Clownfish Babies - The Pictures

My clownfish laid their second clutch of eggs 20 days after the first clutch.  So now I have that schedule going.  And on Sunday night, the eggs hatched!  I am now on Day 4 with clownfish fry and I lost count of how many babies I have.  It is somewhere north of 100, but whether it is 110 or 150 I don't know.

A special thanks has to go out to a bunch of people who helped me get through this:
1.  Big Al from the Delaware Valley Reef Club who provided me with advice, rotifers and a link to MOFIB.
2.  Eric, Kathy and Randy at Reed Mariculture who helped me solve my rotifer issues and more!
3.  Kathy and Mark over at MOFIB who helped me create my larvae snagger and talk me through what to expect on hatch night!

And, now, for the pictures.  They are not the best, but you can see the fry!

 

 

  

Clownfish Babies Born Last Night

Well, the eggs hatched last night!!!

No pictures, sorry. But here is an update and observations:

I think I ended up with over 100 fry. I have 2 bangaii cardinals that hung out int he mid level of the tank and just ate them as they hatched and swam to the light. The large amount that gathered outside the filter pad were easy to grab by submerging my rectangular fish box (catcher thing used in pet stores) righ next to them and they flowed right in!

The move to their basement tank went smooth with one, possibly fatal, mistake. In my rush to get them food (which I now read didn't need to happen until this morning), I scooped up rotifers and instead of filtering the water back into the rotifer containers I just dumped that (probably nasty water) right into the fry tank.

This morning I turned on the lights in the basement so they will have ambient light and I fed them (correctly this time) with a ton of rotifers. There were definitely some fry alive, but I noticed that some were on the bottom of the tank. Not sure if they were dead or sleeping ?????

Follow up questions for those following along:
1. What should the bubble rate be in the fry tank? I have a 10g square glass tank (covered on three sides right now). I have a small heather in the middle on the bottom of the tank and a bubble coming up around it to circulate the heat. Because it is a rectangular tank, I also added a second bubble line in the one corner to provide added circulation. The only other thing int here is an ammonia badge.
2. I have read differing stories on lighting for these fish. Too much and they spiral and die. Too little and they can't see to eat. The tank has a fairly powerful light (forget what right now) on it, but it is not on. Its not MH or anything. But I think it is 36w of T5 lighting. When can I turn this on for them?

Now I am away overnight and counting on my wife to take care of these little guys until i return tomorrow night!!! fingers crossed!

In the meantime, my new ATO malfunctioned and flooded part of the basement. To compensate for that screw-up I opened the drain valve (directly to sewer) and then forgot I did it, emptying both my sump and fuge!!! So, in the middle of this birthing I was scrambling to make new salt water and refill the tanks!!!! Not quite done yet, but getting close!!!! ARGHHHHH!

Oh, and my wife bought us a puppy this weekend.... joy!  Its a golden doodle and it is very cute...  I am NOT a dog person, but may be turned around.

My problem with rotifers

So, on to my rotifer problem.

Batch 1: Ordered from Reed. Made a mix of saltwater and split the rotifers into 2 5-gallon buckets. Water was 1.026 and too high I think. Also added them to almost 4.5 gallons of water. Lost them right away. Something was bad. Not sure what.

Batch 2: Ordered 2 rotifer cultures from Reed. Put them each in their own 5-gallon bucket of 1.015 water. Slowed bubbles to 1-3/second. They did really well for 4 days! Feeding roti-diet from Reed.

Then it was time to start harvesting and replacing water. Instead of siphoning them, I poured the buckets through my sieve (from Florida Aqua-Farms) and then literally poured new saltwater from my tank water into the buckets. Water temp was different, salinity was different. and the rush of water may have knocked off all the eggs. Also added phyto from my cultures, not roti-diet.

Lost both of those cultures. No rotifers showing up when I take cupful of water into a clear glass and the water does not clear when I add roti-diet.

Reed has been kind enough to send me 6 million more rotifers (their customer service is awesome) due to arrive on Tuesday. Also received a call from Eric at Reed. He thinks I need to have my bubbles higher, way higher. Lots of bubbles but so much that foam is forming. Also, he thinks my basement may be too cold and thinks small heaters may help (basement is around 68 degrees) and the water is probably too cold.

Also, he recommended getting Chloram-X which I don't have, plus putting in their filter media which I do have.

I am also thinking of bagging the phyto culture stuff and just using the rotifer diet from reed. I know its expensive, but it is sooo much easier than the phyto with my schedule and three kids at home.

And today I picked up a ton of rotifers from a fellow club member to augment my existing culture.  Hopfeully I will have enough for this batch of fry.  After all I will have 6 rotifer cultures going!!!

Quick Clownfish Update

I have a bunch of pictures that I have taken over the last several weeks, showing the pre-mini-crash and post mini-crash.

But, I wanted to give a quick update.  The clownfish have laid their second clutch of eggs.  This happened on Saturday night, during my daughter's 4th birthday party.  It was quite exciting for everyone there!  But, alas, they did not lay on the clay pot I putin for them, but rather deep in the rock between the 2 anemones.  No ida how I am going to get the fry when they are born.... ughhh...

In the meantime, I now have 8 phytoplankton cultures going and 2 5 gallon buckets of rotifers.  I ended up exchanging emails with Randy Reed at Reed Mariculture last week because I was definitely doing something wrong.  But, have no fear, the rotifers are going strong now. 

So, with a water temp consistently around 78.5 degrees, I am thinking 8 days until the eggs hatch.

Oh, and for those of you who have followed along from the inception of this blog, I am now on Day 8 of Chantix.  I am trying yet again to quit smoking!