Clown sexing

If you have a pair and the female dies, does the male stay male if there is no other fish present? Does it become a female? What happens?
 
Thanks!

RLTW

180 Gallon Mixed Reef

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!" Isaiah 6:8

Excellent question and frankly I'm not sure anyone conclusively knows the answer???  Some folks suggest it requires external stimuli to elicit the sex change...i.e. the presence of a smaller, subordinate clownfish tells the male it should now turn female.  Logically it would be advantageous for the fish to remain male until such time as a new fish arrives...that way if some larger fish moves in, it can accept it as a new female vs. trying to drive away what would've been a suitable mate.
 
Again, all of that is just conjecture.  I only have one experience with such a situation, and I can tell you that when a new "female" arrived from another pair that was split up, the new female was only 1/4" larger than the existing male.  While only alone for a couple weeks or so, this was an extremely difficult pair to create...I had to reinforce the male's subordinate position by removing it from the main tank, placing it in isolation where it could see the "female" romp.  After a couple weeks, I could release the male into the tank and they'd "get along" but to date, months later, no spawns to show for it.

Actually, I do have one other experience...and that would be with the Lightning Maroon - it seemed to remain male even when it had no mate, or when it had only fleeting contact with a much larger Maroon.  When placed with a smaller proven male, it did not accept it, but wanted to kill it.  Experiences pairing maroons suggest that it is largely fish of the same sex (and generally same size) that go nuts on each other, and the Lightning was always intensively submissive when placed with any larger fish despite the assertions by some that it had to be a female.  I'm pretty sure this whole time, where it was "semi mateless", it stayed male.  I base these assumptions on behavioral observation, as there is no outwardly proven way to simply sex a clown by just looking at it.

I'm going to agree with the "external stimuli" scenario in this case. If your male is kept alone I would assume that it would stay male. That's just my opinion though. I have no evidence to prove that theory.

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My experience with the Clarkii species has stated the opposite. I had two experiences where there was one in a tank and it had grown really large, assuming they turned female. One of them, a small assumed male was added and formed a mated pair within 4 months. This seems to be still inconclusive. The second assumed female was alone for months two fish the same size were added and were killed within 2 days. When a much smaller fish was added a bond formed immidiately by the next day. IMO if all clownfish are born male wouldn't it be easier to find a new mate if you were female??

I thought they were born with both sexes and they were dormant until there was a dominate one then the next most dominate became the male. I didn't think they were all male to begin with.

RLTW

180 Gallon Mixed Reef

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!" Isaiah 6:8

I don't believe you can go straight from juvenile (asexual) to functional female...that's why you can have a fertile male Percula at 8 months of age, but to get a functional female takes years (i.e. generally often 2-3 years, or longer).  Going back without a reference, I do believe the general "jist" is that juvenile clowns are generally thought of as "sexually inactive males".  In other words, "all clownfish are born boys".  I suppose, on some levels, it's theoretically possible for a fish to go from "juvenile" to "female" without actually spending time as a sexually active male, but in that period prior to being a functional female, the fish is technically still switching over from "male"...growing the ovaries (which I believe arise from testicular tissues).  Again, a lot of conjecture / "if I recall correctly" type stuff there, so don't hold me to it as I'm not breaking out references and researching these answers.  Totally off the cuff - could be fundamentally wrong in more than one way.

I purchased a group of 5month old Clarkiis in November of 09 and  another batch 3 months later (different breeders) . I took one from each batch put them together in June 2010 and had a mated pair by October 2010. Not trying to prove anyone wrong, but in this case I don't see that it takes 2-3 years to get a functional female. Perhaps it may be different depending on the species or maybe I'm just special, LOL.

 
Um, you nailed it - "species" matters.  Ocellaris generally has a maturity time of 1 to 1.5 years for a female, but it seems that Percula are generally closer to 3, and "Black Ocellaris" 3-4 years for some (unless you "cook" them with uber-high temps, which in essence speeds up EVERYTHING, including metabolism but also aging).
 
And no, you have a better chance at "finding" a mate if you remain male.  The logic is simple.  As a "male", you can take either role in a new pairing.  If you are smaller/subordinate in the new pairing, you can remain male.  If you are larger/dominant in the new pairing, you can turn female.  If you are female, the ONLY acceptable mate that can be offered is a male.  To the best of my recollection, there is only one documented case of a known "female" clownfish reverting to a functional male.  I don't like those "odds".  In bidirectional hermaphrodites, those that can "revert", i..e Pseudochromis cyanotaenia, it was Wittenrich that noted that it can take longer (i.e. perhaps  twice as long) to "revert" to the earlier initial sex, than to go from the initial to the final sex.  In laymans terms, if a clownfish was mature enough to become a female, it could do so in lets's say hypothetically 1 month.  But if that female were to then meet up with another female, and on the outside chance that it even COULD revert to being male, in theory, it could take significantly longer (a hypothetical 2 months for example) to revert (again, assuming that clownfish even could at any point).  Bottom line, staying male leaves both sides of the coin open.  Turning female reduces your chances of finding a mate.
 
Of course,given that the "female" is going to be the older, dominant fish, it is far more likely that if you're a single fish in an anemone, any newcomer is going to likely be a smaller, younger fish, who is in need of a home.  So it's my guess that in the wild, "staying male" when a female dies won't "double" your odds of finding a mate parsay, because while you can mate with 100% of potential new arrivals, the truth is that a Female might be able to mate with 80-90% of new arrivals as well, simply because any new arrival to an anemone is far more likely to be a juvenile / young fish, and not some older, wandering female who's suddenly looking for a new home.  In the end though, staying male means = a 100% match should any suitable new clownfish come along.