reproducing clams?
- Thread starter cdcq12
- Start date
JaredWaites
Premium Member
Yeah, where some are wild and some are maricultured meaning they are farmed in the ocean. Its a type of aquaculture.
But I have to disagree with skinz78, as I have seen them spawn in an aquarium with my own two eyes...but the chances of their gametes actually producing offspring that lives and grows up to be an adult is slim...although possible.
Oh if your wondering what size the aquarium was it was a 200 gallon with a large foot print.
But I have to disagree with skinz78, as I have seen them spawn in an aquarium with my own two eyes...but the chances of their gametes actually producing offspring that lives and grows up to be an adult is slim...although possible.
Oh if your wondering what size the aquarium was it was a 200 gallon with a large foot print.
It's actually very possible in a 200 gallon aquarium.
You will have to get a broodstock together, generally 4" long clams are able to breed.
Use a large broodstock aquarium, dose it with live phytoplankton 10x more then you would a regular reef tank. Then, take one of the clams out of the tank, put it on it's side in the sun for 30 minutes, and then place it back into the broodstock aquarium. This will stress out the clam greatly, and it will think that it's species it threatened. Turn off all of your pumps and powerheads. You will start seeing the poor clam start to gyrate, during these gyrations, you can see some sperm and/or egg be released from it's opening. Once the other clams detect the sperm/egg in the water, all of the other clams will start releasing their eggs/sperm.
To collect this large amount of sperm and egg, you will need siphons, buckets, and clamps. Siphon up the streams of eggs and sperm and put each clams muck into a separate bucket. Do a very quick water change on the broodstock aquarium.
Then, take and look under a microscope at what each individual bucket contains, label them sperm and egg. Now, clams produce way too much sperm compaired to eggs, so if you just mix the buckets, the sperm will eat away at the eggs because there are too many, and you will never make a single veliger.
Measure out in a graduated cylander approximately 250ml of sperm to 1000ml of eggs. (I'm taking a shortcut here, you are supposed to do a long equasion to find out exactly how many sperm there is in the sample and how much egg is in the sample) It's generally a 1:4 or 1:8 ratio.
Put the sperm in the eggs, and put them in a black rubbermaid container, the same setup as if you were rearing clownfish. The black on the sides lets the little veligers find food easier.
Now it's time to do the greenwater method. Slowly drip live phytoplankton into the water until you can see a green tint. This will give them something to eat. Then, take and check their states under the microscope to make sure that some are developing. DO NOT do a water change on them for at least the first two weeks.
Then start dosing with live rotifers (I think) Once they start to develop into the later stages, you need to dose with some zooanthillae. You are going to have to sacrifice a clam to do this. Find your prettiest clam that you can find, and cut a very large piece of the mantle off. Put it in a blender and take a sieve and strain the liquid into saltwater of an sg of 1.022 or at least try to match the sg of the rearing tank. Place in the liquid directly into the tank. This will let the clams ingest the zoanthillae so that they can put pigmented algae into their mantles.
Once they are in the later stages and starting to settle down, you will need to put them perhaps on cured bricks into a large aquarium with strong lighting and low to medium flow. Keep trying the greenwater method in the large tank. You have to put them on bricks so that they can settle down into cracks and feel safe. The only things that affect new clams is overgrowth of algae and starvation. little clams are not big enough to rely on the light as the only source of food.
The only thing about rearing clams is that every clam can produce 250,000 offspring.
IF, which is a big IF, you can even have a successful rearing operation, you will probably not be able to sell them all before they start to die of starvation or you just get tired of doing it.
It's a big deal, and is best done in mariculturing operations.
You will have to get a broodstock together, generally 4" long clams are able to breed.
Use a large broodstock aquarium, dose it with live phytoplankton 10x more then you would a regular reef tank. Then, take one of the clams out of the tank, put it on it's side in the sun for 30 minutes, and then place it back into the broodstock aquarium. This will stress out the clam greatly, and it will think that it's species it threatened. Turn off all of your pumps and powerheads. You will start seeing the poor clam start to gyrate, during these gyrations, you can see some sperm and/or egg be released from it's opening. Once the other clams detect the sperm/egg in the water, all of the other clams will start releasing their eggs/sperm.
To collect this large amount of sperm and egg, you will need siphons, buckets, and clamps. Siphon up the streams of eggs and sperm and put each clams muck into a separate bucket. Do a very quick water change on the broodstock aquarium.
Then, take and look under a microscope at what each individual bucket contains, label them sperm and egg. Now, clams produce way too much sperm compaired to eggs, so if you just mix the buckets, the sperm will eat away at the eggs because there are too many, and you will never make a single veliger.
Measure out in a graduated cylander approximately 250ml of sperm to 1000ml of eggs. (I'm taking a shortcut here, you are supposed to do a long equasion to find out exactly how many sperm there is in the sample and how much egg is in the sample) It's generally a 1:4 or 1:8 ratio.
Put the sperm in the eggs, and put them in a black rubbermaid container, the same setup as if you were rearing clownfish. The black on the sides lets the little veligers find food easier.
Now it's time to do the greenwater method. Slowly drip live phytoplankton into the water until you can see a green tint. This will give them something to eat. Then, take and check their states under the microscope to make sure that some are developing. DO NOT do a water change on them for at least the first two weeks.
Then start dosing with live rotifers (I think) Once they start to develop into the later stages, you need to dose with some zooanthillae. You are going to have to sacrifice a clam to do this. Find your prettiest clam that you can find, and cut a very large piece of the mantle off. Put it in a blender and take a sieve and strain the liquid into saltwater of an sg of 1.022 or at least try to match the sg of the rearing tank. Place in the liquid directly into the tank. This will let the clams ingest the zoanthillae so that they can put pigmented algae into their mantles.
Once they are in the later stages and starting to settle down, you will need to put them perhaps on cured bricks into a large aquarium with strong lighting and low to medium flow. Keep trying the greenwater method in the large tank. You have to put them on bricks so that they can settle down into cracks and feel safe. The only things that affect new clams is overgrowth of algae and starvation. little clams are not big enough to rely on the light as the only source of food.
The only thing about rearing clams is that every clam can produce 250,000 offspring.
IF, which is a big IF, you can even have a successful rearing operation, you will probably not be able to sell them all before they start to die of starvation or you just get tired of doing it.
It's a big deal, and is best done in mariculturing operations.
bluewatr24
New member
Saw it happen in my LFS in there 75G acro tank.
JaredWaites
Premium Member
Just because one releases Gametes doesn't mean that there will be offspring. It takes two just as it does for humans to reproduce.
But yeah its not uncommon for a clam to get stressed and spew out sperm/eggs.
But yeah its not uncommon for a clam to get stressed and spew out sperm/eggs.
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