What do yall think? Clowns.....

[ChunksInClemson]

I have 2 tomato clowns who have been together for about a month. I introduced them at the same time. I am trying to get them to spawn (dont go into telling me how they spawn, I understand it) and today they were really showing strong courting behavior. This was occuring every 5 to 10 minutes and even the female was shaking right back at the male hard. Then the male went up to the rock where his anemone is (they sleep in seperate anemones) and put his mouth up to the rock and he was acting like he was trying to move the rock. Then the female came in and starting helping him doing the same thing. The female was also swimming up and down where the glass is (she never does this) and all I could think of was she was trying to find a smooth surface.

They were totally acting not normal today so my question is are they getting closer to spawning or are they just now starting to accept eachother?

I'm prolly just getting excited for nothing but what do yall think?

 

[traveller7]

The "rock biting" is pseudo site cleaning behavior. Some "pairs" will do that for many years before laying eggs. It is a good sign of progression though

 

[ChunksInClemson]

ok, that helps..thanks scott


Anyone else?

 

[redvipe2010]

I agree with traveler, but how old are the clowns? I'm guessing since they are newly introduced, they will not be laying eggs soon. Have they been getting along since they have been together?

 

[ChunksInClemson]

well chances are no, they wont lay eggs this soon but it can happen. I've talked to a couple ppl who have had some spawn around 45 days after being introduced. I have no idea how old they are. Female is obviously a female and the juvie is bout 1" or maybe a little bigger.

They have pretty much been getting along. A lot of the time, they dont even hang out together but today was like crazyness. They were swimming beside eachother for a lot of the day. I just checked on them and of course they are in seperate anemones. I hope they start sleeping in the same one together soon, this would be more progress.

 

[ChunksInClemson]

Scott, what is a pseudo site behavior? Came you name more of these?

 

[Juck]

Watch the females belly. In the days before a spawn, her ovipositor will protrude slightly. On the day of spawning the ovipositor is sticking out a good 3 or 4 mm.

On Black Occs, the ovipositor tube is black,,,, on regular Occs I think it is white,,,, not sure about Tomato's.

 

[ChunksInClemson]

Yeah, I looked when I started seeing this behavior and didn't see anything so I kinda knew I was jumping the gun. I believe the ovipositor is white on Tom's too.