Tonight’s My First Hatch Night, Could Use Some Advice!

[Jeff Willetts]

So tonight will be my first hatch night, (I have rotifers / rearing tank ready) a fellow breeder gave me an idea on how to catch the larva *Parents-Eggs are in my 220G Reef* I will include pics in my post. So I have a few questions as flooding my room is a concern lol, is there anyway to make this setup better? And or should I wait until lights out and just try to move the rock with eggs to my rearing tank? Although possible I’m not quite sure how I would get an air stone onto the eggs beings there on top of the rock. My Rearing setup is a 10G tank I ran two airlines from my DT to rearing tank, and then a 1” hose from rearing tank back to my sump. (Filter floss and fish net on drain to stop larva from getting sucked into the sump) and I have a dim led light I was planning on putting on the glass near the hoses to attract the larva.

Second question is after hatch how long should I wait before adding rotifers to larva tank? And should i add RGComplete directly to the larva tank instead of using my culture water?

Any suggestion, recommendations?

 

[laverda]

If you can remove the rock, I would do that. The air is to create water movement around the eggs. Turn the rock on its side if you.need to.you did not say what eggs your expecting to hatch. I am guessing clowns.. You may want to place a clay pot to tile for them to lay on in the future, as they are easer to work with. In the future I would move them a little before lights iut on the evening they are due to hatch.
Good luck.

 

[Jeff Willetts]

Thank you for the reply, yes I’m sorry they are clownfish eggs and I did just move the rock along with 5g of tank water over to the hatching tank(lights out normally in 20 mins), I tilted the rock onto the air stone so the bubbles weren’t hitting the eggs but we’re creating some water movement. Set the heater, covered the front glass and threw a towel over the top of the tank and turned the lights out. I’m praying I did it correctly and the eggs hatch but time will tell, if not I’ll better prepair myself for the next batch of eggs, and yes I’m going to go buy a clay pot tomorrow and hopefully they take to it, now I sit in the other room playing the waiting game! Fingers crossed!

 

[Muttley000]

Good luck! I would not add culture water to the rearing tank. Keep us posted!

 

[Jeff Willetts]

Well moving the rock and adding a air stone was a success. Not quite sure how many there are because they are so darn hard to see especially after I added rotifers and RGComplete to the tank, on the light side I did see 10 or so swimming around but didn’t want to poke around too much beings they just hatched so I let them be. I attached two pictures I took before leaving for work, if any one has any suggestions on making the setup better please let me know . I have a small air stone on the dark side of the tank with very little airflow (I read for the first few days air should be turned down) Thanks for all the reply’s super exciting!

 

[Blue Lip]

I find that when I start to hatch clowns, the eggs that don’t hatch soon die. To increase the hatch, I leave lights on the night they should hatch. The following day I remove the rock the eggs are on and place in a 10 gallon tank that is wrapped with black plastic. Cover the top too. It can be difficult to get the rigid tubes just right and cover the tank. Check an hour later and I start collecting the fry and put them into another 10 gallon tank. Reposition tubing and try to hatch more. When the hatch is over, I recommend removing the rock. I always seem to loose the fry that are left in a tank with a rock. I suspect amphipods get them. My last hatch first scoop into the hatching tank to transfer them.