Amphiprion thiellei

Just putting my feelers out there for anyone experienced with breeding fish in the skunk complex.  I have a pair of A. thiellei that were paired by me.  They're definately a bonded pair as exhibited by their behavior.  They have done some cleaning from time to time but never really seem to get past first base.
 
When I'm consciously making an effort to get them to spawn I tend to feed twice per day on the week days and three or four times on the weekends.  I rarely have time for true saturation feeding, so I tend to overfeed and deal with the waste later.
 I am not an experienced breeder.  So, any suggestions are welcome.

Current setup is:
Tank - 40 breeder
Scape - BB with flowerpot
Sump - 100 gallon rubbermaid trough
Filtration - liverock and a huge skimmer.
Heater set point - 80F
Chiller set point - 82F
Lighting - Metal halide
Photoperiod - 0800 to 2000
SG - 1.022
I don't test anything else unless there's a problem
Food - Rod's food fish only formula, frozen cyclopeeze, mysis, Ocean Nutrition pellet
WCs - 30% 1-2 times per month.
 
That's off the top of my head....

you can try an anemone in there to help out. You have the lighting and the system for it.  I would also shorten the lighting to about 10 hours.
 
I've been researching skunks for quite a while now. It's between them and something in the clarkii family on what I get next.
 
If possible you can add a third non sexed fish if you have availablity to one. I've read a ton that this can help out to push them just a little further to breeding.

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've tried this (nevermind the bryopsis.)

...and this (note them cleaning in the second image.)


...and this

 
  
Now they're in the 40B with bare bottom and just a flower pot.
Next I'm probably going to place them in a 75 gallon reef I'm working on.
The non sexed fish wasn't the best idea.

Nigripes are a real witch to get stabilized.  Mine should be a lot easier to get started than those.  They have more of an ocellaris personality than anything else.  What are you feeding if you don't mind my asking and what's the difference in saturation and just plain overfeeding (other than the obvious decomp considerations?)  That is, is there a benefit to one over the other?

what did they do to the non sexed? That's surprising.
 
How often did you change the setups to try to get them to breed?

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 changed the setups about every six months.
 
They were clicking and chasing and biting him...  even when he did submisive twitching.

I guess I should add to try and keep there environment stays the same, moving them around and changing things around in the tank can slow things down too.
By far the best food to condition your fish is PE Mysis shrimp.
 
Saturation feeding just simply means to feed the fish (female mostly) as much as she will eat.  I will sit and feed her until she is stuffed and just watches the shrimp sink.  I would feed one PE mysis at a time to them.  When doing this, they eventually become trained and will eat the shrimp the second it hits the water and become very aggressive feeders. By feeding them one shrimp at a time they seem to eat more than just having extra food floating around.  Just my thoughts though, and not a proven fact or anything.

I've got some PE mysis at home.  I'll give it a try.  They don't really feed with gusto.  So, I see where there might be something to that.  If they see a bunch of food, they don't really feel like it's going anywhere versus if only one piece at a time is offered, they think they're gonna starve.  Clownfish psychology.  Hahaha!
Do you find that they eat more aggressively at regular feedings once they're "trained?"

I feed all my pairs with a cocktail stick. It takes some time but I find it the best way to ensure their full. Doing 26 tanks before going to work though can be stressful if your running late!

OK.  So, I tried the one at a time method last night and again this morning.  They were havin' none of it.  The male ate two last night and either spit out or ignored all that followed.  This morning the female took one bite and spit it out.  The male showed no interest whatsoever.  I think it's the freezer burn.  I'll try again tonight with bloodworms.
On a brighter note, they have been doing some cleaning over the last few days.  I stumbled on Tal's site last night and there was some great detailed info (and pictures) on that site.
Nobody (literature) seems to have any new methods about difficult spawners.  I guess I'll just have to suck it up and wait it out.

Sorry, I missed your question before.  Yes, once the get trained, they will become much more aggressive feeders.
 
To train them you may have to start out with their favorite food.  PE Mysis can sometimes take a little time for them to get used to.  So if they LOVE bring shrimp, try using an eye dropper, and add one drop at a time.  The goal is to get the to start comming to the top of the tank looking for the food when you come up to the tank.  They will eventually start begging you for it!
 
Hang in there.  Like I said feeding and TIME are the biggest factors.  Their food consumption will start going up as they get closer to spawning as well...

