Maxi-mini spawn

[Ron Reefman]

I guess I have a bit of a reputation here at R2R for knowing about Rock Flower Anemones.

But I also have other anemones and a couple of nights ago, I couldn't get back to sleep at 1 am. So I got up and used a UV flashlight to look in my DT. To my surprise, one of my 3 maxi-mini anemones was spawning. It didn't rise up like the RFA does and it was much later in the evening. All the RFA spawns I've witnessed have been in the early evening. The maxi-mini spawn was at 1 am.

Has anybody else seen their maxi-mini spawn? Did you end up with babies?

 

[P-Dub]

Following!

 

[DeniseAndy]

Not yet. I would love to have a spawn. I now have a good amount in my display (10-15) with so many colors. I would love a freak color baby. Then again, I am in bed by 10pm. I may never see it happen.

Did you get any pics or video? I know hard in that light, but hey, just curious.

 

[a hill]

I guess I have a bit of a reputation here at R2R for knowing about Rock Flower Anemones.

But I also have other anemones and a couple of nights ago, I couldn't get back to sleep at 1 am. So I got up and used a UV flashlight to look in my DT. To my surprise, one of my 3 maxi-mini anemones was spawning. It didn't rise up like the RFA does and it was much later in the evening. All the RFA spawns I've witnessed have been in the early evening. The maxi-mini spawn was at 1 am.

Has anybody else seen their maxi-mini spawn? Did you end up with babies?

I’m eagerly awaiting updates!

I’ve been debating if these can be reliably aquaculture if enough were had. Or in a home aquarium they could reproduce similarly to rock flowers.

Your rock flower adventure makes me want a rock flower specific tank.

-Andrew

 

[Ron Reefman]

Not yet. I would love to have a spawn. I now have a good amount in my display (10-15) with so many colors. I would love a freak color baby. Then again, I am in bed by 10pm. I may never see it happen.

Did you get any pics or video? I know hard in that light, but hey, just curious.

I didn't get any pics. I don't know how long the spawning lasted as it was already started when I pick up on it. The spawn itself looked very similar to that of the RFA. And like the RFA it would release a whitish spawn for a time (maybe 10 to 15 seconds?) and then stop. Maybe a minute later it would do it again. I only saw 3 rounds of release. Given the small number of maxi-mini anemones I have and the flow in the DT, I doubt that I'll get any babies. But you never know, and all 3 of the maxi's are close together in the tank...

I’m eagerly awaiting updates!

I’ve been debating if these can be reliably aquaculture if enough were had. Or in a home aquarium they could reproduce similarly to rock flowers.

Your rock flower adventure makes me want a rock flower specific tank.

-Andrew

Just like RFA's I think trying to aquaculture maxi-mini's would involve having lots of them and keeping them in a special tank where you can keep the conditions just right. Even then, waiting for the breeding to take place and the babies to grow big enough to be marketable would require a huge amount of patience!

I did a RFA breeding tank with 30+ nems. Over a year I had 3 spawning events. And two of those 'events' involved 3 different nems spawning about 9 days apart. That was in a 16g tank. Small enough that the entire tank became cloudy white with spawn. I even tried twice to collect spawn with a turkey baster and deliver it directly to other nems. Even with all of that, all I got was 3 babies. I got way better when I had a spawn in my 120g DT and did nothing. That event created over a dozen babies.

So after a year, I called it quits and re-did the rockscape in my new 90g DT and created a small 'field' of RFA's in the sand at the left front corner of the tank.

This was the 16g RFA breeding tank:

This is the same RFA's now in my DT:

 

[a hill]

Great info as always. I’m not well informed in their reproduction cycle past the basics, I’m guessing a special kriessel style tank would be best. Possibly a geodesic sphere holding the nems facing each other slightly in the middle of the tank. Instead of sandy substrate use ceramic biomedia on the bottom for the polyps/babies to settle on.

I’m not sure if that or just making a pvc tube background would ever be cost effective for aquaculture as I assume you’d need a few hundred or more and a large system before seeing any success.

I’m likely over thinking it. However it would look super cool.

-Andrew

 

[KrisReef]

Springtime has arrived, just in time for R2R Family gatherings & other notable events.

Very nice, Ron!