is much easier to spot,,, seeing it kinda gives you a heads-up that clown-humping is imminent.

 

[Juck]

>>Juck- I do have a lot of fish in the tank with them.

No, right now they are in a 75g with 4 peppermint shrimp only,, and their Haddoni,,, no other fish or corals. I used to have a pair of Pajama Cardinals and two firefish in there but I took them out.