Clown Behavior

[rdnelson]

Ok, so I am pretty new to all this and very well may be reading way more into it than I should.

I have a pair of regular clowns. About a month ago I bought a pretty nice size Frogspawn hoping they might host it. About 1-1/2 months ago I watched what is pretty common behavior for a pair of clowns. The larger showing some aggression and the small showing the twitching submission behavior. I haven’t seen it in a while though. Last night, I saw something that has me puzzled.

The larger clown (not sure if it is female yet) started swimming into a pass thru cave in the rocks close to the sand bed. It would hover in the cave then come to the opening and point straight up with the tail close to the sand. Then it would use the tail to hollow out the sand making a depression. It would then swim over near the Frogspawn and hover but never really enter it. The smaller one, was hanging at the other end of the tank and now and then the bigger one would go over and be aggressive and the smaller one would twitch.

None of this behavior was continuous but sporadic throughout the night. Especially after the whites went out and only the blues were one. I just had a sneaky suspicion that she was either getting ready to mate or to host. Anyone have any thought? I am not concerned but just curious.

 

[jennm]

Fanning is pretty common behavior. I wouldn't say that mating is imminent because many clowns (esp. female) will fan. They clear a spot where eggs could be laid.

Mating is imminent when they start scraping the cleaned area with their teeth, and usually both fish do that.

Jenn

 

[rdnelson]

Thanks Jenn. I appreciate the info.

 

[toccoa fish man]

The fanning also looks different when they are mating....you can tell that the female is fat with eggs and trying to dump them when they get ready to drop them.

By the way- my Clarkii clowns always laid their eggs on the dark of the moon. Not sure what happens with other species.....You might want to watch the lunar cycle and figure out if this is when it's happening.

Just be warned that the babies are almost impossible to keep alive unless you're willing to set up a separate tank and to culture rotifers and algae to feed the rotifers. Also- if you don't get them out, all your other fish and inverts will eat them within a few hours once they hatch and start swimming.

 

[rdnelson]

Thanks Toccoa. One guy on another forum says his pair lays eggs every 14 days. That is crazy. Guess they are "Happy" little fishes. It will be fun to see what happens. On another note, I heard the first batch have little chance of making it even with experienced reef keepers. Is that a true statement?

 

[toccoa fish man]

I'm by no means an expert...I just got lucky and had clowns that laid eggs like crazy. Those were Clarkiis. I've got false perculas now and they flirt a lot, but they don't actually ever go through with the mating....With the Clarkiis, I started to buy the rotifer culture and the tanks to do the breeding, but when I noticed I'd be spending $300 for something that MIGHT work, I slapped myself and said forget it. I'd rather buy some nice coral and a few wrasses for that price.

I think it might be true that the first batch is not viable, but I'm not sure why. It probably has something to do with the hormone levels in the clowns, since they are sequential hermaphrodites and all clowns start out as males.

My guess is that they have to get bigger and fatter and "more female" with more estrogen in their system before they can lay good eggs. My guess would be to give the girl clown lots of fatty food during the full moon phase, so maybe she will make lots of hormones and ovulate. We feed/fed ours mashed up seafood (salmon, clams, shrimp) mixed with SelCon mix.

 

[rdnelson]

While it would be cool to actually have them mate, I am not to sure I want to go through all that would be needed to keep the fry going. LOL Getting some store credit would be nice but I doubt it would pay for itself. A bigger reason though is that I am pretty new and would rather spend my efforts on getting my DT in the shape I want it at least for the time being.