I know its up to the fish but.....

Red254

Member
I bought a BTA last week and it looks pretty happy to me. My ocellaris clowns havent even noticed it yet. now i know that its up to the fish if they want to host but ive read on here a few times that if you print out a picture of clowns hosting in anemone that the clowns figure it out faster


is this true? has anyone had experience with this?
 
Never done that, every time I add an anemone it takes my clowns a while to introduce themselves. Usually 1-4 weeks at most. I have has some that just refuse the anemone though. Just give it time. I usually wake up and one morning they are just magically sleeping in it.
 
my clowns took about 3, 4 months before they warmed up to the nems! It may have been that the nems had to grow a bit or my aquascape change could've sparked some interest ..I dunno, JME
 
+1, it usually takes a while, but sometimes they will dart right in when introduced. My Picasso was in a 20g, with btas that she hosted. When it was time to go to the 75g, with an existing haddoni, when she was in the net after acclimation, i put the net in front of the anemone and she darted out and hosted it. I would not recommend this tho.lol
There is a chance the anemone doesn't want the clownfish to host yet and the clown will get stung then possibly die.
As of right now my picasso x onyx pair are in a tank with a bta (avatar) and have not gone in it yet. Which is suprising because she has a reputation of hosting nems or corals fast, But they look very interested :)

Patience is key.
 
It was most likely luck for me but I tried this strategy out. In one tank my clowns were in the anemone 2 days after taping the picture on the glass. The other clowns took one week after putting the picture up.
 
I know several people Who used this trick and it worked, that said, one guy placed his laptop next to the tank and played a repeating loop of a clown going nuts in a nem, and that worked within an hour.
 
I tried it and had no luck, left the picture up for over a week. Gave up and decided if they want to make their way to my BTAs they will eventually. They seem content in my xenia for now lol
 
I've seen several posts over the years that people say it works. But who's to say they weren't ready to check them out. :lol: Mine took about a month and then they became evil clowns. Fighting ever since. They do sleep in separate anemones at night.
 
hmm, would the fish even see it ?

FWIW, I have had 2 pair of clown, one pair hosting my carpet, other pair waiting for the hosting pair to come out so they can attack them lol the second pair hasnt hosted anything in 1 year now !

both pairs were captive bred.
 
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I think I need to do this for my kids at home...

1) Clean Room
2) Take out trash
3) Do Homework
4) stop stealing money from my wallet when I sleep


Can you make that up in a continuous loop... I want the whole thing to be about an hour long though.
 
I'm not sure about the picture thing. I put one up and all the clown did was swim to the other side of the tank. I did notice sting marks on him prior to the picture trick and every now and then he will swim down and stare at it. I might try the video looping thing though.
 
Monkey see monkey do. My black and white oce that watched the orange one live in Xenia, but was never allowed near it. When I separated them and put him in another tank with a rbta, he went right into it. Then when I introduced their new mates, the hosting started as soon as the initial nipping subsided.
 
I will try the picture thing out tonight and report back. I have a couple clowns that have shown no interest in my RBTA.
 
What if we printed a picture saying "The anemone does the hosting, not the clownfish", do you think the reefer would figure that out finally?

Nah, I don't think so either.
 
Several days have passed and it doesn't look like the RBTA is paying any attention to the picture! Switching to video this weekend!
 
Let's be nice with the 'hosting' thing here. ;)


You could just wait it out. :lol:
 
the only thing that works is patience..i waited 4 or 5 months maybe longer..i forget..i just realized that the nem was awesome so were myc lowns and if they happened to be together in the end it was a +1 but i didnt try to control it either way..
 
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