clown fish room!

[wild_one123]

Ok i am going to start a breeding programe for clowns
I plan to get 110 liter tanks and have one anemone to each tank once mature, i will only have a 150watt bulb over each tank for the anemone, i might get some corals but mostlickly just LR and LS, and a anemone. I plan to drill every tank, so the top tank flows into the tank under it until it reaches the sump then pumped up the top to start over again. i plan to have 6 tanks to a sump. These are the clowns that i want, i will graduly add the tanks, and the fish.

Great barrier reef clown
Two banded clown
Mairition Clown
Orange-fin clown
Clarks clown
Saddleback clown
Tomatoe clown
Seychelles clown
Wide band clown
True percula clown
Black onyx clown

Im going to have a go at bulding the fish room, or im going to get a shed and do a bit of DIY. If i get the fish at a few cm's when will they be at breedable size? because it will cost me allot of $$ to start this and will try to provide NZ with affordable clowns and provide LFS. Does anyone have any links to marine fish rooms? i need a few ideas. Thanks

 

[CanesDave]

In the fish breeding forum there are a few threads with pictures of fishrooms. Your plan sounds like a good start but the tough thing is waiting for fish to mature and start to spawn.

 

[dantodd]

Good luck on your endeavour. A few comments if you don't mind.

A) Start with a few pair of ocellaris. These are the most marketable fish and grow to marketable size quickly. Percula are great too but take a long time to mature. Black and White ocellaris are particularly marketable here in the states and demand about 3X the price of an orange.

B) Many of the rare clownfish like latz and akindynos are difficult to get to spawn and/or raise the fry. Don't think that just dropping them in a good tank will start making money for you. If you ever get them breeding at all it will likely be a while. Of course the good news is that they demand a serious premium but remember that ornamental hatcheries like TMC and ORA have multiple pairs of all these clowns and are so far unable to get them to market.

C) Tank size. 110 litres is more than you really need for ocellaris and percula many in the US breed them in 10gallon (38litre) tanks. Some of the bigger fish, especially the ones that can be hard to get breeding might like a little more room and even a surge system.

D) I would set up the tanks on a couple levels with a common large sump/filter system underneath and a common drain rather than a cascade down from one tank to the next. This will als allow you to use fewer lights with less wasted heat, electricity and light. I'd probably recommend T5's over Mh for your plan, it will light multiple tanks better.

E) Don't forget a lavral/growout setup too.

F) check out fishboy42's system on rareclownfish.com he has a great plumbing system figured out which I think might work well for your broodstock system too. It is also a good design for expanding as you can build the plumbing sytem and add tanks as needed and put in larger filtration/sumps as needed too. http://www.rareclownfish.com/forums/showthread.php?t=404&highlight=growout+system

 

[phender]

Good luck, I have a couple comments as well.

1) Although I love the clownfish/anemone interaction, if you are wanting to get a breeding program going, do not include anemones, live rock or sand in your breeding tanks. The amount of food necessary to get pairs into spawing shape creates water conditions that are not good for anemones and great for all sorts of algae. The live rock and sand just make it more difficult to keep things clean. Its ok to use the live rock in your sump, but not the breeding tanks. Clowns are perfectly happy laying eggs on flower pots or ceramic tiles, they don't need anemones.

2) If you really want to supply the demands of people in NZ, then about half your breeding pairs should be plain orange ocellaris. They are by far the number 1 selling clownfish and they are the easiest to get to market. One LFS might buy 50 ocellaris at a time. They won't carry more than 10 of any other clown.

3) As Dan said, your 110 liter tanks will more than you need for ocellaris and percula, about right for the tomatoes, but you will likely need tanks between 160-200 liters for the clowns in the clarki and polymnus complexes.