Clownfish Fry 0-72 hrs

[dmc456]

I have been breeding black-ice clownfish for 3 months. I am now getting around 300-400 to hatch per batch. My hatch rate is 99%+ but I have them die mostly from 12-48 hrs.

I have made the mistake of not enough rotifiers and too many rotifiers. I think now I'm having issues with not enough oxygen in the water. I was using a rigid air line tube under the heater with 2-3 bubbles per sec. I see a dense layer of rotifers forming in the bottom 2-3" of the tank due to minimal water movement. Today I added a airstone to the corner of my 5 gal tank to increase water circulation. I try and get 15 rots / ml for my density....easier said than done.

Once i get past 72 hrs (3-days) I very rarely loose more than 1% from that point on.

Those who regularly get 250-350 to make it past metamorphosis, what are you doing for airflow, rot density, and tank size?

 

[dmc456]

The additional airflow and water movement has seemed to help. Only been a few hours.

 

[Wesley42079]

Great job in getting your clowns past the 3 day mark.

I'll be following along, since one pair of my Onyx Picasso's have been consistently laying clutches.

Have you tried just feeding baby brine shrimo instead of using rots?

 

[dmc456]

No, Rots are so easy...they reproduce in the small tank and they don’t choke on the non hatched eggs or over eat.

If I didn’t have the die off at 12-48 hrs I wouldn’t do much of anything the first week. Only time is vacuuming the bottom of the tank.

I do brine and TDO after 7-8 days. Rots thru 10 days when I move them to a 10 gal tank for the next couple months until they are big enough for 20+ tanks

 

[dmc456]

Still going strong! Increased airflow made a huge difference. Clowns layed 300-400 more eggs today.

Ill try the increased airflow from day 1 again on Tuesday evening when they hatch.

 

[D-Nak]

My black and white ocellaris pair used to have HUGE clutches. It finally dawned on me just to raise a hundred or so at a time. Trying to raise even just 200+ at once was a huge PITA. I had 3 five galon buckets of rots going and still ran out. Smaller batches lessens the demand on rotifer production, produces less waste, and creates better looking clowns. In the long run it makes sense to raise three batches of 100 than one batch of 300. In a few weeks you'll have tons of clowns and you can combine the babies after meta (their size difference isn't an issue).

To answer your questions though, I used a large airstone under my heater which acted as a bubble wall that kept the babies away from the heater. The additional current kept everything in suspension. You can turn it off, let everything settle, vacuum out the tank, then fire it up again. This was done with a high rot density (adding rots about 3 times a day) in a 10 gallon tank filled up only half way for the first few days.