Breeding Journal, Species: A. ocellaris Cube#2

General
Species: A. ocellaris Cube#2
Social Structure: Previously Spawned Pair 
Size of Individuals: F: 3 inches M: 2 inches
Age of Individuals: unknown
Date added to Tank: 03/13/2011
 Background info on Fish: These fish were bought as spawning pairs from Tom Frakes. 

Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank: One cube of 4ft. three cube sea clear system. Total of 12 cubes on system. 
Substrate Details: Bare bottom, 4" Clay pot 
Filtration Details: Central, 50 gallon sump w/ 1/3 hp chiller, 57 watt UV sterilizer, ASM 5 protein skimmer and 60 lbs.  live rock in sump.
Water Changes: Detritus siphoned as needed (generally every other day) and 30 gallons per week.  
Water Temperature: 81 deg.  
Lighting: 4ft. Coralife 10K t-8 bulb- single
Lighting Cycle: 13 hr on/ 11hr off 8AM-9PM 
Other Tank Inhabitants: None 

Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types: Frozen Chopped krill, super brine, and mysis shrimp all Omega Sea brand. Fish roe. Frozen foods are thawed and soaked with Selco.  Otohime C2 and Ep1. Not top dressed.  
Feeding Schedule: 3-4 times per day Mon-Sat. Sun only one feeding.

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn: 09/08/2011
Spawn Time of Day: Approx. 5pm-7pm
Dates of Consecutive Spawns: 09/18/2011 Looks to be on a 10 day cycle.
Courtship Details: Rubbing in the pots, aggressive territorial displays, and male cleaning pot prior to nest being laid.
Egg Size: 1mm
Egg Color: Typical orange
Egg Count: Approx. 100-150
Hatch Details
Hatch Date:  09/15/2011
Hatch Time of Day:  9:45 pm
# Days after Spawn:  6-7 days, had some stragglers that finished hatching on 7th night.  
Larvae Description:  Approx. 3.5mm-4 mm. Clear body. Silver eyes


Larval Tank Details
Temperature:  79 deg. F
Size of Larval Tank:  BRT- approx. 17 gallons. Started out with 10. Filled tank over period of two days.
Substrate Details:  Bare bottom
Other Tank Decor:  Heater, air stone.
Filtration Details:  Trying a continuous slow drip from brood stock tank and siphoning out small portions every day.  
Lighting: 2- bulb 2ft. t-5 fixture located 2 ft above larval tank. 10K and 460 nm blue bulb.
Lighting Cycle:  8A-9P Same as broodstock tank.
Water Changes:  Almost continuous.  Very slow small amounts.

Larval Feeding Details
Food Types:  Rotifer L-strain, <12hr artemia, Otohime A
Feeding Schedule: Keep rotifer density at about 10 per Ml. Twice per day for now. Once off the live foods, up to 4 times per day of Otohime A

Metamorphosis/Settlement
Date of Settlement Start:  09/27/2011
Days after Hatch:  11
Date of Settlement End:  10/02/11
Description of Fry:  Starting to get orange color with a hint of the headband starting to appear. Still have silver bellies. Pic posted below.

Grow-Out Tank Details
Temperature:  78 deg F
Size of Grow-Out Tank:  40 gallon Breeder.
Substrate Details:  bare bottom
Other Tank Decor:  Misc. pvc pipes.
Filtration Details:  Central filtration with 3 other 40 gallon breeder aquariums, protein skimmer, live rock as biological.
Lighting: single 10K t-5 bulb.
Lighting Cycle:  12hr on-12hr off
Water Changes:  Infrequent. Will have to do more as they grow and conditions warrant.
Size at Transfer: 
Age at Transfer: 

Grow-Out Feeding Details
Food Types:  Otohime B-2 and on up as they grow.
Feeding Schedule:  3 times per day.

