Have i got a prego? Or just two nasty clownfish that arent alike?

aaa1234

Member
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Ok so the first pic is of the two hangin out by my hammer coral. The second pic is of my suspected "prego". And the third is a solo pic of the "male, possibly wrong kind of clown"

My questions are pretty simple. I had the "prego" clown in my tank for about a month and a half, so it was my established dominant one in my scheme of mating these two. After it had become comfortable and almost lonely, i purchased the clown you see in the 3rd picture. At first glance, one would think they are different kinds, thats what i though. The guy at the lfs said that if the new clown isnt dead within the first week (from the other killing it) then ive got two of the same. This clown was also about 1/4 the size bigger than my "prego".
SO
About a month has gone by almost with both clowns living together. Within the past couple of days, i have noticed that my "prego" has outgrown the other one (I mentioned before that this one was smaller upon introducing the new clown) Also, the belly on it is starting to look like my dads beer belly.
As for the behavior of the two, the prego one seems to like to have the anemone and hammer coral to itself, however, my other clown (from now on B) gets to host in them once in a while only to have prego chase it off and nip at it. To put their behavior into simpler words, Prego is a biatch and clown b is taking it all in stride. Also a lot of twitching, shaking, spasming, whatever you want to call it is occurring. They will swim at one another, turn to their side, and twitch.
I only wish getting that girl on the other side of the room was as simple as spasming my body....

What is everyone's insight on this?
 
The smaller fish is a percula clown(probably captive bred base on the gill covers). The larger clown is an ocellaris. It is not unusual for them to accept each other and even mate.

I am not clear on your "prego" clown. Is she always that fat? A female with that many eggs would be laying them tomorrow (if they were eggs). If she has been that fat for a while, I would think she might have some internal parasites or a tumor.
 
No actually i have noticed a physical change in her size since this morning and today had been different in their behavior, thats why i finally posted...along with her size increase of course.
 
If they were going to spawn soon, they would likely be spending a lot of time cleaning a spot near the anemone.
I have raised three different species of clowns. For some reason the shape of her swollen belly doesn't look like she is carrying eggs to me. Sometimes they get partial blockages that work themselves out in a couple days.

Most ocellaris females are a little bigger (lengthwise) before they start spawning.
 
So what would you suggest? I am trying to get a maiting pair. Should i take the Occelaris back to my LFS because they sold it to me as a True Percula. Im ****ed because they told me about stores selling occelaris's as True Percs and they went and did it to me! Tell me what you would do in this situation if you just wanted a beautiful pair of mating clowns :D

Thanks for your help.
And actually, her belly does look as petruding now as it did before i originally posted this thread

-Steve
 
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