Timeline to get clowns to host nem

[ThRoewer]

In my experience, the time frame for clownfish to accept an anemone as host is between 5 seconds and several years.
Natural hosts are generally accepted right away while the acceptance of other anemones may take some time and convincing.
The above is primarily for wild-caught an F1 generation anemonefish who's parents were in a natural host. Highly domesticated clownfish who's parents may or may not have seen any anemone may behave very different.

 

[Sdot]

In my experience, the time frame for clownfish to accept an anemone as host is between 5 seconds and several years.
Natural hosts are generally accepted right away while the acceptance of other anemones may take some time and convincing.
The above is primarily for wild-caught an F1 generation anemonefish who's parents were in a natural host. Highly domesticated clownfish who's parents may or may not have seen any anemone may behave very different.

This.... so true....

 

[stanleo]

My clowns lived in a tank with many perfectly acceptable hosts. Very large RBTA, Duncan colony, huge hammer garden, octospawn, clove colonies, etc. Propped an iPad against the tank playing a 10 hour vid of clowns hosting near where the clowns hung out. Did this for 3 days straight and suddenly the clowns were hosting!! Dumb idiots tho, my male is hosting my Duncan and my female is hosting only my green/purple hammer on the opposite side of the tank!! The sexy shrimp have gotten very comfortable in the nem tho.

My clown does that too. A very nice cluster of BTA and the clown stays with the hammer.

 

[MrDLHughesY]

My clowns won’t go near my BTA and have settled for my indo torch

 

[Homebrewer]

Anemone hosting clowns.

I appreciate the advice on waiting a bit for an anemone. I have heard many different recommendations for the time frame of getting them.... Some say a year, some say 6 months, some say they do just fine right after the cycle. So doing the research is not always easy lol. My semi local fish...

www.reef2reef.com

Convincing a clown to move into an anemone...

I think I may have found a good way to convince my clown to make a home in the anemone. It's foolproof! Oh wait... I forgot fish can't read! Back to the drawing board!

www.reef2reef.com

Won't host

doesn't always work, but you can tape a picture of an anemone (that looks similar to yours) hosting a clown to the side of the tank. i did this with one of my older tanks and it worked within a few hours. doesn't hurt to try :) +1 on this technique, it worked for me. This topic came up in...

www.reef2reef.com

This topic comes up from time to time. Rather than offer my opinion, here are a few other threads that attempt to address your question.

 

[JohnnyBeagle]

my clowns found their anemone about 16 days after I added the nem

The female played in it first while the male hovered nearby, and by the time I came back from work that day, they both were in there

 

[Super Fly]

Finally caught the female clown fish while she was sleeping and had her in the strainer with anemone. No interest what so ever of the anemone and only after 2 days she somehow escaped back into the display tank during the night!!! ;Facepalm ;Drowning ;Drowning ;Drowning My youngest son said to evict them from the tank and get new clown fish!
Will try to catch the clowns again & next time put netting over the strainer...

 

[Homebrewer]

Try the picture technique talked about in those other threads I attached. Can’t promise it will work, but I can promise that it’s a no-risk, high-reward option. There is absolutely no harm in taping a picture to the tank, and if it works, great; if it doesn’t, oh well.

 

[Super Fly]

Try the picture technique talked about in those other threads I attached. Can’t promise it will work, but I can promise that it’s a no-risk, high-reward option. There is absolutely no harm in taping a picture to the tank, and if it works, great; if it doesn’t, oh well.

yup, tried them all, pix taped to tank glass & playing video of clown fish swimming in anemone... none has yet to work.

 

[Bfragale]

Just food for thought:

I have a pairof clowns that I’ve had over a year. Last a BTA for same time. They never even paid it any attention so I gave up.

I did a 3 day black out for some algea and low and behold when I uncovered the tank they were in the nem.

no idea if this is common or if it can be replicated but it was an unintended result that I was pleasantly surprised with.

happy reefing!

 

[rapid]

just let them be eventually the will host. myn started hosting as soon as i started introducing more bigger fish then them. guess it gave them a reason to hide in the nem. with out that prey instinct to hide in the nem i doubt they would ever even notice it.

