Baby Clown Fish - Day 12 - Pictures

[GaryG]

It's now day 12. About 1/2 of them have made it through metamorphosis. The most mature ones have started to develope pectoral fins. I'm cutting down the rotifer feedings, and doing pulverized dry food and newly hatched baby brine shrimp. I have started a biological filter going and reducing the water changes.

They still do not have any color yet. They have their white color bands on clear bodies. Here are some pictures taken an hour ago.

[Shack]

how many are there do you think?

[speechdr]

This is GaryG's significant other and co-conspirator. He blames me for starting the breeding of these cute guys. He thinks that there are about 60, but I think closer to three times that amount. Since he is the C.P.A., I guess we have to go by his count for now. Yesterday you could count the ones that had morphed into their stripes, but today there are too many.

[Brooke]

That is great! Simply amazing! Keep up the good work you guys!

Brooke

[Alice]

Great work, you two! It must be fun watching them change everyday.

[GaryG]

As of tonight it looks like they are about 75% morphed. A good handful of them are still very tiny. I'm thinking they are runts and may die off. But it looks like I'm going to get at least 50 good ones.

The parents are spawning another batch as I write this. The wife makes paths up and down the rock (like mowing the lawn) laying the eggs, and then the husband traces the same path fertilizing them [Doesn't look like much fun - I like the way we humans do it better].

[Drew]

Gary, that is very cool! Quite an accomplishment! TRT is proud of our first clownfish breeder! Definitely get rid of the runts, as Joyce Wilkerson said, "cull mercilessly!"

Great job!
Drew

[FishDaddy]

That's superb, Gary!!!!

Speechdr,

"He thinks that there are about 60, but I think closer to three times that amount. Since he is the C.P.A., I guess we have to go by his count for now."

Well, you know how accountants are; they start with the answer first and then figure out the calculations to get there!
Dick

[Doug1]

Hey Gary and Speechdr, thats really really awesome:
Brooke we need the breeders archive STAT

[GaryG]

I guess I should cull the runts. But it's hard to do! In dog litters the runts have sometimes turned out to have the best personalities. But, I know, fish are not dogs. And nature would have done it by now.

This morning (Day 14) the very mature ones have started to develope some of the dark yellow color [they are Clark's] and have started to swim like adults [that broken back type swim]. They also are beggining to form clusters in the bottom corners.

I'll post another picture in a few days.

[JennM]

Awesome

I've passed the link to this (and the original thread) to a friend whose A. ocellaris are incubating eggs.

How did you retrieve the fry when they hatched?

I've been told to cull seahorse fry too, but I find that Nature does a good job of that. Now if I was out of space, I would have to cull, but as long as I have enough nursery bowls, I let Nature take her course and the weak die off, and I remove them promptly. For example, I can see culling from a brood of 1500, but my horse has been having 50-200 fry at a time, and that's manageable.

Looking at your pic, and knowning what 100 seahorse babies looks like, I'd say you have well over 300-400 fry there now.

I'm not going to sit and count the dots but you've got a lotta hungry mouths to feed there!

Jenn

[GaryG]

Joyce Wilkerson's book was indespensible in the process. It explains exactly how to do it step by step. It's still not easy, but it would have been impossible with out the book.

I am keeping a running set of pictures at
www.ctcpas.com/Subpages/BabyClownFish.htm

if your friend wants to see all the pictures

I will continue to update as I go along

[beach bum]

Hi Gary, congrats. Can you tell the setup you had these clowns in when they began spawning? My skunks are doing some serious mating dances at the present time, since getting a slightly larger tank to call home they have been alot more active. I don't want to interrupt them by adding another fish to the tank now. Were yours in a community tank?

On a side note, the female is talking! LOUDLY! I can hear her from the other room sometimes. She just keeps shrilling away like an opera singer, it's really cool.

[Flatlander]

I have to agree also.

amazing

[speechdr]

The Ckarkii's were some of the very first fish we got. I believe that they were also tank raised. We started with a 55 gallon which we had converted over from fresh water to salt, and then on to the larger 150 gallon. We have many corals, mostly soft but a few hard, a yellow tang, a mandarin (the male was found floating last week) which was one of the newer additions, a porcupine puffer who is getting larger by the minute (and will beg for food even though he has just been fed), a six line wrasse, snowflake moray, Royal Gramma (AKA fairy basslet) royal tang (?)and another kind of algae eater. Also snails and hermit crabs and about a ton (REALLY) of live rock. Actually, the Clarkiis started messing around after we were gone for three weeks so that there was no fussing with the environment. The house sitter only fed them from pre-measured cups, and added water to ther sump. I think that they were finally feeling comfortable since hubby didn't mess around with their home for almost a month (by the time we got over jet-lag). They hatch after eight days. When the lights go off at night on the 8th day and you can see the eyes on the babies attached to the rocks, you wait 15 to 20 minutes, put a flashlight at the top of the tank and suction them out.