Third attempt raising clownfish...

Some interesting thought there folks.
I do not believe that we get DT's here in the UK, but it is far cheaper to grow your own and educational to for the kids.

Luis, tell us more or show us more please.

Learning all the time about what techniques are being used, have been used and ehat has worked or not.

Thanks for all the comments.
Steve
 
Kathy,

DT,IA and home grown.

Well it is a lengthy subject and I donÃ"šÃ‚´t feel like going into that debate:D .Which phyto is better?.Yes,it depends on what you need it for;reef tank,growing clams,rots,copepods or green water technique.

In a nutshell,the "best "phyto is a mix of different species offering a DHA/EPA/ARA similar to natural phyto.A blend of NAN and T-ISO gives a decent proportion,as T-Iso is high in DHA while NAN is rich in EPA (but poor in DHA).DT does not give that,but it still is a practical and convenient product.



Old techniques?

Why,fresh new developments:p .Nobody has ever raised many of the species we are dealing with now,or kept corals,or raised calanoid copepods .This part of the hobby is very cutting edge,and new things show all the time.It is challenging and that makes it fascinating!:idea:



Sunlight

Well,some greenhouse window,or a high shelf (childproof) by a south looking window.



Rots males

They donÃ"šÃ‚´t look like rots,they are small and fast,and sometimes circle the females like bumblebees.They have a bright "eyespot"



Recipe

Get some distilled water.Buy sodium thiosulfate in a chemical store.Check how much Cl per L your house bleach has.Say it is 55 grams /L.Now weigh 55grams of Sodium thio.and mix it in 1 L of dist.water.Ready!

Now if you put say 1ml of bleach,you dechlorinate it with 1 ml of your diy preparation,always same volume.Voila!



:mixed:
 
Luis A M said:
Kathy,


Recipe

Get some distilled water.Buy sodium thiosulfate in a chemical store.Check how much Cl per L your house bleach has.Say it is 55 grams /L.Now weigh 55grams of Sodium thio.and mix it in 1 L of dist.water.Ready!

Now if you put say 1ml of bleach,you dechlorinate it with 1 ml of your diy preparation,always same volume.Voila!



:mixed:
Click to expand...

I have looked into doing just that. Sigma chemical company is based right here in St. Louis, my home town. Believe it or not, it is cheaper to buy Sodium thiosulphate from Florida Aqua Farms, than from Sigma!

I did buy a bunch shortly before going to IMAC. Right now I don't need it because I have so much "free" sample dechlorinator from vendors at IMAC.

Thanks again, Luis!
 
Kathy,

I have never tried woth T-iso before, however I did get a disk of that and will experiment once things do get off the ground. I did discover that they use slightly different food than what you feed to Nan. Did you use the same of some different food.

Going to the LFS today to chase the progress of the system. I am having a stand made that will be 6' long and 2' wide and 5' tall for the breeding tanks.

Luis, I agree with you about the cutting edge, sometimes the old ideas pay off just as much as new ideas. I am the believer of the KISS principle. "Keep it simple stupid", that way there is very little that can go worng.

Getting back to breeding the fish and baby clowns, what is you plan? That question does not quite portray what I am trying to ask. Have you a single tank, multiples??????

Thanks


PS: What camera do you use?
Steve
 
Hi Steve,
Assuming you asked these questions of me, my plan is to start with one hatch at a time until I figure out how to raise them. I have one 20 gallon and 3 10 gallon tanks, but after conversations with someone here, I may switch to dark plastic tubs if I really get serious about this.

I am covering the sides with a black plastic trash can liner of the 20 gallon tank, and plan to drip RO/DI water to reduce the salinity of the parent tank water to 25ppt as soon as I can. I will get the eggs on a tile from my friend, along with some of his tank water, put them in the tank and start a slow drip of RO/DI. An air pump with a gang valve will provide aeration of the eggs, not too turbulent this time, and maybe another line into another part of the tank to provide some air and flow, and then wait for lights out.