 

[mcshams]

I know people get particular with who is "hosted" and who is the "host". But that's not really the point. Watching our clowns nuzzle into the nem (or torch, duncan, or whatever the clown has chosen) is one of the highlights of owning the pair. I agree with the poster that indicates it can take between 5 seconds and years.
Our clowns loved the PVC pipe that we used for QT. He/she acted stressed when in the display tank without it. So we placed the PVC adjacent the anemone. It took about 2 months if I'm guessing right, and once the clown found the nem, the PVC pipe was no longer of interest and we removed it from the display.

Lastly, there are some rare instances where clowns can indeed hurt corals and/or nems. It's not often, but to say the relationship is always symbiotic and thus beneficial to both animals is not 100% true at all times.

Best of luck. Oh, and we've tried the funnel/acrylic tube method, the running videos method, all with varied success/failure (tbh more failure than success, as it takes a lot of patience). Time was the best method. And IF you can seperate the nem and clowns from the main tank and place them in a fixed container (such as the strainer) I felt this worked the best from our experiences. BUT, we have often introduced them at different times so the nems have been fixed and we can not remove them without risks of damage.

Take care.

 

[Veora]

Just food for thought:

I have a pairof clowns that I’ve had over a year. Last a BTA for same time. They never even paid it any attention so I gave up.

I did a 3 day black out for some algea and low and behold when I uncovered the tank they were in the nem.

no idea if this is common or if it can be replicated but it was an unintended result that I was pleasantly surprised with.

happy reefing!

Thank you for your post! I have been trying to deal with algae and wondered why none of my clowns will live in my anemone. I will try the blackout and see if it works for either or both of my problems. Thx again.

 

[argiBK]

Not sure if you've tried this yet, but what worked for me when my pair were still juveniles was to wait until the room was completely dark, turn off all the tank lights, and shine a flashlight on the anemone nearest to where the fish were hanging out. They went right in after a few minutes.

Good luck!

 

[Morbo]

My clowns have shown zero interest in any of the 3 BTAs we have in the tank. I tried to "nudge" them in when I added them. They looked at the nem for a minute and swam away. Never been back as far as I know.

Someday maybe... I'm not going to try and force them again.

 

[Sdot]

In my experience, the time frame for clownfish to accept an anemone as host is between 5 seconds and several years.
Natural hosts are generally accepted right away while the acceptance of other anemones may take some time and convincing.
The above is primarily for wild-caught an F1 generation anemonefish who's parents were in a natural host. Highly domesticated clownfish who's parents may or may not have seen any anemone may behave very different.

This all day... was my experience with both of my pair of Clowns.

 

[Labora]

I believe quadricolor anemone is not a natural host for clownfish a. ocellaris which is why people have so much trouble as well as over breeding etc. I had some black and white clownfish that never hosted but they passed.

I went to the store and bought some galaxy clarkiis that were already bonded to bubble tip anemone. So I brought them home and they are obsessed with the anemone and even feed it. They were under about 7 months old. I looked it up and Clarkiis and BTAs are hosts in the wild so it makes sense.

It is super rewarding to watch.

 

[ThRoewer]

I believe quadricolor anemone is not a natural host for clownfish a. ocellaris which is why people have so much trouble as well as over breeding etc. I had some black and white clownfish that never hosted but they passed.

I went to the store and bought some galaxy clarkiis that were already bonded to bubble tip anemone. So I brought them home and they are obsessed with the anemone and even feed it. They were under about 7 months old. I looked it up and Clarkiis and BTAs are hosts in the wild so it makes sense.

It is super rewarding to watch.

Clarkii (the real and all the ones mistakenly identified as such) accept pretty much any anemone you offer them, even if they are not host anemones.
I had one even forcing himself on an Atlantic Actina equina...

 

[JonnyTorch]

Not sure if you've tried this yet, but what worked for me when my pair were still juveniles was to wait until the room was completely dark, turn off all the tank lights, and shine a flashlight on the anemone nearest to where the fish were hanging out. They went right in after a few minutes.

Good luck!

+1 on that. Worked immediately for one of my clowns and a day later the other hosted it also.

 

[sgrosenb]

I had a pair of clowns and a green BTA for about 2.5 years and they never hosted. My tank is 165g and I had a really light fish load. About 2 months ago I put 3 tangs in and a few anthias. Just last week I looked over and the clowns were hosting! Took them almost 3 years... Someone in this thread mentioned bigger fish being introduced which may have caused it... they certainly aren't stressed (looks like they are happier!) but maybe the tangs were the driver. Either way, it's one of my favorite parts of the tank now.