Breeding Journal, Species: Premnas biaculeatus

General
Species: Premnas biaculeatus (Gold Stripe Maroon clownfish)
Social Structure: Mated Pair
Size of Individuals: Mother 5in father 2in
Age of Individuals: 5 years as of December 2008
Date added to Tank: May 2009
Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank: 135 gallons
Substrate Details: 2in sandbed with 150 pounds of live rock
Filtration Details: Grape Caulerpa, Wire Algae
Water Changes: 1, 10% every other week
Water Temperature: 78-81 degrees 
Lighting: Outer Orbit 6ft lighting fixture
Lighting Cycle: 14hours 8:00 A.M.-10:00 P.M.
Other Tank Inhabitants: Royal Gramma, bubble tip anemone, green mandarin, sailfin tang, powder brown tang, 1 damsel, flame angel, 1 peppermint shrimp, 2 cleaner shrimp, 1 arrow crab, pistol shrimp, pistol goby, orchid dottyback, many corals, other cleaning inverts

Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types: Mysis shrimp, and flake foods
Feeding Schedule: Flake food three times per day, mysis once every two days  

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn: Sometime in July of 2009
Dates of Consecutive Spawns: 

9/7/09
10/2/09
10/12/09
10/24/09
11/3/09
11/13/09
11/23/09
12/3/09 
To find more dates please refer to my breeding journal, there may have been more dates but I was not very accurate on documenting several months ago
 
Larval Tank Details
Temperature: 78-80 degrees
Size of Larval Tank: 10 gallon with 7 gallons of water
Substrate Details: Bare bottom  
Other Tank Decor: heater, salinity meter, bottom of tank is painted white, 3 sides are painted black; the front of the tank has a wooden flap covered with electrical tape that is taped shut this can open allowing for viewing of the larvae
Filtration Details: Phytoplankton (I will find out the species), and after three weeks a bubble filter is added  
Lighting: 100W clip on light
Lighting Cycle: usually 6:20A.M.-10P.M.
Water Changes: Everyday 10%, 5% done at 6:20 A.M. and topped off with a drip, 5% at 6:00 P.M. and topped off with a drip 

Larval Feeding Details
Food Types: Rotifers (from one day post hatch-three weeks), Baby brine (from two weeks post hatch to time the larvae are eating flake food), Copepods (from 2.5 weeks post hatch to the time the larvae are eating flake food [I will find out the species of copepod]), flake foods (Formula 1, Formula 2, Tetra Marine; pulverized to feel like dust specks, fed for the rest of the time that I have the clowns), Cyclopeeze (Fed from the time that the clowns have been eating flake food for two week until the clowns become a desirable color)  
Feeding Schedule: Please refer to "Food Types"

Metamorphosis/Settlement
Date of Metamorphosis: 10/17/09
Date of Settlement: 10/20/09 (Not sure about this date this will be updated after my next clutch)

Grow-Out Tank Details
Temperature: 80-84 degrees
Size of Grow-Out Tank: 20 gallons with 30 gallon sump
Substrate Details: Black Hawaiian Sand about 1/4in deep 
Other Tank Decor: small piece of live rock, heater, and bubble filter
Filtration Details: Refugium with grape caulerpa
Lighting: 100W clip-on light
Lighting Cycle: 6:00 A.M. - 10:00 P.M.
Water Changes: 5% every month - note at the moment there are only four fish in this tank which are still very small  
Size at Transfer: 1/4 in
Age at Transfer: 1 month

Grow-Out Feeding Details
Food Types: Various Flake foods (Formula 1, Formula 2, and TetraMarine) ground up into small pieces ground to the consistency of dust, cyclopeeze fed until the clowns are a desirable color, copepods are also fed from time to time
Feeding Schedule: 10:00 A.M. and 4:00 P.M. (automatic feeder)
 
Additional Information
Miscellaneous Information: 
9/7/09 Maroons lay eggs in a clay pot
9/13/09 Moved the pot into a ten gallon tank filled with 7 gallons of water at 1.020 salinity
 
9/14/09 Eggs begin to hatch around 6:00 P.M. about 300 fry
 
9/17/09 Ammonia spike kills the last 2 clownfish fry
 
9/17/09-10/2/09 Let eggs on rock hatch realized that it would be easy to siphon clown fry out of main tank into another tank siphoned none due to improper preparation 
  
