Clown fish eggs? If so HEEEELLLLLLPPPPPP

[Zephrant]

Low airstone is fine, just enough to keep the tank turned over. What are you feeding the rotifers with?
Make sure you have it dense enough in there, the fry should not have to swim far to get to a rotifer.
Level of green looks good- Maybe a bit less if that is not live phyto.

I co-cultured- (1L live phyto three times a day in to 2-4g of water). I over-added rotifers at the start, and they lasted my 50 fry for a week or more before I had to add more. They were multiplying faster than the fry could eat them.

Watch ammonia, although with live phyto I didn't have any measureable.

 

[Zephrant]

BTW- Find someone else local with rotifer and phyto cultures, so you can get a re-start if they crash. Saves a lot of money on shipping.
Also, keep multiple cultures going, for the same reasons. I've been keeping four rotifer cultures going: two 5g buckets, two 1g jugs, just so I don't have to buy them again.

 

[bdejong1112o]

The water was thick with rottifers, they didn't have to swim far or at all in order to get to them. Probably could just sit still and open their mouth.

Sad to report that after the first day about 80% didn't make it and after day 3 all were dead. Still plenty of rottifers and ammonia badge was clear. I did a 25% water change and pulled out all the dead fry after day 1 die off.

I have been using rgcomplete to feed the rottifers but plan to get a phyto system up and running.

But mama is laying a new batch of eggs as I type this so I need to get things reset quickly.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Took the advice from @Zephrant and started my own phyto culture. These are the first two bottles. Bought the culture from Mercer of montana. Added the f2 fertilizer with the ratio of 1.5ml per gallon. These are 32oz bottles and split the culture 50/50 between the two bottles and added fresh saltwater in a 1:1 ratio.



I also blacked out the fry holding tank. I didn't do that the last time. So all sides are black and I will have a very dim light on the top.

My rottifers are still going strong so that's all ready. I will use those with the new live phyto this time. Hatch night is 6 days away.

 

[Zephrant]

Looks like a good start. I started with two 1 L flasks, then went four, then four 1/2 gallon jugs, then ten 2 gallon jugs.

Don’t let it get away from you...

 

[Zephrant]

Have seen it when people add too much of the dead phyto, and it wipes them out. Easy to OD them.

Can’t really do that with home grown life phyto.

 

[bdejong1112o]

I agree on the dead phyto. I restarted my rottifer bucket and used some live phyto from the LFS and it has been much cleaner. My culture should be ready by hatch day and I will be out of my lfs phyto at that time as well. @Zephrant, I appreciate your input here. Thanks and please keep helping and advising on this thread as I learn.

 

[bdejong1112o]

ok, so hatch night was last night. the vossen trap worked great again and I got all but a few that just refused to get with the program. I added them to the holding tank that was stoked with rottifers and far less tint than last time. Enough Phyto to keep the rottifers fed. I can see the rottifers as a cloud and it moves in retraction to the light so I know they are there. This was at 1:10am

Now, at 8am this morning I go check the holding tank and there are quite a few of them dead on the bottom of the tank. The others are moving around the tank ok and there are still a good qty of rottifers. I will harvest more for them this afternoon. Is first day die off normal and how many should I expect? they were all very active swimmers when put in the tank last night....

 

[Zephrant]

I don't know- I've read about that happening a lot, even for experienced breeders. I've only done this once. Friend and I collected 40ish fry, and I've never found a dead one, and have 40ish left still (Approaching 8 weeks). So in my case, I didn't lose any overnight.

Same friend has collected fry for himself several times, lost 100% overnight every time.

This is what worked well for me once:
I took a mixture of about 75% aged (but new) saltwater (IO) from my 100g stock tank that always has water in it (and some dead rock, heaters, pump) and added 2 L live Nannochloropsis, for about 2 gallons of water in a 5g blacked out tank. I had the tank setup a few days in advance with an airstone under a 50w heater, holding 80 F with just the tank water, I addded the Nanno after I added the fry.

I strained about 4L of Rotifer culture though a 53u sieve, and flushed it in to the greenwater. I only spent a few minutes acclimating the fry to the new water by slowly pouring it in to their bucket. I matched the salinity prior. Rotifers are fed mostly Nanno (1L per day) and some iso (250ml per day).

Old 10g fluorescent tank light sitting over the top on a timer, and that was it.

Every day I'd add another liter of Nanno in at morning, noon and evening, as needed (mostly was needed). I added more Rotifers a few times, but they multiplied and grew so fast the fry could nearly walk on them. Each night, I'd siphon out 2-3 L of detritus in to a bucket, check it for fry, then dump it.

Never saw a lick of Ammonia, Nitrite or Nitrate. Only 49ish fry in the tank though, so a light load.

