Is my urchin spawning?

Reefing_Engineer · Feb 17, 2022

Hi everyone! I was looking at my tank (20L) and noticed my urchin had small opaque balls on it! Normally it’s tentacles are long and maybe there just bounces up right now? Please let me know what you think, because I’ve only seen pictures in here of males releasing sperm into the water! Thanks in advance!

MnFish1 · Feb 17, 2022

Could be - did you see the sperm released?

Timfish · Feb 17, 2022

Urchins spawning will look something like these. It looks like your urchin just has it's feet pulled in for some reason.

Reefing_Engineer · Feb 17, 2022

MnFish1 said:
Could be - did you see the sperm released?

I didn’t but saw it climbing toward the top when this happened so was curious! Looks like it’s a no though!

Reefing_Engineer · Feb 17, 2022

Timfish said:
Urchins spawning will look something like these. It looks like your urchin just has it's feet pulled in for some reason.

Okay thanks for those! I had only seen videos of sperm released and wasn’t sure what eggs might look like! I’ll make sure none of my fish are picking at the feet or anything, so thanks for that heads up too!

MnFish1 · Feb 18, 2022

Reefing_Engineer said:
I didn’t but saw it climbing toward the top when this happened so was curious! Looks like it’s a no though!

The eggs (from what ive seen - are on long threads - and are smaller than the one on your particular urchin. Then there is usually a cloud of sperm - which you could have missed. What I'm not sure of is whether EVERY urchin spawns in the same way - Its also possible to induce them to spawn.

Kapachuka3 · Feb 19, 2022

MnFish1 said:
The eggs (from what ive seen - are on long threads - and are smaller than the one on your particular urchin. Then there is usually a cloud of sperm - which you could have missed. What I'm not sure of is whether EVERY urchin spawns in the same way - Its also possible to induce them to spawn.

Dude i just had my urchin release stuff it turned my entire tank white.