Additional Information
Batch 1 09/08/2011: Small nest. First one spawned for us from this pair. Pulled nest, lost most of the larvae. About 15 may make it through meta.
Batch 2 09/18/2011:since we are out of town for 3 days on 09/30/2011-10/2/2011 i will not pull this nest.  Hatched at approx. 9:45 pm. 09/27/11. Whole nest hatched within minutes.
Batch 3 09/29/2011. Came home after being out of town and on 10/02/2011 less than 1/2 of the nest is left. Need to do some serious water changes. Suspect eggs are dieing due to water quality.
Batch 4 10/11/2011 approx. 6pm. Nice nest. Will probably pull these at hatching.
(No Pictures or Videos in the Section Please)
Miscellaneous Information: 



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Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Female is very aggressive, but not a biter like those of cube #4. Looks to have a lot of potential at laying a nest soon.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Well time to finally get the larval rearing system and some rotifer culture/ artemia culture set up. Nest is bigger than pair in cube #4 who laid first today. Pic of nest posted tomorrow.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Notice how dark they are this morning. About 14 hours or so after being laid. Are these fertilized? The other nest laid in cube#4 is half gone and they are very pale looking this morning.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Day 2
 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Day 3

 
Day 4

 
Day 5

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Day 6- Looking like they could hatch any minute. Hoping they last until day 7. Not ready to pull them tonight.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Well they didn't last until day 7. I had not pulled the pot tonight. Just happen to go look and sure enough saw larvae swimming in the broodstock system. Set up the BRT real quick. Using water from the broodstock system. Then put in the heater, and rigged an airline. Added the 4 " clay pot to incubate the rest of them into hatching. Tried to catch as many larvae as possible in the broodstock tank and added to BRT. We'll see how it goes. Just got the rotifers today. Definately not a big denisity of them. Hope we at least save a few to meta.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Congrats and good luck!!

Thanks. Corals i can do. Have raised Euphyilla from planulae to full colonies before, but this fish thing is tougher than it looks.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Dripping in more water from broodstock tank to finish filling BRT up. Added more rotifers and a few <12hr artemia naupalii. Will try Otohime A in a day or so. Larvae seem to be doing good. Although i do see a lot of them hanging out at the tank walls. Not sure what this means. Added 2 mil of Nanno to darken the water up more and 2 mil of Chloram x. Hope i'm doing this all proper. So many different versions, still kind of confusing, but i'm pushing my way through. If i get at least 30-40 completely grown up i'd be happy and consider this first batch a success. 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

They laid again. 10 days from the first one. Nice nest this time. pic to be posted.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Just for comparison, here is the 2nd nest just laid tonight. What a difference. Approx. 250-300 eggs, and nice and neatly laid.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

After darkening up with more nanno the fish seemed to get off the walls and are now free swimming. Must have let it get too light with not enough nanno added.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

So apprently rotifers and artemia really like nanno in a BRT. I believe i have an over aboundance of food in the BRT. Need to do a good size partial tonight to try and remove the density of this food. Been trying to feed Otohime A now, but with so much live food in the water i cannot tell if they are eating it. Anyone have this problem before?

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

Congrats on the progress so far
 
Any more photos to share?
(you should check out some of the other posts here, as well as Tal's site..I use it alot... www.fishtalpropagations.com)
As well as www.kathysclowns.com - both offer a good deal of information.
 
Good luck on the batch.. looking forward to seeing photos of the babies!

Michelle  
 

Will try to post some photos tonight or some time this week. They will 10 days old and i do not believe the 6 or 7 that are left have gone through meta. After reading some other journals i believe i changed foods to quickly. Also there was a lighting issue, which i believe they were not feeding properly due to the low lighting conditions. We have to go out of town this weekend. I have another batch that will hatch tonight from this pair, but am going to have to let them as i will not be home to babysit them. I really want to get  the central system going first before i pull anymore nests also. So much to do and not enough hours in the day. I have a good idea though of where my mistakes were. We'll see on subsequent batches.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

So finally after working with it for awhile I was able to get a decent shot of one of the larvae going through meta i believe. Correct me if i'm wrong but this is a shot of one going through meta? I see a head stripe starting to appear. This is Day 11.

 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

That's the start of Meta.  Fishy shape and a hint of a head band.  congrats!

Thanks. There is 15 of them out of about 60-70. Definitely learned a lot in this first batch.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

That's the way to look at it.
It's what I love about Moe's Orchid Dottyback book.  There was a long time of frustration before he found the method, but never discouraged, he always looked for the learning.  That's what we gotta do.

Ok, so batch number two hatched at approx. 9:45 pm 9/27/2011. I needed a video/pic of larvae from this pair so here it is.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

And i pulled one of the larvae with a beaker and took a still photo of it.

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

09/29/11 First one complete of meta!

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

10/02/2011 Last one complete of meta!

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee
 

30 DPH. 30 more to go to finish off my first species! Yay! There are 15 babies. Amazingly most of them have full striping. only 2 have misbars.

 

Mike Meadows
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/thecoralshoppe
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/TheCoralShoppe?feature=mhee