Hopefully they will hatch that night or the next night. Then I'll start the feeding routine in the morning. Sound like a plan?

As far as a system is concerned, I was thinking I might like to build something like what Martin Moe had in his book "Breeding the Orchid Dottyback" . It was a gravity fed system with a header tank into which water from the sump was pumped. Then between the header tank and the sump were broodstock tanks and larval tanks attached to the drain of the header with adjustable valves, and drains to the sump so 1 pump was needed to supply flow to all the tanks, and gravity allowed individual tanks to be turned on or off to flow without affecting the other tanks on the system.

I do not want to put larval tanks on this system, just brood tanks and grow out tanks, because these aged fish are more hardy and need the filtering capacity of live rock, protein skimmer, etc. I think a UV on the line from the sump up to the header would be good idea to hopefully prevent toxic tank syndrome.

I have no experience, obviously, so anyone with suggestions please comment.

I think I want to keep the larval growth tanks separate and just deal with them manually as per Joyce Wilkerson's book, i.e. water changes and a sponge filter after they quit eating rotifers.

I have gotten rid of some of my junk in the basement, and moved the wall of kids toys in storage to another wall of the basement, so now I have a space to put the grow out system when I get ready to build it. I was going to wait until I see if I can get these fish to survive before investing in the more permanent breeding system, and thinking about acquiring a breeding pair or two of my own.

Meanwhile I am feeding my pair of ocellaris a LOT of food in the hopes that they will spawn. I have had them for 2 years, they are beautiful, and are clearly a pair. One thing I have noticed since I started feeding them more is that the female no longer minds if the male eats something. Before, when I was feeding them sparsely in an attempt to control algae, the female would attack the male whenever she caught him eating. She left the other fish in the tank alone, but the male was not allowed to eat.

Then, for a little while, the female was hosted by my colt coral and the male chose to be hosted by either one of my toadstools at the other end of the tank. I thought they had gotten divorced!

Must have been just a trial separation, because now that there is more than enough food, they get along great, and stay in the colt together very chummy.

I recently got a Canon Powershot A75 digital camera. Still learning how to use it.
 
Kathy,

Your thread in very interesting to me. I recently found an egg sack in my tank from my two Orchid Dottybacks that I've only had for a few months. Quite a surprise! I'm trying to decide on whether to try and raise the babies and my concern was growing the rotifers to feed them.

I was planning to purchase the food for the rotifers instead of making it. Basically I feel like the rots are gonna be challenging enough. I'm undecided on creating a batch or continuous culture. From what I've read, the continuous culture is more stable. What is your opinion and what do you do with the rots when you harvest them? I'm wondering if there might be a market in my area for distributing and since I would need them for the babies anyway.

I just purchase Martin Moe's book and have alot of studing to do.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Pam
 
Hi Pam,
Do you live near the ocean? I don't know anything about dottybacks, except that I've read Martin Moe's book. He did not have success with raising the larvae until he started feeding them wild plankton from tidal tows using a plankton net. He lived in Ft. Lauderdale at the time.

But then, he had trouble getting his phytoplankton and rotifers to grow. As you are reading, keep in mind that this book was written a few years ago.

Other folks on this board can advise you better than I can on how do raise the dottybacks. But my advice is to still read the book! I really enjoyed it and learned some interesting and practical things from it. I met Martin and Barbara Moe at IMAC and they are both very charming people.

Batch or continuous both work and are stable. With continuous culture, if the culture crashes and you only have one, you are done. So to be sure to always have rots, you need at least 2, in case one crashes.

If I am going to have 2 of something and twice the maintenance of 1, then I will do batches of 4. I did some calculations that tell me that my hypothetical larvae can consume 25% of my 4 gallon culture a day, and that is sustainable. So I do 4 gallons. Your results may vary. Also keep in mind that I have yet to raise clownfish larvae. I am speaking from complete inexperience. =o

There may be less risk from crashes with batch, because you can recover more easily if you lose 1/4 of your rots than if you lose 1/2 of your rots.

