rose anemone

If you wore pants for the first 5-10 years of your life and stopped wearing them for the next 20-30, if someone handed you a pair of pants, would you know what to do with them?
 
And it's not like the maroons you have had a choice of hosting or not...it was forced upon them at a young age to be disallowed the option of an anem.
 
Thats so great about this hobby so many different opinions on the same topic. If it works for you go for it! Like I mentioned Im not an expert or have never even tried to raise fry. But I know what works for me and my tanks and only give suggestions on what I have tried myself not what I have read some where. Keep up the good work!
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9605845#post9605845 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by cschweitzer
If you wore pants for the first 5-10 years of your life and stopped wearing them for the next 20-30, if someone handed you a pair of pants, would you know what to do with them?

The littlest of my 3 cats likes to crawl inside pants when they aren't being worn. He goes inside a pantleg, falls down and coos. Now if someone can explain *that* behavior I'll give you a cookie.
 
I posted a thread on the other forums to get everyone else's opinions...I'll link them once I get any responses(for or against my opinions).
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=9605900#post9605900 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by chrisstie
The littlest of my 3 cats likes to crawl inside pants when they aren't being worn. He goes inside a pantleg, falls down and coos. Now if someone can explain *that* behavior I'll give you a cookie.

Same with my ferrets. And my reasoning for this is that they love their owners and the scent of them makes the animal happy:)

Is that a good enough reason to merit a cookie? PLEASE!!!!J/K...
 
As I mentioned, the maroons were WC 23 years ago, but did they remember an anemone from that long ago, or were they drawn to it by instinct and knew what to do? As you said, the anemone is a source, in the wild, for clowns to seek a home and protection. In our home tanks, they will host just about anything (I love chrisstie's avatar pic of hers hosting her veggie clip!). So, does instinct push them to an anemone, per se, or to seek a suitably "safe" place to live (in the wild, their choices are more limited than in our tanks)?
 
On that thought, how much of it is following patterns of others, as you said, Craig, when you placed the other clown in and the one's you had started hosting the anemone. Just a freaky mention here: the two WC clowns in my third tank will host anything (currently it's African Blue Xenia...yikes!) and my Red Sea Sailfin follows suit. Yes, bizarre, but she acts just like a clownfish when she is with them. So, I have to assume, since Tangs don't host, that she is follwing their example. I've also read about some aquarists tauting success with a photo of a clown hosting an anemone placed on the outside glass.
 
See, I think that is a misconception. I think it is completely instinctual to host(if you consider sitting in a veggie clip hosting, if you consider an overflow box hosting). My belief is that they will always claim a little area as their own, TB or WC. They will sleep there, they will defend it. Broodstock without anems still lay their eggs in one particular spot and guard that spot regardless of what that spot is. It is whether it is hosting an anem.

I've had 9WC clowns and when put into tanks(different times) they all found BTA's or frogspawns within minutes, if not seconds. I've had 7 ORA clowns, two of which went over a day into a living host(mimicing the WC's that were in there already) and 5 of which have hosted pumps, overflows, etc. Not saying that with time or prodding, they have not moved to the anem. But never have I seen a TB clown go directly head first into an anem when being placed into a tank, like every single WC clown I have had has done.

I had one pair that I put into the tank, by the time I let it out of the net, it's head was pointed dirctly towards the anem and floated right down into it...I have NEVER seen an ORA clown do this.
 
As much as I am for conservation and what not it makes me feel I should be looking into WC clowns in the future when my 125g is set up.

Actually, ideally, at that time I hope to maybe find a trio of anemone, clown 1 and clown 2 available from someone who already has the whole kit n kaboodle available.

I don't know if youd find it interesting or not but my clowns host in my veggie clip by day- the female gets the clip, the male gets the not-turned on tunze.. and by night they usually swim bumping into each other somewhere in the same area in the water column. It makes me think they wont breed because they dont really have a place to sleep.

I've been considering moving the clip slightly closer to the powerhead so that it is almost like one big "creature" for them to host in and so that the female wont fall out of her clip when it tips over.. don't know if they would like this or not.

I also catch them by my mag float if there is something obstructing the chip clip or if it fell down.

