Picasso Pairs

[Arati]

Um .. OK but if they spawn after this week I get dibs

Really though. The one Picasso is Wild and may never develope the deeps blacks common with ORA picasso's who if im not mistaken the F0 ORA pair was a Female Onyx and the male a picasso. Thats why we see so much black on the ora picasso's

I have had the pleasure of looking at colbys female upclose and it looks to me like she has already spawned. That would mean she was spawning in the wild. as we all know its impossible to be accurate about a wc clownfish's age since the can remain sub adults for year. It is at least possible to say if a female clownfish that had spawned at least once is at least 11/2 years old or more.

Like colby said the males can be really little and still spawn.

More VIDS!

 

[Colby88]

I will post some more videos this afternoon, as well as a video of one of my little Onyx pairs.

The female picasso has been eating non-stop, and I feed my broodstock pairs at a minimum ten times a day, so they are always pretty happy. Their temp is also at 84f and I'm going to work on increasing the REDOX later this week to add the icing to the cake, and that should get them going.

Unfortunately I have run out of fish roe which is normally how I would try and coax a reluctant pair into laying for me, but like I said they look like they want to lay.

The pair in the first video should also start going any time now. I believe that they had a false spawn last week when the video of was shot. You can see she had a nice potbelly going on there, but no eggs and she slimmed down a bit. I have only had her fopr about six weeks so I'm still trying to figure out what she likes. The reason I think it was a false spawn was because:

The male cleaned like crazy for four days...
The female ate like a pig for a week prior...
Then the female stopped eating...
The pair got very mean...

AND THEN...nothing lol

After the female hydrated and didn't lay eggs when she deficated it looked oily which to me indicates that she was passing all the lipids that she had stored and used to develop eggs. However she is packing on weight again and the cleaning activities from both fish have greatly increased in the past 48 hours so hopefully a spawn from them should happen this week...

Colby

 

[Arati]

Hey Colby If you can't get roe try the live black worms people use for fresh water. Just feed them one at a time becuase the worms will die ina few seconds from the salt and rott.

I have a few friends that swear by them for inducing breeding.

 

[Colby88]

Thanks, I do feed blackworms typically once a week, as long as I can get clean ones. I haven't had a batch for about two weeks, but I have some coming in to the shop that ill try.

Colby

 

[Colby88]

Ok well, we got a delivery of worms today (of course on my day off...) so I picked some up and fed it out to my pairs.

Anyway, as asked for here are some more videos plus a video of one of my Onyx pairs. The larger one is WC from Bali and the male from the hatchery I work for (C-Quest). They are still small but have been cleaning a bit the past few days. They have some growing up to do before they lay, but hopefully by summer time. You can kind of see the female perc getting chunky again...

Onyx Pair


Picasso x Picasso



Picasso x Percula



Colby

 

[Colby88]

Well both pairs are looking great and loving the worms.

The picasso x picasso pairs tank is due for a water change tonight so I'm going to try a few more tricks to get them to spawn starting tonight.

The pair has been at 84f with 16hrs of light a day and moonlight. For reluctant spawners I've induced an initial spawn via simulated rainstorm and faux plankton bloom.

My plan is to do a 50 percent water change this evening and reduce the specific gravity from roughly 1.025 down to 1.020 over the course of a few hours. I'm also going to increase the turbidity of the water and simulate a plankton bloom via additions of live artemia nauplii, live phyto and some copepods.

I think that doing all these things and simulating the wet season (breeding season) should be enough to get the pair spawning sooner than later. I'm also waiting for my fish roe to get here.

Does anyone else here have suggestions on how they have increased water turbidity? I have used the detritus from a sponge filter before, however I don't like the side effects lol.

Colby

 

[Colby88]

Here is an updated video of the pair. I have been feeding them black worms and flooding the tank with copepods and phyto on a daily basis and they have increased in activity big time. You can see in the video that the female has joined in the cleaning.

 

[blazing]

sup Colby88 if ur Picasso Pair breads how about sellin me a couple?

 

[Colby88]

I don't want to get this thread closed, so anyone with questions regarding progeny please just pm me.