This is just my opinion. In some ways continuous is easier. But none of it is hard.

I started with cysts, but that is a slow way to start. If you know someone local who is keeping rots, get some from them. You will get a much faster start. You may be able to purchase live rots as well. Try Florida Aqua Farms. You will still need some food for them to enrich them before feeding to the larvae.

I've never used purchased food for the rots. Someone else out there? Feel free to chime in.

I feed excess rots to my display tank, and I give them away to friends locally. It is like a plankton bloom in your tank. The fish and inverts really like them. I have also frozen some for use in feeding juvenile clowns if I am good enough to raise some.

Good luck to you! Take your time, and learn as much as you can. It is really fun stuff to think about, as well as to do.

(If you do decide to order from FAF, and do the culturing of phyto yourself, get one of the kits that includes the plankton culture manual. It is full of interesting and useful information. And it is much cheaper to buy the kit than to do it the way I did, buying a little here, a little there, then the manual, and it turns out that even without shipping, I spent much more in little bits than if I had just bought the kit.)
Cheers,
Kathy
 
Kathy,

Thanks for your reply. I just got the book and have started reading it. I've been told to check out Florida Aqua Farms and Reed Mariculture for the Rots and food. I may be out in left field, but my thought was to used a 5 gallon bucket or two. I mean, if you use a small container don't the rots run out of room from multiplying? As you suggested, I was looking at the kits.

Have you actually collected the clownfish eggs and started feeding the rots?

Thanks,

Pam
 
pamsreef said:
Kathy,

Thanks for your reply. I just got the book and have started reading it. I've been told to check out Florida Aqua Farms and Reed Mariculture for the Rots and food.

I may be out in left field, but my thought was to used a 5 gallon bucket or two.
Click to expand...
That will work beautifully. But I would set up two, in case one crashes.

I mean, if you use a small container don't the rots run out of room from multiplying?
Click to expand...

Yes, they do run out of room. Every day a jug gets removed from the culture and harvested. Some rots from the other 3 jugs are filtered and put into a fresh clean jug with water and phyto to replace the one harvested. Now there is room in the other 3 jugs to feed phyto. Tomorrow one of the oldest 3 jugs gets harvested and the process repeats.

In this way, they are not left in a dirty jug for more than 4 days, 25% is harvested daily, and everybody is happy.

This isn't the only way to do it, it is just the way I have chosen. Many ways exist to raise the rots! :-)


Have you actually collected the clownfish eggs and started feeding the rots?
Click to expand...

Twice, all fry died....
First time, I had too much air on the eggs and ended up with piles of hundreds of mangled dead fry.
Second time they hatched a day early, and the parents had a nice snack. I tried to hatch the remaining eggs with no luck.

Thursday I get to try again.
My third attempt rearing clownfish.

Cheers,
Kathy
 
Kathy,

You were tight on the button, yes I was asking the question of you and I thank you for the response.

I too have read Moe Jr's book on the Orchid Dottyback, thoroughly enjoying it. I am in the process of setting up a system but unlike Moe, it will not be gravity fed, however I will have the ability to turn off and isolate tanks where needs.

I will be using a sump that is 4'x18"x18" and have two tiers of tanks. I will be using a trickle tower to deal with the excess waste once the fishes start to breed, but more oin that later. The system I am planning will have on Coral growout tank that will be approx. 6'x12"x12" for growing Rics and others. Then there will be approx. 6 12"x12"x12" tanks for fishes. The return pump will be an Aqua Medic OR6500.

That is the plan at the moment. I am having the stand built around the week of the 17th September and then will start with the tanks after that. Once the stand has been built, I will have a better idea on how many tanks I will be having.

For black outs I am going to use black perspect that has been cut to size so that I can isolate a single tank. This will give me the ability to adjust to what I need.

It is just great to be able to speak to someone in a similar situation, just starting out and planning a system, rather than someone who has the setup already built.