Yeah, they typically do love the mysis.  So, it has to be the freezerburn.  Perhaps I should go buy a new pack of mysis and try again tonight.  If they don't eat, I'll starve them until they do start to show interest in food again.

Try smaller foods Walt. I have some really finicky pairs that won't eat hardly anything and others that are complete pigs. For finicky feeders I use lobster eggs and cyclopeeze. As there planktivores they go mad for it! Also try mixing lobster eggs with spirulina to make  a paste. They seem to like it because it doesn't require any effort to eat it.

It seems like the pellet food will be the best thing to start with.  I just need to kill the return so they will see them....
Where do you get the lobster eggs?  Are they sold in pet stores?

They are over here in blister packs. Not sure if they are actually lobster egss, but they are certainly eggs of some crustacean, but that's what they call them.
I use 400 micron pellets also for my clowns. My Thiellei loves it!

OK Thanks.  I remember seeing rods food have some sort of eggs, maybe I'll try that.  Give 'em what I want them to produce.

Maybe they'll take a hint.  Hahaha!

I have a pair of Occy's adults that spawn that took about a year (maybe a little more) to eat PE mysis. Even one cut in half was too big and they'd spit it out.
 
Now, she will mow them down with force.

-Adam

They've been eating everything I've put in the tank for a couple years now including mysis.

Seems like it's been more than two months.
 
I've tried the saturation feeding but it's been a half-vast effort at best.  I did notice this week that when I drop Rod's food in the tank they eat a bit then let the remainder float around....
But if I throw in a pinch of spectrum pellets they will pick at the remaining Rod's food and spit it out and go for the pellets.  I've been thawing one of the following in the AM (Rods fish only, mysis, bloodworms) and feeding pellets in the evening.
 
IM GETTING ANTSY TO MAKE A CHANGE!!!

Keep going!

These do seem to be really picky fish Walt. I found when I put mine with a large female Oc' his appetite massively increased. She is really greedy so he had to get in there quickly to get any. Maybe woth putiing a different fish in with them (thats greedy). A couple of days without eating might get them to attack the food offered a bit better. Just my two penneth.....sorry cents!

DThom, Thanks for the encouragement.
 
Duck, They do eat with gusto but it's not really what I want or expect them to eat. I have a tendancy to feed the same breakfast (Rod's food) several days in a row. So, I guess they're acting as though they're bored with it. So, they're acting interested in the pellets now whereas they were disinterested in pellets when I was trying to saturation feed with the pellets a couple months ago. Maybe I need to set a weekly schedule with a different breakfast and dinner each day. That way I don't have to think about what to give them and they don't get stuck with the same old stuff day after day.
 
I appreciate the two pents! So, you separated the leuc and the thiellei?

Ye nothin was happening. neither of them were interested especially the Leuc. All my other clowns have spawned except them and a pair of Snow Onyx.....So split them. Hoping to get a wild bonded pair of Leucs hopefully this year.
 

Mitch May - talk to him (Booyah).  Tell him I told you to talk to him.  He has some great ideas that go "outside the box", and since they're his ideas told to me in person, I generally don't bring them up publicly because I'm not sure if I'd be a breaking a confidence to do so.
 
Matt

Matt,
If you have e-mail or FB for him could you ask him to contact me?  You still have my e-mail right?  This fellow doesn't know me from Adam.
Walt

 

Matt,
 
I actually did make an effort to track him down...  I found a booya and a BooYA on RC but neither had any posts or threads that I might be able to ID them as a breeder or enthusiast.  I looked here but didn't figure out how to find members.  I also looked over your lightning marroon project page and did find some helpful ideas regarding pairing...
 
I went home last night angry at my fish and cleaned their tank vigorously without regard to their preference and put it back together.  I have been a bit reluctant to make changes that might upset them over the last several months.  The only change being that I painted three sides of the tank black and took some 3.5" x 3.5" plexiglass squares and siliconed them to several 6" flowerpots.  They have been working beautifully to the end of making a repeatable environment.  I can swap the pots out every time I clean the tank.  My question about cleaning is how often is cleaning the tank walls and bottom OK?  I think I've been letting it go too far letting algae grow etc.  Is doing a daily wipedown common practice?  Once a week?  Anyway, after cleaning the tank I fed them again.  When I walked away they were so bloated they were swimming funny.  Fish waddling if you will.  I also decided to put together a feeding regimine in case part of the problem is food boredom.
 