They have been cleaning together a ton lately, so I am hoping spawning will be soon.

I am pretty amazed at how quickly they have progressed since I got the female on March 24th and paired these two on the 27th. So, they have been together for 18 days!

Colby

 

[blazing]

Ok may bad dude. Well that's a nice pair u got there they. Since u owen a lot of clonws could u tell me if its normal that my true percs always chill at the top of my tank? And sometimes they go to a certain rock and kinda chill there. Do u know y that is? I only seen them chill at the rock a few times but they only go to that certain part of the rock.

 

[blazing]

any updates on the pair?

 

[Heterodonut]

Colby, you mind sharing who has roe for sale at this time. Mullet roe season is usually at years end. It's been hard to come by lately.

 

[Arati]

Unpacked in a direct shipment from Bali on 2/20/09

I am verry impressed Colby you obviously know your stuff. Good luck.

 

[Colby88]

Just an update.

I got a spawn last night! The perc female x picasso male spawned yesterday.

The picasso x picasso pair is doing great. I noticed a tiny bit of ich on the female a couple weeks ago, so as a precaution I removed the anemone and lowered the salinity. The ich went away after about a week and I now feel confident it its gone, so I began raising the salinity again several days ago. Once I started bringing the salinity up again the pair instantly resumed cleaning together, so spawning there should not be too far off!

But in the mean time the perc x picasso pair will be giving me some babies to raise!

The nest was very very small as it was the first spawn for the female in a while, but I'm pretty confident the next nest will be 500 plus eggs.

Colby

 

[Magga Pie]

Thats great congrats!! How long have u had the pair that spawned?

 

[Colby88]

Thanks! I put the pair together around 8 - 9 weeks ago.

I am very excited to see how many babies come out picasso!

Colby

 

[ILLiDaN]

Whats your opinion on how you got them to spawn that quick? Also how are you c-quest onyx juvies doing?

 

[Magga Pie]

Do they sleep together at night? I have a pair of picasso's but they dont sleep together so I dont know if they are a pair?. They are in a 12g tank. My other 2 pairs of clowns 1 which are spawning sleep together so im not sure.

 

[Colby88]

Well, if they aren't sleeping together yet then they haven't fully established themselves as a pair yet. How long have they been together? Are there any other fish in the tank?

I get my fish to spawn so quickly by emulating nature...

When I get a new pair here is what I do...

They go into QT with hyposalinity for a while and I treat them with cyropro for deworming and metro in their food for internal parasites. I do that for two weeks. During that time period and for two weeks after I keep them on a 10 hour photoperiod and at about 78 degrees. I feed sparingly, just enough to keep them happy. After about four weeks I begin to raise the salinity, temp and light cycle until it hits 1.021, 16hrs of light and 84F. I also flood the tank with phyto and live zooplankton on a daily basis. After a week or so of that I will add a nightlight as well. Typically this will get them cleaning a lot. Then after two additional weeks I do a 60 percent water change and drop the salinity down to 1.017. Of course during this time I am stuffing them full of food. I feed atleast ten times a day all they will eat. I highly advise using roe, black worms (only after they have been thouroughly rinsed several times a day for atleast a week to remove parasites) as well as squid and mysis. I also feed spirulina very heavily, many people overlook the importance of algae in their diet. Spirulina is a green/blue cyanobacteria that that is essential for clownfish. In the wild their diet consists of roughly 80 percent algae/cyanobacteria. For this reason I let my broodstock tanks get covered with the stuff. Spirulina is not the only species of cyano that I have found in my tanks when I look under the microscope, but the clownfish seem to enjoy the other species as well.

Following this protocol I am often successful in getting clowns to spawn within 4-12 weeks, assuming they are sexually mature.

That being said, if you are starting with CB broodstock often times simply maintaining them on a good regular schedule is all that is needed to induce a spawning event.

HTH,

Colby

 

[ILLiDaN]

Thanks for the explanation and info. A little bit more off topic, but with the knowledge you have clowns losing their onyx coloration being wc or cb have you found what may or may not be affecting this? Also keeping juvies and low light such as refugiums, help improve this trait because of the young age? thanks in advance