Breeding Journal, Species: Amphiprion ocellaris, Orange type

General
Species:  Orange Amphiprion ocellaris
Social Structure:  Pair, these are a pair that I raised previously from eggs. 
Size of Individuals:  Large, female larger than male
Age of Individuals:  At least 2 years of consistent spawning
Date added to Tank:  3-4 years ago.  They are in a cube system with other broodstock.


Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank:  8 gallons on a 80 gallon system
Substrate Details:  bare, with large flower pot
Filtration Details:  10 micron filter sock, bioballs, heater, sometime a weak protein skimmer.  I don't like protein skimmers.  I would rather do water changes, skimming the surface of the sump.
Water Changes:  10 % weekly
Water Temperature:  80
Lighting:  ambient
Lighting Cycle:  14 hours light/10 dark
Other Tank Inhabitants:  other breeding pairs in adjacent cubes, blacks and oranges

Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types:  Frozen Ocean Nutrition Formula One gel and various pellets, and other frozen foods
Feeding Schedule:  Once or twice a day.

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn:  Can't remember.  Date of this spawn is 7/25/2011
Spawn Time of Day: late afternoon          
Dates of Consecutive Spawns:  every eleven days
Courtship Details:  Female was huge, larger than I've seen her.  Male pays strict attention and tries to be where she is.  They cleaned half of a 6 inch pot interier of some sheet cyano that is taking over everything . They laid the eggs on the top inside curve of the pot, a large, solidly packed nest that extends a quarter of the way around the pot.  Much bigger area is taken by the eggs than the fish combined.
Egg Size:  2 mm x 1 mm oval ?
Egg Color:  Flower pot orange, hard to see in the pictures
Egg Count:  541-600!

Hatch Details
Hatch Date:  August 1 with a few July 31, many more August 2 
Hatch Time of Day:  after lights out
# Days after Spawn:  7 or 8
Larvae Description:  tiny eyes with a tail, tummy, clear


Larval Tank Details
Temperature:  80
Size of Larval Tank:  20 gallons , 10 gallons in use
Substrate Details:  bare
Other Tank Decor:  heater, air bar 
Filtration Details:  none until put on system, then bioballs , sock filter , UV
Lighting:  ambient
Lighting Cycle:  14 hrs light/10 hrs dark
Water Changes:  Continous slow drip  inflow with manual removal. 
Larval Feeding Details
Food Types:  rotifers grown and enriched on Reed's rotirich plus and cloram-x for ammonia control
Feeding Schedule:  As needed to maintain at least 10 rots per ml.

Metamorphosis/Settlement
Date of Settlement Start: 
Days after Hatch: 
Date of Settlement End: 
Description of Fry: 

Grow-Out Tank Details
Temperature: 
Size of Grow-Out Tank: 
Substrate Details: 
Other Tank Decor: 
Filtration Details: 
Lighting: 
Lighting Cycle: 
Water Changes: 
Size at Transfer: 
Age at Transfer: 

Grow-Out Feeding Details
Food Types: 
Feeding Schedule: 

Additional Information

(No Pictures or Videos in the Section Please)
Miscellaneous Information: 



You will be required to provide photographic or video evidence in this thread of each event submitted for the MBI Program.
If your thread does not contain these photos the MBI Committee will not be able to approve your reports. PHOTOS AND VIDEO S MUST BE PLACED IN ADDITIONAL POSTS, NEVER IN THE FIRST POST IN A JOURNAL.

This is the 6 inch diameter pot with eggs:

 
 

The eggs match the pot in color, and comprise a quarter of the 6 inch diameter pot's circumference, about 7 linear inches around the rim. Rather dense, this is the biggest nest of eggs I've ever gotten from an ocellaris.  The female isn't really that big a fish.

 

a couple days later when the eggs darken, you can see them better:

Yesterday I scraped the eggs off the pot and siphoned into a brine shrimp hatcher, added a drop of methylene blue, and found maybe a dozen hatched ones after an hour in the dark. So I thought that the majority would hatch tonight. Well, … maybe a quarter hatched this evening, so I put the rest back in the hatcher with another drop of methylene blue and we will see if I get any more hatched tomorrow.
 
The rest of them are chowing down on N-rich enriched rots.  It's the first time I've used this product, and I'm curious if I notice any difference.  I've left a dim light on the tank, with the hatcher shaded. Hopefully, there will be more hatching tomorrow.
 
The disadvantage of the hatcher is that one may not be able to separate the hatched from the unhatched. If you leave the hatched in there, they get beaten up a lot.  If you don't use enough air, the unhatched will never hatch.  Otherwise I like the hatcher very much.
 
 

What type of hatcher are you using and why? I'm surprised that you're still using pots. I find tiles MUCH easier to work with.  

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

I'm using a purchased brine shrimp hatcher, the kind that uses a cut off upside down soda bottle.
I have pots in the broodstock tanks because they seem to like the cave like space. They tend to spawn on the pots.  I have tiles in one cube, and they are not yet spawning.
 
This spawn was so large and the pot so covered in cyano, that I did not want to hatch directly off the pot. It would be difficult to get an airstream to jostle all the eggs given their position on the rim of the pot, and its size.  So I just took the eggs.
 
Frankly, I'm out of practice.  It's been a long while since I've hatched eggs.  My timing is clearly off.

Here's the hatcher:
I added 1 drop methylene blue to keep the fungus down.

With air:

And here's the all important proof of hatch:

An aweful lot of them did not hatch, so back in the hatcher they went, and we will see if I get any love this evening.  Not going to get 541 larvae out of this nest, however.  Not that lucky.

I did get some more hatchlings, probably a couple hundred or so larvae all together.  I've done better with smaller nests, but I never do that well when it takes two days to get them all out.
 
