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The Pants/Sharkey Bangaii Breeding program…..


Sharkey18

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Papa fish released some more babies last night. Unfortunately by the time I was able to fish them out only 4 remained (but they are a sturdy 4). I really upset my urchin getting those 4 out. I broke a bunch of his spines and had to lift him out of the water - feel bad as I suspect he is getting old. I dropped some algae wafers in the tank as an "I'm sorry." There hasn't been much algae in the tank the past month or so so he was probably pretty cranky already.

 

I just started baby brine now so I won't have any live food to feed for probably 36 hours or so. I'll try some frozen rotifers tonight.

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So my young male has been holding eggs for 25 days now.  At this point babies should be viable, I am just waiting for him to release them. The female was removed over a week ago so he is in there alone. I even removed the peppermint shrimp just in case they were interested in a tiny fish snack. 

 

This male is only about 8 months old at this time, so his inability to hold eggs to term in the past is most likely due to his youth and still small size. I am going to give him a break from breeding after this clutch is released so that he can fatten up a bit. 

 

Hoping for babies any day now.... 

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We lost 2 of my 4 from the last clutch when I drove them to Sharkey. Sudden Fright Syndrome. I wasn't very good about getting them onto frozen super early like I have in the past. I'm going to try Sharkey's method of a selcon bath for the baby brine shrimp prior to feeding them to the bangaii fry.

 

8 months is pretty young to be holding eggs so that totally explains the earlier losses. I don't know my fish's age but they were a bit less than a year old when they first bred. I only got one baby out of it though.

 

My new clutch is on day 29, and they are usually released at 30-31. I can see baby fish looking back at me through papa's mouth so they are ready to go. I need to get rid of all the xenia I threw in the baby fish holder. Free Pulsing Xenia!

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We have 11 new baby bangaii. I caught 5 this morning, and 6 more this evening. I think I caught him in the process of releasing the babies this morning. There is a good chance some got gobbled up while I was at work, but 11 isn't bad. My sea urchin is horribly traumatized from my manhandling it to remove the babies from it.

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(edited)

Caught a straggler just now. I have no idea where he had been hiding, but he found the urchin tonight and I scooped him out. So we have a clutch of 12.

kkY1loR.jpg

Edited by Pants
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So cute. So why are they attracted to sea urchins? I see that you have made one for them.

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They host in long spine sea urchins in the wild. Much like clownfish host in anemones. Thats why they have those black stripes. It helps them blend in. Practically speaking they will host in pretty much anything that waves about. Often in the wild that is sea grasses. In my tank that sometimes means corals that eat them. 

 

As they grow up they become less interested in the urchin, but even the adults seem drawn to it when stressed.

 

Here they are in the real urchin.

VgZa1zcl.jpg

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Wow! My male started releasing his babies this morning. I had 2. Tonight I still had 2 and his jaw had become smaller. I figured he may have released more that were hiding and I should probably remove him so he didn't eat the few he had released. So I netted him to move him to a recovery tank and he spit out like 20 tiny little fry!  

 

I have no idea how many there actually are but it is definitely over 20. And they are like the size of a sesame seed. So tiny.  We shall see how many there are tomorrow! 

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