Picasso and True Perc laying eggs- rookie help for hatchery setup

jlnielsen13

jlnielsen13

New member
Hey RC,

So my Male Bali Aquarich Picasso and my female true Perc are regularly laying eggs. I decided to give raising clownfish a try and have ordered all the supplies needed from Reed Mariculture to be ready for the next batch- one will hatch tonight but I'm not ready for them. Although I have been maintaining reefs for 20 years I am a rookie when it comes to raising fry!

I figured I would start a thread of my journey and kindly ask for any tips and advice that you experienced reefers may have!

Here is a picture of the pair, my tank, and the hatchery I have set up so far. Lots of equipment coming in this week.

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Thanks in advance for all the advice!

- JIM
 
gorgeous tank! following along since i'm interested in trying my hand at this in the not too distant future...

are you letting the eggs hatch in the display tank and then attempting to move over the babies?
 
adoptaspork said:
gorgeous tank! following along since i'm interested in trying my hand at this in the not too distant future...

are you letting the eggs hatch in the display tank and then attempting to move over the babies?
Click to expand...

I haven't decided yet so that's an excellent question that I will need to figure out!

I have two options- take out rock on hatch day and place it down in the fish room hatchery or try the flashlight method in the tank and hopefully the light attracts all the fry an I can scoop them up in a bucket??

The first batch hatched last night so I should be up and running by this Wednesday with rotifers. If they lay a new batch this week hopefully I will be good to go!

Thanks
JIM
 
Try getting a tile where they lay on the rock for future spawns, otherwise use some ridged airline tubing on the end of airline and try to syphon them off when there ready.

The reason you want to do that is so you can give them a dip in some hydrogen peroxide to kill any bacteria on them. It really helps with survivability. If you pull the rock you risk the chance of spooking the fish and making they hold off laying. Sometimes they don't care others it could be 6 months or more before they start again.
 
Using a large black tub with a little water is the best way to hatch them, after a few days you can use a slow drip of new water and use that to fill the tub u till after meta happens. It keeps the water clean like waterchanges but water changes on new fry usually dont go well, not having clean water kills a bunch and many of the rest will be deformed. The slow drip solves that. Otohime is good from a few days on. No need for freshly hatched baby brine shimp. That's been known to kill them I. Some instances from light shock.
 
Also keep a light on half the tub 24 hours a day after hatch. Just aim it at a wall so there dark area if they want to be in the dark. They need light to feed on rots untill meta and will feed around the clock between you feeding them otohime.
 
That is a beautiful tank Jim and one you should do a thread on in the Soft corals forum. You could be selected as a contender for TOTM? Might give it a try if you're interested.

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Dkuhlmann said:
That is a beautiful tank Jim and one you should do a thread on in the Soft corals forum. You could be selected as a contender for TOTM? Might give it a try if you're interested.

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Click to expand...

Thanks! Man it would be incredible to be considered for TOTM!! Not sure how that works but appreciate the comment!!
 
Well,

The clowns have laid their second batch since I got things moving. This time in another location on the back of the tank. Bad news is it is really hard to get to and may be impossible to get the eggs.

Tomorrow, my rotifers come in from Reed Mariculture. I should have everything ready to go for their arrival.

I have 2 five gallon buckets with their custom fittings and will be splitting the culture in two buckets. In my mind I hope this will help when I have a crash having a spare bucket but in reality if one bucket crashes the other probably will as well.

We will see!

JIM
 
Many people that breed clowns use a piece of tile for the fish to lay eggs on, that way it's easy to take out and moved right before the fry hatch.
 
Set up the rotifers last night. Not sure I have everything up and running correctly. I bought the Reed mariculture system and I'm not getting a lot of bubbles from the airline.

Eggs look good in the tank, going to try the light and suction method I think to get them out, hopefully that works??

Tips appreciated!

JIM
 
I'm watching intently, as my clownfishes just laid their 3rd clutch of eggs and I'm debating whether to go all-in and try to raise them.

I bought M. Wittenrich's book on fish breeding and J. Wilkerson's book on clownfish breeding and I feel MUCH better about how to approach actually raising the fishes and raising them in a healthy way. Might be worth you taking a look, since you've already invested some $$$ in your setup.

I also recall someone setting up a reverse funnel for capturing the larvae with a dim light, some contraption hanging at the top of the tank at night. I'll keep looking, but it seemed like an easy enough way to go. I can't recall if I saw it in Coral Magazine or online.

If worse comes to worse, you can try turning most of your flow off the night of the hatch, and then in the AM before the lights come on, try capturing them at the surface with a light and bowl.

Looking forward to seeing how it comes out. Good luck!
 
Good looking setup there Jim. You appear to be well prepared!

Several years back I decided to raise Clowns and have been hooked since. It's truly an awesome experience watching their physical and social development. They have such cool personalities, some good, some naughty...lol

If I could offer one piece of advice from personal experience It would be to lose the bubbles in the Rotifer cultures. I found early on that I was effectively skimming the Rotifer food...not good. After going with a larger diameter outlet tubing the skimming effect was eliminated and my culture production skyrocketed.

HTH and good luck!

Joe
 
Thanks for the comments and advice... I hope I didn't kill my rotifers as the water doesn't seem to be changing shades of green???

Got all ready last night and shut off the lights/pumps for hatch night (day8) but it didn't happen. Hopefully will tonight as I will give it another try.

The flashlight technique attracted all kinds of micro organisms so hopefully it will work with clownfish as well!!

Thanks
JIM
 
Well...

Hatch night isn't going as planned. I caught four but was only able to transfer one to the fry tank. No others have hatched and I am sure this is Day nine. I feel like if I go to bed they will all hatch over night!!

Argh!

Turned off lights one more time, gonna wait 30 minutes and then give it one last try!

Jim
 
Thanks for the update. I was planning on just either dialing down my vortech the night of hatching, or turning it off entirely, and then going in the early AM and doing the light capture. I figured the fry couldn't deal with flow.

Looking forward to seeing how your experience goes. My wife just okayed (almost insisted) that now that we have our third clutch of eggs, we try to actually raise them, but we have no room because of our tiny NYC apartment, so I'll be seeing what I can cram into maybe 2.5g tanks and 2 liter bottles. So thanks for the video and looking forward to updates :)
 
Well it looks like there are at least some eggs left, do they sometimes hatch day 10??

If they are there tonight I will give it another try!

Fed the clowns that did survive so far (about 4-5).

I'll keep ya posted,
JIM
 
Big night!

So far I have caught around 20-30 using a siphon 1by1....


The process seems to work and the light has attracted everyone that I have caught so far.

Couple of tips for siphoning to help future hatchers:
Siphon head on! If you approach from behind or the side they feel the siphon and Bolt... FAST!

Well, back for another round!

Updates to come - JIM
 
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