WSM pair are spawning!

[Ohio]

So I posted the first batch of eggs in the Anemone/Clownfish forum. My son has convinced me to try and raise some of the fry. So I am moving my thread here and this is what I have going on so far...

Spawn #1
I was super excited to see the little patch of orange on my aquarium glass.:bounce1:
Unforntunately, I place a piece of tile in the tank long ago in preparation for this and they passed it up




Spawn #2
14 days exactly:bounce1:
View attachment 197371
So I am getting pretty excited at this point. It appears that they are going to be laying regularly.

I have several problems though, first the eggs do not develop after being laid. They turn white and are eaten around day 12. Is my male not fertilizing them properly or do I need to feed them differently? I increased my feeding to twice daily but since my clowns started laying they are not eating like they used to(of course the male never has been much of an eater). They hardly ever leave their nem. Should I use a turkey baster to get the food closer to them?

Second, my RBTA decided to move and split last week. I am worried this will cause them to take a break from laying. Which wouldn't be a problem but I ordered Rots last week and have a ton. I have been harvesting them daily and changing out a bottle in the fridge and tossing the rest but I am worried that they will crash before I even get a chance to use them.

Today is spawn day, so I should know soon if they are going to lay or not soon.

 

[Ohio]

I just checked on my clowns. No eggs yet but my female is very fat. So it looks like they will be laying after all. I wonder if they will choose a new place near the nem or go back to where they laid before.

 

[billsreef]

Hey Jenn,

I'd up that feeding to at least 4 times per day with a variety of food, especially some quality frozen food like mysis shrimp. Usually they are pretty habitual in where they lay their eggs, so probably will lay them in the same place. BTW, with excess rots, just feed your reef tank with them

 

[Timfish]

. . . I have several problems though, first the eggs do not develop after being laid. They turn white and are eaten around day 12. Is my male not fertilizing them properly or do I need to feed them differently? . . .

I have a pair of Skunk Clowns with the same problem. I'm guessing it's the male since the female is laying eggs but that is just an assumption. The anemonie splitting should not be an issue as far as the clowns laying eggs.

 

[Ohio]

My clowns laid their eggs 2 days late in a new spot. They laid on Wednesday, so I expect tomorrow to be hatch night but I saw my chromas eating something in the water last night. This morning most the eggs where still there. So tonight I am up waiting to see if the rest will hatch. The lights have been off for about 20 min, no fry yet.

 

[Ohio]

Well they hatched!!!!

I have a lot of clown fry. No idea how many. Parents would not lay on tile so I siphoned what I could get out of the display. I have them in a round bucket with a heater and an airstone. I added some rots and tinted the water green. Now to see if I can get any to survive.

I had no clue how many rots to add because I can't really see them and I am using a coffee filter. Hopefully sieve will be here by next batch.

I noticed something weird while getting the fry out of the display. Some of the fry's bellies looked orange and others looked white. Any idea why that would be?

I will try to post pics tomorrow but I don't have a macro lens so they won't be much.

 

[billsreef]

:thumbsup:

The difference in color is most likely a difference in how much yolk they had left. With the rots, shining a bright flashlight at an angle will generally highlight the rots. They will look like little dust specks. The idea is to maintain enough that the larval fish won't have to travel more than 1.5 body lengths before bumping into a rot, as a minimum density.

 

[Ohio]

I have learned a lot from this try. Next time I will siphon the fry directly into my 5 gal tank instead of using a bucket. I will just leave the tank next to my DT until they are off rots. It is easier to determine the density of the rots in the tank. Plus I can use DT water for water changes.

These fry are insanely small. It seems like they can only eat the smaller rots. Is that likely? I say this because the fry were jerking all over this morning but later stopped and I could still see lots of rots in the tank. When I changed the water and added more rots, they started eating again.

 

[billsreef]

Possible. Maroon fry do tend to be a bit smaller than other clownfish.

 

[Ohio]

I have been unable to get any adequate pictures. The fry are just too small.

My fry are not doing so well, out of several hundred only a handful are still alive on day 3. I have done some more research regarding maroons and it seems that even the rotifers are too large for them. I bought L-strain from Reed Mariculture and have plenty but I am going to have to start my culture over with S-strain. Apparently S-strain are smaller and more suitable for Maroon Clownfish fry.:headwalls:

Well that is how we are doing for now. I am still going to try to keep the few I have alive but I expect them to die soon because they have not grown any from hatch night despite the plentiful amount of live rotifers in the larvae tank. :thumbdown

My new rotifers will not arrive until Wednesday, it will be a close call as to whether I am able to try again with the next spawn.