Pam, sounds as if you have some funf times ahead of you. When I first started growing the rots, I could never keep them alive long enough, however this time things seems to be working. the biggest difference is that I used tank water to start the culture with and not fresh water.


Thanks for your replies.

Steve
 
Good morning Steve,
I am still a little unclear. Was the successful rotifer culture with fresh saltwater or used tank water?
 
Steve,
What is black perspect? I've never heard of it here in the US.

Also, what is the food you use for T.Iso phytoplankton that is different from Guillard's f/2 (Micro Algae Grow)?

Thanks,
Kathy
 
Kathy,

Ok, the first batch of rots was with tank water. I was in the US when they arrived so Vikki, my ever patient other half stuck them on the window for me.

Black Perspex (Sorry spelling mistake), is acrylic that is coloured black.

I use a Cell-HI F2P for Nano and I have Cell-HI WP for T-Iso. I will have to hunt for the difference for you. But I get these from a supplier here in the UK that I believe sources from FAF.

Today, I have prepared 6 bottles of tank water, and put one uner culture for Phyto. i hope that this takes. It is old tank water diluted to ~20ppt. I have never used tank water before so it will be a good experiment.
 
Kathy,

My thought was to use water from my main system diluted with fresh RO water to start the process in 2 five gallon buckets. Would I then harvest a gallon out of each bucket daily and replace with more diluted tank water. I imagine that the food that I purchase will be quite a bit more concentrated than what you're making. I'm wondering if there might be a market in the Atlanta area for selling the rots that I harvest. How would you know how many you have (can you see them) and how much to used in tanks for feeding?

I wish there was a way to raise the babies in my large refugium, if there was a way to keep them separate from the rest of the system. Any ideas? I only have a pistol shrimp w/goby and recently a seahorse in there. It's approx. a 75 gallon tank with low flow and lots of pods and calerpa. The problem would be keeping them separated and feeding them without poluting my tank. If that's not possible, I have a 10 gallon tank that I'm not currently using.

I've read a little of Martin Moe's book and so far it seems quite discouraging. I would love to hear from people that have succeeded with raising orchid dottybacks recently and learn from them what worked.

I'm sure my 1st batch of eggs were a snack and I may have a new batch by now. I don't want to get too invested in this project and lose hope. I know it won't be easy plus I'm sure it will be time consuming.

Any thoughts?

Pam
 
Pam,

Sorry to jump in, finish reading Moe's book. It is a facinating read and well worth it at the end.

Breeding and growing in our hobby is going to be the way forward soon, so although it might be discouraging to start with, while you learn what works for you. Keep your head up and remember you are putting back into the system.

Do a search on Lisa P on RC as she has documented her stories about both goby and sexy shrimp. Great process to look at.

Good luck.
Steve
 
Thanks Steve for the encouraging words! I will try to remember that in the future.

I will definately search for the thread you mentioned. The information available on the internet is a huge benefit to the survival of this great hobby.

Thanks again,

Pam
 
I am a big fan of the gravity fed systems like Moe's, have set up a couple of them. However I do not really suggest it for densely packed growout tanks unless the supply line is huge, you just can't get enough flow. I screwed up the current system using a 1" drain to feed six tanks, should have been 2" at least. Had to hook up a pump to get enough water to the tanks.
 
head tank.

head tank.

I know it sounds herectic to say that Martin M.was wrong about something but his system with a head tank gravity feeding several tanks is wrong,it does not work.I talked about that with Martin once.To feed several tanks and be able to close one valve without disrupting the othersÃ"šÃ‚´flow,what you need is pressure,which a head tank is not going to provide unless you place it high on the roof:p
All what is needed is a pump in the sump,with enough pressure and volume for the job,no head tank.
The only way a head tank could work as Martin says,is using it as a manifold,i.e.running separate water lines for each tank.Or using an extra wide delivery line as David says,in this case that pipe is the manifold.
 
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