10/2/09 Maroons lay a new batch of eggs on rock I begin to prepare for the hatch 
 
10/8/09 Siphoned baby maroons out of tank 200 babies captured the eggs were caught by shining a flashlight into the tank the babies were attracted to the light so they swam into it I was then able to siphon them into a bucket and move them into another tank the salinity in my main tank is 1.025 and the salinity needed in a broodstock tank is 1.020 I set up a slow drip of water and dripped water into the tank over night
 
10/12/09 have about 30 babies left from previous hatch the maroons laid a new batch of eggs today
 
10/17/09 went to fishtal's MASM meeting on captive breeding it was very informational thank you for all of your help Tal
 
10/18/09 I moved the clowns out of the broodstock tank into another 10 gallon tank this gave them a fresh start and allowed them to get out of the water that had a 4.0 ammonia level when I moved them I transferred them to the new tank with 50% of their old water.  The other batch of eggs hatched I moved them into the tank that I had the other clowns in before I cleaned it before I put them into it I siphoned about 200 babies
 
10/20/09 1 maroon from the hatch on 10/8/09 goes through metamorphosis and gets a stripe and is the color of it's parents
 
10/21/09 a the same maroon gets a second stripe 2 babies left from this hatch I did an 50% water change on this tank to bring the ammonia level down to 1.00
 
10/22/09 I did another 50% water change to bring the ammonia level down to .50%.  Did my first siphoning of clowns from 10/18/09 tank noticed about 20 dead fry ammonia level was .25% after change
 
10/23/09 still have 2 maroons from hatch on 10/8/09 waiting for the second to go through metamorphosis it is beginning to get longer and turn black.  I still have about 80-100 babies from my hatch on 10/18/09 this is three times more this same time on my hatch from 10/8/09
 
10/24/09 maroons lay a new batch of eggs which will be hatching on 10/30/09
 
10/26/09 hatch from 10/18/09 are going through metamorphosis tonight, and my clown left from the hatch on 10/8/09 now has three stripes
 
10/30/09 all clowns from hatch on 10/18/09 have gone through metamorphosis, and another group of clowns hatched I siphoned about 250 out of the tank
 
11/1/09 all of clowns from hatch on 10/18/09 have 2-3 stripes and I have one clown left from my first hatch it has 3 stripes, all clowns are .5 cm long I still have about 40 most are eating flake food, and I still have 250 babies from the hatch on 10/30/09
11/3/09 clowns laid a clutch of about 50 eggs
 
11/13/09 clowns laid another clutch of about 600 eggs in the pot for the second time 
 
11/18/09 moved clowns that hatched the 30th into the tank with the older ones. The eggs in the pot should be hatching tomorrow.

11/19/09 Moved pot over to the tank where the babies would hatch, after a series of long events the next morning I ended up with 20 larvae

11/23/09 Clowns laid eggs on rock, I need to get them moved into a broodstock tank ASAP but it probably won't happen until after Christmas

11/29/09 Clown eggs hatched I got about 400-500 fry

12/3/09 Clowns laid eggs

12/9/09 Clown eggs hatched 

1/3/10 Clowns laid eggs (I will not be able to save this hatch because I'm going to be gone for the weekend)  
 
1/15/10 Clowns laid a clutch of eggs in their pot there are about 600 eggs
 
To find more information please refer to the rest of my breeding journal.

That's great Kevin!  Thanks for starting your journal.  Now we need pics.  

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Excellent.  Now I have a source to pair up my maroon once I tire of the hybrid experiment.

Rook

Your welcome Tal,
I have been very busy for the last few weeks I will try to get some pictures posted tonight.

I can't figure out how to post pictures on here yet but here is a video link of the babies that I took today, the clowns laid eggs in the pot for the second time. 

Posting images and videos pretty much works the same way.
 
To post a picture just click the icon on the toolbar and paste the url for the image in the dialog box.
 
For videos click the  icon and paste the link to the youtube video.
 
If you image isn't already on a website like photobucket, snapfish, etc. The you also have the option of posting the picture as a file attachment. At the bottom of the message box there is a button that says "You may attach file(s) to this message. Click that and then you can upload the pictures and attach them right to your post. You will probably have to resize them down to around 800x600 before you upload them though.

