Tonight my Magnifica spawned!

[Outerbank]

I have had the anemonee for over 4.5 years. It has always been very healthy. Tonight at about 10 pm I noticed the tank was very cloudy with brown eggs about 1/4mm diameter. I looked at everything and suspected the magnifica since it was somewhat deflated. About every 5-10 minutes, the oral disc would swell, then gape and release eggs. It clouded the water substantially. Here is a so so video I posted on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=-sLcGc_Ne2U

 

[Catchoftheday]

there is no Video

 

[Outerbank]

there is no Video

Just added.

 

[elegance coral]

Congrats!!!! Has this anemone ever split?

 

[BonsaiNut]

Now you just need to find a male

 

[Outerbank]

Congrats!!!! Has this anemone ever split?

It has never split. I have never seen it spawn before this event.

 

[garygb]

Very cool. Mags don't seem to spawn often at all in aquaria. I've had one for 10 years and it's never spawned that I'm aware of. Congrats!

 

[Zuska]

they spawn and dont split?

 

[garygb]

Zuska, they spawn and split. H. magnifica and E. quadricolor are the only two host species that are known to reproduce somewhat regularly in nature by both sexual and asexual means.

 

[nino4u]

Congrats on the nem spawning...

 

[Outerbank]

Thanks. In the video, the globs floating by the camera are eggs. There were many many eggs. The water was very cloudy from the spawn. The video was taken with a canon S90, which is their top of the line compact digital, while I had 420 watts of VHO lighting. It usually takes great video, but the tank was too dark. It almost looks as if lights are off.

 

[Outerbank]

I was thinking about this spawn recently and the spawn occured after I bought 2 new clams and was adjusting my refugium lighting for the clams. My refugium lights are on at night and I started at 4 hours and ramped up to 6 hours over 3-4 days and then increased the lighting 15-30 minutes a night to about 9 hours when the spawn occured. I am not sure how much a factor this played, but this may have been very important.

 

[garygb]

Interesting. Maybe after the anemone has time to get conditioned to spawn again, you could follow that same lighting schedule and see if it happens again. It would be really cool if you had a male and could get them both to spawn simultaneously. I'm quite sure no one has successfully bred magnifica in aquaria.

 

[jumpman420]

That is crazy. Never have seen nothing like that before.