I have enough rotifers for 541 larvae though, so even in 10 gallons, there are plenty of rots.  Once a day addition of NRich 8 hour rots, and the rest of time I just add RotiGrow+ to the tank to green it up.  About 10 drops morning and evening.  They are easy at this stage.  I did have to siphon out the dead eggs and there was a layer of sedimented algae as well.  I've seen more energetic larvae, but then I did starve the parents one day before the eggs were laid.  MBI conference….totally worth it.

LOL that you now have to identify ocellaris as "orange type"
 
That is one huge nest, and unusual that its not somewhat round.  Do you find the Meth Blue is really that helpful?

Rook

Oh, since I scraped the eggs off a day early, and there were two days to the hatch, I would have lost them all without the methylene blue.  Fungus is real, and it kills eggs.  I've done that experiment.
 
I think they just followed the curve of the pot, and it was so big, they just kept going!
 
I'm just trying to maximize my MBI points.  I do blacks and oranges all the time.  If I kept good records with pictures, I could have gotten all the ocellaris points long ago.  I keep a notebook for my day job, and afford myself the luxury of not writing everything down in the home "lab".  I know I should.  But this is for fun, not work.

larvae look good. Most are eating well. There seem to be more than I originally thought.

What fungus are you keeping away while you're tumbling your eggs? Is it something common?

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

Um, I have no idea.  When I did the " experiment", the eggs all turned white and died, seemingly coated with a white fuzzy substance.  I was told that it was fungus.

 
I wanted to point out something kinda clever about this hatcher. Notice how the tubing goes up and thru a hole in the top of the cup? I made that hole with an ordinary paper punch.  Threading the tubing thru this way prevents any accidental draining of the hatcher.  The water all stays in.  I find this handy, and thought I would share….

very slick!

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

Well…there are a lot of larvae.  I've been leaving the lights on constantly for these guys, After noticing a slight decline in rotifer production in my cultures and no rotifers left in the larval tank, I've started sprinkling Otohime A, just a dusting, whenever I think of it.  I've seen some strike it at yesterday at 7 days. And I've started some brine shrimp hatching, which I'll introduce today.  I don't ususally use brine shrimp, but in cases like this, close to meta, where I'm afraid I don't have enough live food, decapped cycsts in the fridge are a great fall back.
 
I'm dripping in a gallon or two a day of fresh saltwater, and siphoning bottom daily, sorta.  I'm dosing the tank with chloramX daily as well, because I don't have an ammonia alert badge in there, and I figure it can't hurt.
 
Last night I turned the lights out for the first time.  They are all fine this morning.  Some had full bellies even though it was pitch black for 8 hours or so.  Go figure!

sounds like they are getting big and strong. My female is about to pop, but I don't have enough rotifers yet to keep them.

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

Here are some shots from August 4, and this morning, 4 days later (different magnification):
August 4:

 
This morning:

 

And here is the beginning of metamorphosis:   Headbands! (on just some of the larvae)

 

 

 

 

Great! How old are they now?

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

They are 6,7, and 8 days old.

i would say that 75% of them look like this:

 
Two mornings ago, when they were just getting their headbands, there were about 40 dead on the bottom.  With such a large hatching, I guess it is to be expected that some would not make it at metamorphosis.  Usually I get them all through, though, so I was a little surprised.  But not disappointed, given the large numbers that survived.  After all these years, I still am bad at estimating fish numbers, but all in all, I feel it went well.
 

Just wanted to make a couple of additions to this journal.
 
I've been having some trouble with eggs not hatching when they usually do, and parental fish eating the eggs before the night they should hatch.  If this happens to you, check the temperature!  I was down to 72F, and the eggs didn't hatch until 10 days after spawn. It's the little things that frequently confound me.
 
I have a good pair that consistently lay eggs on the side of the tank.  This time I scraped and siphoned the eggs on hatch night (now that I've corrected the heating issue) into a gallon sized plastic bag, and arranged them in the corner of the bag, clamped to the side of the larval tank they are going into, partially submerged to preserve temperature.  I stuck a rigid airline in the bottom corner of the bag, with just enough bubbles to keep the eggs moving.  It works like a clean, disposable funnel.  Worked great, they all hatched within a couple hours, and the larvae are doing well.
 
There you go, the cheapest hatcher ever, and I think it works better than the brine shrimp hatcher.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

Here's a large nest, just hatched from the same pair, in the same way: Click for the video.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

Nice... are you still using the gallon zip lock bag clipped to the tank? When do you release then into their larval tank, from the bag? Just anytime after they've hatched?
 
 

Yes to all questions.

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

awesome, sorry I threw a bunch at ya! lol... 
 

No worries! :-)
    I wasn't being very descriptive, though.  They all hatched between an hour and an hour and a half after lights out. Except for about 5 of them….

check out Kathy's Clowns, llc website:
http://kathysclowns.com
Captive bred clownfish and more
(Wholesale to the trade.)

I have a buddy who gives me his clarkii eggs- always sooo early (like only a few days after being laid), and I think it's fungis I am fighting (per your posts description). Eggs turn all white-never hatch.... any how. I was trying to try and do something along these lines: methylene blue route, maybe egg scrape?? (always on live rock, never tiles or pots! ugh). gallon ziplock bag hatchery...?? (mimc your idea there!) 
 
Currently he has 2 day old nest, which I have begged him to keep longer with the parents (let them do the cleaning work!), not entirely sure how long I can convince him to keep them... but it's worth a shot. I figured I would try the methylene blue trick and see what comes of it.  
Thanks for the info! 
 

you don't use any particular type or brand of Methylene blue do you?