Breeding Clowns

[GodZilla]

Hello everyone ,

So, nice to meet you for everyone.

I sincerely need to know , if there are, some methods on how to make clowns breed faster. I really wish to see my clowns with babies.;;

Do you think that to breed clowns you really need an anemone ?!
Can you breed them without anemone?

[Penguin]

Hi GodZilla. Welcome to Reefland!

You do not need an anemone to breed clownfish. For tips on getting clownfish to spawn, you may want to check Clownfishes by Joyce Wilkerson. It is an excellent book.

[GodZilla]

Yes Penguin I heard about Clownfishes by Joyce Wilkerson.
But I searched alot to buy this book and I cannot find it in my country.
Maybe it's better to buy it from an Online Store.

Can someone gives me some few tips on getting clowns to spawn ?
I will really appreciated...

[GregD]

Mark,

Penguin's advice is very sound. If you cannot find Joyce Wilkerson's book locally I STRONGLY recommend you try and order a copy online.

In addition, I would also recommend patience....clownfish rearing is not easy to just "start doing". With that said read...read...and read some more!!!
To get you started here are some initial words of advice-

- Make sure you have a mature pair - this means a male and a female that are probabaly at least 2 years old

- Regular lighting cycles help encourage clowns to develop routines and become comfortable in their setting. This comfort factor is a pre-requisite before any clown will begin to spawn.

- Make sure there are no other fish that harass or even really come into contact with the clown pair you are breeding

- Make sure you have a suitable surface in the tank for the clown to lay her eggs...it should be a somewhat smooth surface and preferably easily removable (some suggestion are a pice of clay tile, the bottom of a glass bottle, etc.).

Also before your clowns start breeding you will need to ensure you have the appropriate food sources of the right sizes for the clown larvae.

-This means you will need to begin culturing rotifers (like brine shrimp only smaller).

- In order to feed the rotifers you will also need to grow batches of green water to feed the rotifers (nanochloropsis is the most common although there are other strains of algae that can be as effective).

- You will also need to have a suitable 2nd tank to keep the clown larvae in once they hatch. (including the correct filter and heater setup so as not to damage the larvae/babies as they grow)


The above is just a tiny amount of the information you will need to be prepared with in order to rear clownfish. I am not trying to discourage you, however, there is a lot of preparation that you need go through and clownfish larvae are extremely delicate in their early stages, so it will take you many itterations to tune your processes to improve your success.

When you are successful it is very rewarding!

Hope this helps!
Greg D

[tendar]

Well my gold stripe maroon clowns just spawn last friday. I got them as a small pair and luckly they took to each other right away. I've had them together for almost 1.5 years and they are just now spawning. I spent $250 getting everything required to raise and feed the larvae including buting a batch of green water and rotifers from www.mountiancorals.com so by friday or saturday they should hatch and the nightmare begins.

[GregD]

Tendar,

Congratulations!

I currently have a friend who is successfully breeding gold stripe maroons. A couple of tips that I can pass on about gold stripes in particular and in general about rearing clowns-

- Gold stripe maroon eggs will generally hatch on the 8th day at 80 degrees

- Do not net the larvae......very very gently scoop using a container or the best way is to move the egg clutch to your rearing tank prior to hatching.

- Once they hatch do not start filtering the water right away ...wait as long as possible until the ammonia levels start to rise. The babies are VERY delicate in their first 3 days of life. (BTW...what kind of air filter are you using in your larvae tank???)

- While buying rotifers and greenwater helps in the short term....you are going to need to start growing regular cultures of greenwater, rotifers and brine shrimp to have on hand constantly.

- Feed the greenwater to the rotifer cultures for the babies in their first 0 to 7 days or so....then mix with baby brine shrimp which they will start to be able to eat around day 14.

- You are going to need to have on hand a supply of rotifers and baby brine shrimp at the largest for approximately the first 24 to 30 days of their development.

Good luck and keep us posted!

Greg D.

[GodZilla]

I really want to tell a big thanks to 'GregD' You were a great help for me. I don't know how old my Percula Clowns are because I recently purchased them.

They are 1 inch long. Does someone knows how old are they ? Are they matured ?

[tendar]

Well slowly but surely all of the eggs disappeared over the week to only a couple left by day 8 and they disappeared before night fall. I will be adding a clay tile or pot near way they layed the last batch and hope that they spawn it so I can remove them a day before they hatch and see what happens.
At least this will give me time to get my rotifers going good and my green water. They are both started allready just a matter of expanding for the next batch of eggs.

I have joyce wilkins book clownfish which helps alot on every thing you need to know on clowns. Great book.

[GregD]

Tendar-

You may want to also want to keep an eye on the following two things with the next batch of egs:

1) Make sure to look at the color change in the eggs. The eggs (generally) depending on species will go from a bright color to a more grey color with a black dot. If this is not happening, the female may be laying the eggs but the male is not making passes over them to fertilize them.
(this is a current issue with one of my clown pairs) From what I understand the male will eventually catch on to his duties, however it may take a few batches.

2) Do you have any other fish that may be snacking on your eggs? In general the egg patch should remain roughly the same size until the larvae hatch. The hatching process generally occurs at the same time for all of the eggs, over the course of an hour or two.
If you are seeing depletion in your egg patch you may have other fish snacking on them. The clown parents will normally guard the eggs, however, if you have a male that is slacking (see point 1), the eggs may not be protected.

Definitely keep us posted & good luck with the next batch!

Greg D.

[GregD]

Godzilla-

You are quite welcome, I am glad I could be of assistance.

Based on your description of your percs they sound rather young yet.
If they are only an inch or so long they are probabaly only a year or year and one half old and still developing sexually. Going from juvenile to male and one (the more aggressive) hopefully continuing to change to a female.

During this time while they "figure things out" it is unlikely they will start spawning. My first perc pair only began to spawn after they were over 2 years old (closer to 3 actually) and the male was about 2" long, female about 2.5.

My recommendation- At this time in the clowns life the best thing you can do is to make sure your are feeding them well and providing a balanced diet to help them continue growing.

HTH,
Greg D

[GodZilla]

Thanks again ' GregD ' for helping me.


Please, I want to ask one more question.
1/ How do you know which one is the Male ?

I think if my clowns are still juvenile I cannot figure out who's the Male and Female. So when I can know ?

Tendar Good luck with your clowns. Wish you they spawn soon.

[tendar]

The male is always the smaller of the two with the female being larger and dominet of the 2.