Otohime users...

K

Kathy55g

In Memoriam
Hi,
I have a batch of larvae that were raised on rotifers, a couple of days of nhbs, and Otohime diet. This is the first batch of otohime fish I've raised. They are well past metamorphosis, and now for the past 2 weeks, the majority of them have lived on the bottom of the tank. I tried to get them to swim up into the water, but they will not go. I think they have no swim bladder.

This was a different bunch of larvae from previous hatches. Most survival rate I have ever had, but a lot of them have jaw deformities and now this bottom dwelling thing. Also, these guys are from parents that stopped spawning immediately after laying this nest. So there may have been something amiss from the parents, but could it have been the Otohime? Anyone else see deformities in their juvies?

Thanks,
Kathy
 
Kathy,

My first set that I raised on Otohime (same basic feeding schedule as you) did fine. I kept one of them for a freinds tank and he is 3 months old today (I've been selling mine to an aquaculture facility right after meta).

I recently changed out a rock in my tank, and the clowns freaked and ate their eggs, and stop laying. Last Sunday they finally spawned again, so I'll be trying again next week.

Good luck with them...mine do eat otohime off the bottom, but they don't stay there all the time.

Jason
 
Only the one batch, here, but I don't see any jaw issues. I do have lots of misbars, but those were mostly clear before I started Otohime. Also, I have a couple with ragged fins, but I haven't determined yet if that is due to aggression damage or if they did not grow in properly.
 
Are they actually laying on the tank bottom as if unable to swim? Or just hovering near the bottom but swimming normally? I just got the otohime "sample pack" and I'm not impressed, I guess it never occured to me to ask if it floated or not, I assumed it would. It's going to take some serious "retraining" to get my older juvies to eat off the tank floor, they just refuse to do that. I'm thinking if yours were primarily raised on oto then they are hanging out at the bottom because that's where the food lives :D

FWIW at 3-4 weeks I transfer my fish form the isolated larval tanks to "bottomless" tanks in the main system, that's why I'm so disappointed in the sinking otohime. Basically baskets, they are 5.5 gallon tanks with the bottom panel removed and window screen in it's place. Sure makes cleaning easy :D They stay there for a month or so until I need the tanks for the next batch, then they go to 15 gal growout tanks. By that time it's about impossible to get them eating off "the floor". So about the only use I might get out of the oto is the first 2 weeks after rots. I'm gonna try and crush up all the larger sizes and screen them down to the 125-250um range.
 
I think that the Oto A is a nice size to feed the young ones and get them eating dry food. My Oto A does not sink, but stays floating and slowly becomes incorporated into the water column. It takes long enough to do this that the larvae see it very nicely.

The larger sizes do sink faster, as you would expect.
 
They scoot along the bottom as though they have no positive bouyancy. Wilkerson describes this phenomenon and calls it a swim bladder defect that will not cure with time. They perch on the PVC on the bottom, but if I put my hand in the water, I can push them around on the floor of the aquarium, they move as a group unit, and they do not swim into the water column. I have about 50-75 juvies in this group. Other siblings swim in the water and check out the sides of the tank, the pvc, the overflow, the feeding ring, the airline tubing, etc. They are all over. The majority, I am afraid, have the bladder problem, though. I had high hopes for this group as these are the most numerous survivors of my husbandry so far, not including the one week old ones that have yet to metamorphosize. As Nicole says, don't count your gobies until they met. Goes for clownfish, too.
 
So now what? If they are truely "incurable" you know the ethical question you will have to face. I am sorry about that, I'm sure my day will come and I do not look forward to it.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7171625#post7171625 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Kathy55g
Wilkerson describes this phenomenon and calls it a swim bladder defect that will not cure with time
Click to expand...
I think she dubbed them"belly sliders".Nasty thing,IÃ"šÃ‚´m glad I never had one.
 
For those who have fed oto A to larvae- can you tell if they are eating it by a color change in the belly like with bbs? I just tried a small dab on some 4 day tomato clowns, think 4 days is too early? Some of the bellies seem more "cream" colored than silver. The toms hatch out bigger than my oc's, I'm pretty sure they can take bbs today but I'll probably hold off until tomorrow. The ocellaris are at 3 days, way too small for oto, right?
 
This earlier hatch that I am concerned about: they ate Oto A like it was going out of style. They had huge bellies and they were orange/cream, and it could not be due to rots or bbs. In fact I hardly fed them any bbs because I thought they were already full enough 1/2 hour after Oto A.

My new hatch from my own clownfish get rounded bellies after eating, but not as huge as the previous hatch from my friend's parent clownfish.

I was just reading in Hoff's Conditioning.... book that healthy larvae are hatched transparent, like my friend's larvae, and stressed larvae are dark, like my larvae......

I wonder if that's true. Funny they should be stressed, but not die as the previous hatches did. I have had very little death: about 1 per day for the first few days and perhaps 5 per day for the last 5 days or so. There are lots and lots of larvae....

Meanwhile, it is day 10 for my larvae and they are changing from the dark pigmentation to orange. Still no sign of headbands, though. My friend's larvae had headbands on day 10, very consistently. Hmm...
 
FWIW
My clowns tend to stay together and only enter the water column seperating themselves at feeding time. They also like to stay at the bottom corner in a ball. They are percs and are just about 6weeks. I thought it might be swim bladder, but they seem to be able to go into the column when they want.

Kevin
 
Kathy,
The diet you are using is identical to mine with my Oc's. But I haven't experienced any problems like your having. I have had a couple of isolated deaths suddenly of 30 day olds but everyone else has seemed fine. The ones that have died like this tend to be smaller then their brothers and sisters.

I have had 4 batches on Oto and it has worked great. Only used nhbbs for two days (on days 5 and 6) then 2 days of 50/50 then 75% Oto and 25% F1.
The first couple of batches on Oto seemed a little pale so started mixing in the F1 and the color has come back and fish seem a little more lively. I am currently using A, B1, B2, and C were required.

Sorry to here the fish stopped laying eggs. Did you happen to change their light schedule suddenly with the recent time change? Just a thought.

Hope everything works out!
 
Thanks Lance one. The fish stopped laying long before the time change. They are in my friend's tank. It is a beautiful reef tank --just gorgeous-- and his main aim is for it to stay that way. He uses all kinds of additives, and we had a disasterous hatch after chemi-clean, but I thought that part was over. His clowns are quite old, too, and may have stopped due to old age. Then again, they may be just taking a break. He told me that they sometimes do that.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7174152#post7174152 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Lance one
[B

then 75% Oto and 25% F1.
The first couple of batches on Oto seemed a little pale so started mixing in the F1 and the color has come back and fish seem a little more lively. I am currently using A, B1, B2, and C were required.

[/B]
Click to expand...

F1=formula one:confused:
 
Are they growing as fast as your previous batches? Fishes with swim bladder problems often develop spinal deformities and they tend to grow slower (since they do spend more energy swimming around). If they are growing at the same rate their swimming behavior may indeed be related to habit. :D
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7175801#post7175801 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ediaz
Do they look that they are just chilling on the bottom slowly moving their tail?

Ed
Click to expand...

Yes.

Day before yesterday I cleaned their corner and their pvc pile. Yesterday they swam up to meet some food . Then back down.
I autofeed them so I am not always there when feeding happens.

I wonder if they have just decided the corner is their home anemone and they are reluctant to leave. .
 
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