The other day, too I was watching Blenny-thing (the wild caught guy) do donuts up from the bottom, a lap around the clip, and back down to bottom. The clowns didn't try to defend it at all just sorta moved out of the way so he could perch on it for .3 seconds and fall off and swim to the bottom again.

In a way it just reminds me of a domesticated animal. They do have some very basic instincts but having not grown up in the wild and being taught and\or observing the behavior patterns of a wild animal they are missing a little bit of the "nurture" that wild caught guys would have.. where the nature is all there.

My cat knows how to hunt down a bug or other critter but once he gets it he doesnt know what the heck to do with it. If it was like, a tiger cub or something, the parent would either teach or otherwise demonstrate how to figure out if said critter is edible or not and what to do in each case.


In other words you're all right all at the same time. Or something.
 
Not to hijack this thread

Not to hijack this thread

back to the orginal tread starter. does anyone have a rbta? i will start a tread for clown fish hosting or not hosting so george can find someone that is looking to sell a rtba
 
cschweitzer-Can you please explain what you meant in these two sperate postings. You first said this in one post

strongly disagree with the instinctual part, in a way...I think in the wild it is instinctual
I think instincts play a part, but I think moreover that environment is the major deciding factor.

And then this another

I think it is completely instinctual to host(if you consider sitting in a veggie clip hosting, if you consider an overflow box hosting). My belief is that they will always claim a little area as their own, TB or WC.

Are you saying you believe its natural for TB to host in varies items just not an anenome ? Im confused as if you beleive Tb clowns have a instinctual to host.

Lots of great info in this post:)
 
gwrench-Sorry to get off track. Hopefully all this info helps you on your success of keep this species.
 
Just consider them free bumps so that everyone knows exactly who it is and what he wants...:)

By this statement above that you quoted, I mean this:

Yes, a clown will always have a spot that it finds security in. It will go to that spot, protect that spot(kind of), and make sure that is their own area.

A wild caught clown spends its whole life in an anemone. It will not leave the anem for any reason. That is its home and only natural defense against other fish. They are pretty much a predators dream...they are slow swimmers, they can get big, they are clumbsy and suceptable to currents. The only thing they have going for them is that they swoosh into their anemone not more than 3 meters away.

With a wild caught clownfish, it already knows what it wants for its spot...preferably an anem, if not available, some kind of wavy tantacle coral, so that it can stay hidden, has protection of nematocysts, has an advantage on gathering food, can lay eggs under for their protection, etc.

A TB clown is much different. It is not protected by its parent during egg stage, it is instead moved to another tank where it is growing up around hundreds or thousands of other siblings. In the wild, if a clownfish pair produces two viable surviving offspring, it has done its job as a pair. A clown pair producing 600 eggs/clutch, every 14 days, for ten years will have very low(most of the time under 10) offspring to survive. Most likely, these babies will never know their parents, never know their siblings(obviously as much as a fish can "know" something). Instead, they are stuck with hundreds of others all being fed very well with clean water. All of them have never seen a coral, never seen an anem...they know walls, pvc pipes, plastic boxes, glass...these are the things they grow up with. They compete for the most protected areas(middle of the clownfish "ball" of young and usually near the PVS returns) of the tanks. You can clearly see this at ORA. They will get curious as they rarely have anything to worry about.

When you place them into your tanks, the "protected" areas to them are not the same as the "protected" areas that a WC knows. They know that a dark area(against a black overflow box), a hidden area(on top of a pump or veggie clip), or behind some tubes(behind a return pipe) as their protected areas to give them cover and shade...
 
First, when we were discussing and I said it was not instinctual, we were talking about hosting as solely in an anemone...Later, we were talking about hosting, as in a veggie clip and pump and overflow box as "hosts"...it is not true hosting because hosting incurs a symbiotic relationship...pumps, overflows, and veggies clip are not biological, but instead mechanical...I do not consider this hosting, although the clowns perform many of the same behaviors.
 
But never have I seen a TB clown go directly head first into an anem when being placed into a tank, like every single WC clown I have had has done.

Like I said in the other thread...I bought two Clarkii clowns from Petco which are obviously TB. Instantly, they hosted my blue Haddoni. They literally DOVE right in to the anemone. Now, do you call that instintual or what? TB Clarkii clowns that have never seen an anemone in their life instantly hosted an anemone. That is pure instincts.
 
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