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

Thank you Chad here are some pictures the first one is of the eggs in the pot and the next one is of the baby clowns about a week ago.
 

My hatch from the 18th is one month old today.  I had 21 survive in total,  I had eleven from my other hatch giving me a total of 32 baby clowns that have survived metamorphosis.

That's great Kevin!  I told you that you could do it.  Make sure you update your journal.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Way to go!

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

Sorry I have not been on for quite some time.  I have a new grow out tank set up and my baby gold stripes are over two months old now they are longer than half an inch.  I will try to get pictures posted tomorrow.

Cool!  Can't wait to see how they're doing.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

 

Here are a couple of pictures there are more clowns than these but those pictures didn't turn out very well.  I will have a video on later.

They look great Kevin!  I've been feeding my juveniles the Cyclopeeze from Argent (find it at Mobys) and I'm getting amazing coloration.  

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

"
Here are some pictures of the clowns that hatched on 10/18/09
The third picture is of them right after they hatched.
The second picture was taken when the clowns were several days old.
The first picture was taken when the clowns began to go through metamorphosis.
There are many other pictures of these clowns on photobucket here is the link to more pictures of the clowns http://s607.photobucket.com/home/fishboy13/index

I got some cyclopeeze a few days ago and the babies love it my clowns laid eggs a few days ago but they didn't make it to today when they should have hatched they may still be there but I didn't see any.  I need to move them to a broodstock tank like I have been saying for a few months.  It is going to be impossible to get the male out of the 135 gallon the female is big so I could catch her in a large container when she swims up to the top and tries to eat.  Also how often do I have to feed the babies cyclopeeze?  I'll try to post pictures this weekend.

I feed Cyclopeeze with every meal but you don't have to.  I'm getting excellent coloration feeding this way.

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Kevin,

Your maroon babies look amazing! The color and body proportions are fantastic. You should be proud.

Thank you Matthew I hope to get more than one or two to live through a hatch like I have had lately.  I hope I can get back to the thirty or fourty maroons per hatch.

So I came home from school today to have a nice surprise the clowns laid eggs for the first time in a while.  My very amazing surprise is that the eggs were laid in the pot.  I have a very good feeling about this new clutch, I just need to remember to turn the heater on this time.

Very cool!  It just takes them some time to get used to things.  They should be back on schedule now.  

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Here are the eggs that she laid today 

Eggs Day 2

No more eggs they are all gone.

Well I'm waiting for the clowns to spawn again but my largest baby is about 3/4in. They grow up so fast

Look what I found
Sorry for the bad picture, there are probably  more eggs than that, but I couldn't get a picture from the front of the tank because the anemone was in the way.  They will hatch 2/10/10

Here is a picture of one of my larger clowns, he has a cool spot on him.

No more eggs.

There will be more
My GSM seem to stop spawning at even the slightest change, but they always start back up again soon.

Thanks for the optimism.

I brought four of my babies to Moby Dick today.  They grow up so fast   I'm going to miss them so much.  I still have nine babies I think, now it is time for me to start over and get more eggs .

I caught my clowns spawning today while I was cleaning the tank.  There are about 500-600 eggs, I'll post pictures of them tomorrow.

Well the clown laid eggs two days ago, and I got five babies to make it from my 20 larvae that hatched a few weeks ago.

Sorry I know that it has been to long since I last updated this journal.  I have finally figured how to work my camera so here is my favorite that I have taken in the last few days.

These eggs are hatching tonight .

So I tried taking my first pictures of a clownfish larvae under a microscope, here is a gold stripe maroon about 17 hours after hatching at 40x magnification.

Let me know what you think of my pictures.

Great shots!

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

Thanks, I'm going to add new picts everyday.  I still have about 200 eggs to hatch but none of them have fungused yet and I don't care because the longer that they are in the eggs the larger they will be .

Well I got bored and I wanted to see what two extra days of egg development would do, here are the eggs that are hatching tonight.  I am not sure how old the eggs are I didn't see them get laid.
Day 7-8                                           Day 5-6
 

Guess what, I had my very first 100% hatch .  I'm so happy, I'll post pictures of the larvae later.