New to Clown Breeding

[littlest reef]

Been in the hobby ~30 years but this is a first. I am building a large reef in our new home, but over the last year to scratch the itch I set up a very no frills 10 gallon in my sons room with two clowns.

I doubt I will get the rotis in time to get a culture setup for this clutch, but could someone with knowledge tell me how far along they think these are?

 

[IKD]

Those look like they’re going to hatch in the next day or so (my bet is closer to a day than two)

 

[IKD]

But no worries, once they get started, they keep laying eggs over and over and over…

 

[littlest reef]

Woke up today and still have eggs. May happen tonight. I bought the Reef Nutrition breeder gear but it may not come in time so I am trying to find rotis in RI area today but am striking out.

Question - they are laying on a dry barnacle decoration. After this clutch should I remove that and replace it with a pot (which is easier to replace with a second pot between hatchings) or should I not mess with their setup if they want to lay on the barnacle?

 

[littlest reef]

These guys are still hanging on. I can still see their eyes. Not sure if they are viable but they haven't turned white. My rotifers deliver today and the hatch tank is setup, so I may just move the barnacle to that tank tonight.

 

[littlest reef]

Still no hatch. Male is now paying them constant attention where before he seemed 50% out to lunch. UPS lost our shipment but rotis delivered today. I have to imagine if they are going to hatch it will be tonight, so I may remove the barnacle as I do not have a vossen trap yet.

 

[littlest reef]

Most of the eggs hatched tonight. I left the lights off till morning in case more hatch and I added a dose of rotifers and tinted the water. Question - if I still have a good number of unborn eggs, do I turn the lights off tomorrow night for a few hours and try to coax a few more out? Or just go 24 hours with the lights?

 

[littlest reef]

For anyone who comes across this - and I have seen this question unanswered on a separate post - I would not turn the lighting off to see if you can hatch additional eggs if the bulk of them hatched. I turned off my lights for 2.5-3 hours and I thought I lost all the fry. The lack of light caused them to be attracted to the heater light. I checked on them around midnight and thought they were all dead. Could just see them all floating lifeless on the bottom. Just in case I left everything running and the lights on. When i woke up this morning I have a lot back to normal swimming! I probably lost half the clutch. Still a good 30-40 swimming around,. Won't do that again. Once the hatch lights are on, leave on 24/7.

 

[burnsq]

Thank you for the advice!

 

[littlest reef]

I have 16 fry on day 6. All things considered going well.

 

[916aquatics]

Awesome I’m glad you got them going

 

[littlest reef]

12 fry on day 10. It seems like what's left are the biggest/strongest - I can't see any runts at this point. They all attack the food when I feed, and seem to sort of come alive when I check on the tank.

Curious what the consensus is on feeding frequency and lighting. Right now I am on TDO B-1. I didn't really have a choice because my roti culture crashed on day 8. I was already feeding B-1 at this point, but I let the rotis run out. Since then, I lightly dust the surface with TDO 5-6 times a day. Is this too much? I am cleaning about ~3 gallons of water per day, I have them in a 10 gallon about 75% full.

On lighting, I am still on a 24 hour lighting schedule. When is a good time to introduce some lights out time? I can't seem to find an answer to this.

My plan is to introduce the sponge filter in a few days. With the rotis done, the water has been significantly less cloudy. I still tinted a little bit each morning just in case it is giving the fish some depth perception benefit.

 

[littlest reef]

For anyone who comes across this, I successfully reared 10 clowns. I really enjoyed the experience and gained an appreciation for how challenging the process was. I've been in the hobby a very long time, and I feel like this was a fun thing to put on my hobby bucket list as completed. My kids loved the process also and that was probably the best part, getting them interested in the hobby.

I think the biggest problem with breeding clowns is the inability to find homes for them once they're ready to move out of the nursery. Most of the club members in my area are set, the market as a whole is just saturated with clowns. I couldn't even find a local shop that would take them for store credit. I was basically donating them (asking for a frag or $25 credit for all 10) and was still getting a "no". My clowns are still spawning but we haven't been raising the clutches for that reason. I ended up placing 3 with a family member, keeping the runt of the litter, and giving the other 6 away to local club members.

 

[littlest reef]