Yellowtail Damsel Eggs (inc. Photo)

Mako Shark II

Fish are Friends not Food
I’m an established Aquarist, but I’ve never been a breeder. (Not that I never wanted to, it just hasn't been first on my list.)

My 120 Reef tank is all loaded up and doing great. In particular, my Yellow Tail Damsels (Chrysiptera parasema) seem Very happy, otherwise they would not be laying eggs.

So here’s the questions:
1. ARE they really happy, or is this just the “circle of life”, doing what it does?
2. Do I have any prayer of actually hatching Damsels?
3. Do I WANT to even hatch Damsels?
4. What do I have to do to foster this natural breeding?

I’m only asking these questions, because this is like the fifth time they’ve laid eggs and before I scrape them off the glass, I thought I’d throw these questions out to the masses.

Here’s (not a great) shot of what’s going on:

Damseleggs021.jpg


Questions?
Comments?
Dirty jokes?

Thanks for your help folks!
 
I think your best bet is to go to MOFIB . I talked to these people at MACNA and they are very helpful. I think if someone is gonna give you the right answers they will be on here.
 
Gee I think people can get answers here without sending them to another board :rolleyes:

Mako Shark II,

Your damsels must be pretty happy and healthy to be breeding regularly :thumbsup: From a monetary standpoint, Yellow Tails are just too cheap to ever expect to even coming close to breaking even, never mind a profit. However, if you just want to have some fun, go for it. To seperate out the larvae, you'll need to make a larval snagger. Do a search on "snagger" and you'll come up with some posts that will give you the necessary info to make and use one. For rearing, you'll need to get some live food (rotifer) cultures going. There's a thread stickied to the top of this forum on micro food culture that will give a great primer. Since it takes awhile to get food cultures and rearing equipment set up, it's probably wise to let this batch go and get set for the next batch if you want to try your hand at raising them.
 
rydr119,
Thanks(!), and I'll certainly check out your friends from my hometown, but I tend to agree with Bill. 1,100 member vs. 203,000...... Hmmmm..... that's not even a contest, especailly given the advanced forums and gloabl reach of RC.

But I hear you and certainly apprecaite the heads-up. I'll check them too. Thanks.

Bill,
My query really is more for My own information. I wouldn't mind trying, just for the sheer heck of it. Commercially, I'm not looking to turn a profit; just looking to see if I can hatch something.

For Rotifer, I assume I can use stuff from Reef-Nutrition?
 
Marty,

Reed does sell live rotifers that you can use to get your own cultures going. Their Reef Nutrition stuff isn't live, so wouldn't be useful for larval fish culture. One warning if you decide to try and raise these, fish breeding is addictive :D
 
OH GREAT!

Like the $pousal Unit doesn't already have a predisposition against the on-going development$.

(Actually, she's pretty cool....... Stand by)
 
Let me know when you raise a damsel on rotifers...

They are extremely hard to raise. Small copepods. Black round tub. But you should be able to hatch them but raise them different story.

Also I think that is very rude of you to just rule out somebody's advice based upon when they joined.
 
Nice, that's pretty incredible that your wife surrendered a closet. My wife lays claim to all closets in the house, with the one exception of my daughters :lol: Though I do lay claim to the entire basement :D

I'm quite a ways east of Garden City, out in the farm fields and beaches of the east end of the Island. Though prices on the Island as a whole tend to be higher than much of anyplace else. What stores did you check out?
 
My understanding is that larval Chrysiptera damsels won't accept Brachionus rotifers (even S strain) as a first food - you need to culture copepod nauplii or better yet, use wild plankton. That's why you don't see these being produced commercially. If they would take rotifers from the start, everyone would be doing it. There is one damsel that produces larva large enough for rotifers - the golden damsel - Amblyglyphidodon aureus. Advanced Aquarist Magazine had an article on how it was done in an issue earlier this year.


Jay
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13527435#post13527435 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by tcmfish
Also I think that is very rude of you to just rule out somebody's advice based upon when they joined.

I don't see where anyone was ruling out anyones advice, join dates or otherwise :rolleyes:

BTW you all do realize that clownfish are damsels?
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=13527102#post13527102 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Mako Shark II
rydr119,
Thanks(!), and I'll certainly check out your friends from my hometown, but I tend to agree with Bill. 1,100 member vs. 203,000...... Hmmmm..... that's not even a contest, especailly given the advanced forums and gloabl reach of RC.