I moved to BBS after Meta, then standard Formula 1/2 flake that I grind in a mortar/pestle. I'm too cheap to pay for the TDO food, although I'd certainly use them if I had them available.

Moved the fry to a 20g Eclipse setup last weekend. Tough to catch the little buggers, I was chasing them in to a beaker with a net. Didn't want to siphon them, was deathly afraid I'd scare them to death, but they all made it.

They are eating like pigs.

They are under the care of a caretaker for the next three weeks, I'll be worrying about them the entire time.

Again, first time for me. I've read Joyce's book several times, haunted these forums for weeks, and bug the LFS as often as possible. There is no doubt I got lucky too.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Happy to report that the last clutch has had a very high survival rate. They are 6 days old and on average I lost only 4 to 6 per day. Estimated about 200 from the hatch night so I have quite a few left.

Main change was starting the fry tank with 100% display tank water. I used display tank water for the daily water changes for the first 2 days the started using fresh mix salt water. I also do daily water changes without fail. The first day die off did not happen this time.

 

[Zephrant]

How are they doing?

 

[bdejong1112o]

Here they are from hatch 3. Its going very well. Very high survival rate now. Hatch 4 went to a friend of mine since i had a work trip and couldn't take care of them and hatch 5 was Sunday. All of them are doing well so far. By all of them I mean at least 300 from that hatch 5 ... I have at least 70 from hatch 3 that are growing up and all look like mini clowns. So cool to watch. I am in the process of putting up a 6 tank grow out system. I figured why not, lets see where this goes. A couple of the local places i get fish and coral from will trade me so if i can support even a little bit of my hobby then at least they are given a chance instead of being fish food for my cardinals. Here are a few snaps. They seem to hang out in three groups. Well fed on baby brine now but i am starting to add a bit of TDO that i crush up.

 

[Zephrant]

Well done. I suspect you may supersaturate the local market though.

Love my little cluster of 49, don’t want to part with them.

I’ve been feeding ground up flake food. Working fine so far, and far, far cheaper than TDO.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Moved them to a larger 20g tank this weekend that has an established bio bed and has been empty for awhile. Then moved the last batch of 5 day olds to the 10g and now the 5g is ready for the next hatch which is this weekend.

I am making progress on the grow out system but have about 2 more weeks of work to get it running. It will be easier to manage them all when its done. Still enjoying it and i am also struggling with the thought of getting rid of the originals. I want so desperately to keep them all but i can't setup another permanent tank, my wife would kill me...

 

[doughboy]

good job!
I quit after 2 hatches and respect/admire the breeders, as I know how hard it is to do. Its not as easy as it looks, a lot of time and effort needed.

 

[Zephrant]

Yep, I’m struggling with when to sell my batch too. So much effort in to them, hate to risk letting someone else kill them.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Yeah, going to have to detach from them for sure. I am still moving forward with my 6 tank grow out system. Most of the work is around all the water changes. My hope is that with a big sump and good filtration the need for all the water changes should be reduced if not eliminated. That is other than the fry tank for the first week but thats 2 gallons a day on average. Manageable.

I also agree, lots of work but worth it when you see them all in the tank doing clown stuff.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Its hatch night once again. Things are looking good so far. Starting them out in 100% tank water like the last few times. Since my luck growing phyto was 0% i have switched over to just using RG Complete. That stuff is working great and my rottifers are good and plentiful.

One thing i do now is that i feed the rottifers and harvest them about 3 hours later. There was a noticable color change in the concentrated mass of rottifers. Feeding and then harvesting resulted in a dark green mass vs the golden brown mass.

I did this on the last batch and had a much higher percentage make it past 3 days.

The last batch is now in the 10g and eating brine shrimp.

 

[Mr. Limpid]

Very cool. My clowns have laid many eggs and then they became food for the fish and into my filter sock. I also looked into the amount of room you need to grow these guys and I just don't have it. My wife puts up with my temporary mixing tank set up and QT. Wouldn't be able set up a clown rearing area.

 

[bdejong1112o]

Update

Completed the 6 tank grow out system a few weeks ago and moved all the current batches into their own respective tanks. I currently have 4 batches at different stages in the tanks with a new hatch arriving this Friday.

I have discovered that using RG Complete to not only feed the rottifers but to also tint the fry tank has skyrocketed my survival rate. I started this on last weeks hatch and had excellent results. Day 3 passed and no mass die off. I add about 1.5ml per day to the fry tank and change 50% of the water every other day. I also run the removed water through a sieve to reclaim the rottifers.

It is day 8 on the last batch and most all of them have advanced and have their first noticable clown stripe. This is much better than past batches. I will repeat this process on Fridays hatch to test the theory.

Some bad cell phone clown candy. Lol