Monday - Frozen Bloodworms - Rod's Fish Only
Tuesday - Frozen Vegetarian - Tropic Marin Flake
Wednesday - Spectrum Pellet - PE Mysis
Thursday - Rod's Fish Only - Cyclopeeze
Friday - Tropic Marin Flake - Bloodworms
Saturday - Mysis - Frozen Vegetarian
Sunday - Cyclopeeze - Spectrum Pellet

I can throw in some flake or pellet any time I think of it (and will.)  I re-read Wilkerson's ideas for stubborn spawners and plan to re-try any suggestions I'm not currently doing.  I'm actually really irritated that they haven't spawned in nearly three years as a pair.  They're full sized, and are inseparable but just won't consumate the darn relationship!!!  From now I'm gonna feed 'em till they pop, clean the tank more often and see what happens.

I feed most of those foods but I mix them up in a dish so they get a little bit of everything each day.
 
One thing I would suggest is switching to tiles instead of pots. I started with pots too and switched, I'll never go back. Tiles are a LOT easier to work with if you plan on pulling the egg to hatch them.

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

Thanks Tal.
My thinking on the food is that if I give them something like Rod's where it's all mixed together, they seem more inclined to pick out the bits they like and let the rest float by.  I don't know if offering mostly non-homogenous mixes is really any better (and certainly doesn't make my life any easier) but I'm gonna try it this way for a while.
 
I made some tile triangles too that were all identical.  I tried the tiles and the flower pots.  I switched them to different corners of the tank they preferred the flowerpots.  So, while I would be inclined to use the tiles for ease of aeration, I just gave in on their preference.
 
Please don't let this disuade you from making additional suggestions.  I've tried everything I could think of but have by no means tried everything.  I know the right factor or combination of factors is out there.

...more on the food...  I have done the home-made fish mash with store bought items as well as cyclopeeze and PE mysis.  This time around I'm gonna see what all they like out of the above list and may take your advise and go back to a fish mash mixture.
 
...and once they start spawning I'll certainly have to reconsider the tiles.

You're nicer than I am. I just pulled the pots and gave them tiles, they didn't get a choice. Didn't take them long to adjust.

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

In your opinion would it better to get them acclimated before or after the first spawning event?

Acclimated to tiles? Before they spawn so you don't throw them off their cycle.

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

Yes... and thank you.

Getting a smackdown education.  The following facts didn't add up in my head 'till this morning:
 
1.  I had a skimmer overflow 4-5 days ago.
2.  Female had a couple scales scuffed for about the last three days.  I thought it was because I break the bottoms out of the flower pots and maybe I didn't sand the rough edges as well as I should.  I did a heavy display cleaning about three days ago too and swapped flower pots assuming that it would rectify the problem of sharp edges.
3.  Having "slept on it" and being concerned about the scales getting worse, I took Tal's advise this AM and swapped the flower pot to one of my tile triangles.
4.  I actually spent some time staring at the tank (I rarely take the time to do this.)
5.  I came to realize that my female is getting sick as a result of the skimmer overflow.
6.  Dropped a 7 gallon bucket of FW into the sump for some dilution (140 gallon system.)
7.  Dropped the temp setting from 82 to 80.  I will drop it to 78 tonight.  I know many people have the philosophy that they should keep a high temp when fish are sick to speed the life cycle of any pathogens but I think the opposite.  I want to slow the life cycle of the pathogen to slow it's progression and slow the fish's metabolism to reduce stress.
8a.  I will also drop the salinity of the system to 1.009.
8b.  I have not yet decided but am considering dismantling and cleaning the sump while running the display with a couple power filters till this clears up... or maybe as a permanent change to my approach.
 
Lessons learned:
1.  I need to spend more time in front of the tank.
2.  I am considering simplifying the system by switching to bioballs and removing the skimmer or #8b above.
 

Luckily it was nothing major. A little fungal infection from the dirty
skimmate. Still haven't done a WC and she already looks almost completely
healed. I'm guessing she did get an abrassion. Whether it was intentional or
from scratching is unclear. I have water mixing for tomorrow though.
 
They are adjusting to the tiles well. They pretty much wouldn't come out
yesterday. Today they're acting more normal.

Penelope has made a full recovery. Both seem to be adjusted to the new house yet still quite inquisitive about it. Pedro keeps doing burnouts on the textured surface.
 

Told ya they'd get the hang of it. It looks like your diagonal tile has the bottom on its top...? Might want to flip it so the rough side is on the inside.

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