And yes if you want to be picky clowns are damsels but when usually referring to clownfish people don't call them damsels they call them clownfish. Its a lot easier to say damsels than list out all the genus names of the different damsel fishes out there to specify which ones you are talking about especially when the people you are talking to understand what you mean.
 
Morrissey,

You need to calm down a bit and relax some. That quote is about volume of board membership and number of people we tap into as a result, nothing about lenght of membership or anything else for anyone to be taking offense at ;)

BTW with the number of different Geneses in the damsel family, and all their differences, it's best not to generalize. Leads to erroneous assumptions and misinformation.
 
THANK you Bill....

(I've learned something in Corporate Life: Written Word is almost always perceived negatively vs. the spoken word, becuase of "tone".)

TCM, I clearly meant no offense, only that it was kinda......interesting...... of others to re-direct us to another site, away from RC.

No foul Intended mate. It's all good.

Bill, I'll check the Stores, but their prices were whacked!
 
Well mofib is a very good site for breeding fish. That said yes I do believe your questions can be answered here.

And thanks for clearing things up mako.
 
The question wasn't asked on MOFIB, it was asked here. You seem to respond to an inordinate amount of posts with the recommendation to "go to MOFIB".

Give that a rest.
 
Dude c'mon now... I didn't it bring up or send him there. We worked this out days ago. I was simply posting about the topics mentioned in the thread. Your post added nothing to help anyone, can you please quit singling me out.
 
If you are interested in trying to raise these damsels, I suggest you pick up Matthew Wittenrich's book "The Complete Illustrated Breeder's Guide to Marine Aquarium Fishes ". Mr. Wittenrich is an active contributor on MOFIB and he may be able to help you directly as well. It won't give you a step by step exactly, but it will give you a starting point.

Ok, I have to chime in here and stand in defiance of the moderators, possibly at my own expense. I don't want to get banned or anything, but I do feel that I should feel free to help those people on RC asking questions. Different aquarium forums are not and should not be mutually exclusive. You can be a member and a contributor of more than one forum. Most of us have more than a single interest within the hobby. I raise seahorses as a business, but that doesn't mean that I can't keep a reef tank (I do) or have an interest in protein skimmers (I do), etc.

Let's be honest here, the breeding forum on RC doesn't get much traffic. More than 99% of the people on RC are not breeding marine fish. So the 200K members on RC is not terribly useful if you are asking about breeding fish. Meanwhile, EVERYONE on MOFIB is a breeder. Many of them do it professionaly and have experience well beyond that of your average casual clownfish breeder.

tcmfish is on MOFIB. Look at his signature. Look at the array of species he has successfully (or unsuccessfully) reared. Look at his advice.

No offense at all intended, but Bill has given you poor advice with respect to raising these damsels. I do not know Bill's breeding credentials, but I suspect he has never successfully reared a damsel (with the exception of clownfish). Rotifers are not going to work as a first food in all probability. Given your location,
you would have to start a large culture of calanoid copepods or some other experimental food.

I'm sorry if I have offended anyone here, but I am just trying to be honest and helpful.
 
Ok, I'd like to retract part of my statement. Bill's advice to see the microfoods sticky is good advice, but it was misleading in that it suggested that rotifers could be used.
 
I can remember when Mofib did not exist. I can also remember discussing with/teaching many of its founding members about clownfish or bangaii right here on RC's little breeders forum. A large portion of the information used to rear new species came from people that got their start here. To come here and devalue this forum is unjustified and just wrong...

Mofib is a great forum because it is the new place breeders are all hanging out and discussing hot new topics. Please do not tarnish its reputation by spamming this/other boards with elitist bullcrap. If you have the answer to someone's question on this or another board, POST IT. Leaving their question unanswered and giving them a link to another forum is really useless to everyone reading the post.

Sharing information is what this hobby is about. Without sharing we would all still be struggling to raise clownfish and none of these other species would be possible except for by those with deep pockets. So, please respect each other, play fair, share information, and after all of that is said and done maybe invite someone to your board for a discussion... Sound a little more reasonable?
 
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