To be continued....

 

[Ohio]

Question

Question

When the clownfish eggs hatch is anything left behind, such as a clear soft shell?

I am asking because the first few spawns my WSMs laid ended up turning white and being eaten about day 12 -or at least that is what I thought until last week. With my current batch, I noticed small fry(?) being eaten by my Chroma's on night 4 after spawn. The next day there were still eggs so I set up the larvae tank and siphoned the fry out that night. The following day I have a larvae tank full of babies and there still appear to be eggs in my DT. I thought I must've been wrong initially about the eggs disappearing after hatching, because I gathered what I think are hundreds of clownfish fry. So they must leave shells behind, right?

Today, I moved the clownfish(?) larvae so that I could clean the tank they have been in. Ammonia was climbing and after several different attempted methods to siphon the bottom, I was left with moving the still living larvae to a new home. I lost count but believe I have almost 100 still alive.

This afternoon I also checked on the parents. They are still tending to what is left of the eggs and it appears that they may be still developing. They appear to be silver with black eyes -today would be day 8. But due to their location, I cannot be sure.

So this leaves me to wonder, with the problems I have been having with the fry eating my rotifers and the possibility that the eggs are still developing, could I have collected a different type of larvae? The only other fish/invertabrates in my tanks that could have spawned would be Chromas or Fire Shrimp.

Eggs today(the best photo I could get):



I wish that I could get a picture of the larvae but I do not have a macro lens and they are really small.

 

[billsreef]

Sometimes you can get a split hatch like that. Typically after hatch, there is little to no evidence of empty egg shell left behind. Possible you had some chromis hatch, they tend to hide their nests and hatch out very small.

For siphoning, my favorite is a plastic pipette (10ml works well) with a length of siphon hose attached to the big end. This gives you an easy to hold and control siphon with small tip to avoid siphoning up fry

 

[Ohio]

Sometimes you can get a split hatch like that. Typically after hatch, there is little to no evidence of empty egg shell left behind. Possible you had some chromis hatch, they tend to hide their nests and hatch out very small.

For siphoning, my favorite is a plastic pipette (10ml works well) with a length of siphon hose attached to the big end. This gives you an easy to hold and control siphon with small tip to avoid siphoning up fry

Thank you so much for being so helpful. Good News below...

 

[Ohio]

Spawn #3 Hatch Night

Spawn #3 Hatch Night

Ladies and Gents WE HAVE REAL CLOWNFISH FRY THIS TIME....










The verdict is in. The fry that I collected on Wednesday were not Clownfish but most likely Chromis. Tonight was the first viable hatch and I collected upwards of 100 fry and left almost as many in the tank as coral/fish food because I was getting tired. I placed the clownfish fry in with the fry I collected on Wednesday(since they were not eating -might as well be clownfish food). The Clownfish fry had rid the tank of the other fry before I could even get all of them in the tank.

:bounce3:

 

[billsreef]

:thumbsup: :beer:

 

[Ohio]

What are the chances that I am up waiting on Clownfish fry last week and get Chromis fry instead! Obviously my tank is prime for breeding. Maybe I should get a pair of Mandarins too. Although harder too raise, I'll have babies galore!

 

[Ohio]

I had massive casualties last night. There are only about 3 to 4 fry left alive.:sad1:

On a good note, the parents had a surprise for me in my reef tank. Biggest nest yet and it is several days early. I am going to scrap the siphon line this next time and dip them out. The siphon could have been too rough on their fragile little bodies. I am also going to place a few more tile pieces in the display. Hopefully the parents will soon lay on the tile instead.

 

[izzy123]

Well, my first time raising the fry of my clowns wasn't a great succes either, I have only two left and they're about 5 months old now.

But I learnt a lot from that first time, now I'm getting ready to try it again.

Just a warning tho, I wanted to sell the two clowns, but my wife found them so cute she wants to keep them
(bless her) the problem is that they need another tank......

If she keeps saying no to selling them, I'm going to have more tanks than furniture......

 

[billsreef]

If she keeps saying no to selling them, I'm going to have more tanks than furniture......

What's wrong with that?

 

[Ohio]

All of my clown fry are gone I will try again this weekend.

But believe it or not I still have 4 to 5 Chromis left alive. I am amazed! These fry were barely bigger than rots when hatched and yet they are still living and now appear to be eating rots. They are still not identifiable. I did get some pictures though. I will post tomorrow. They aren't much but maybe someone will be able to confirm they are Chromis.