Funky Clown

[purduemaximus]

I just bought an anenome for my tank. I already have a clown in the tank, but the clown will not take any interest. Any thoughts on why he is not "laying" in it?

[kevinpo]

My clowns took just under 2 years to host in my H. crispa anemone. It happened about the time they became sexually mature and paired up.

HTH,
Kevin

[purduemaximus]

Now there is this weird looking thing like a rasin with white spots in the middle of the anemone. Any idea what that might be? It is only open this much at night to where you can see it.

[Chuck S]

The raisin looks to be where the placement of his mouth should be. That picture is blurry so just a guess.

Now as far as the chances of hosting the fish. You look to have an Entacmaea quadricolor(bubble-tip) there which naturally hosts the Maroon and Bluestripe clownfishes. In the aquarium they also will host the Tomato and Clark's clownfishes as well. You have an ocellaris clownfish which may never take to this anemone. Ocellaris clownfish will take to the following anemone's (Ritteri or Carpet's) I have seen strange things happen but usually clownfishes stick to what they know.. I do not mean to be there bearer of bad new but I give it a 10% percent chance that these two would pair up. This of course does not mean go out and buy another anemone. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

[Katspaw]

One other thing to think about. Clowns going into an anemone is a learned behavior. If your clown is captive bred and wasn't around wild caught ones, then it will not know to go into the anemone. I have Amphiprion Ocellaris clowns in my 90 gallon and they are being host to a condy anemone. So strange things can happen. Now years ago I had two maroon clowns, one with captive brad and the other was wild caught with her anemone. I was hoping for the small captive brad one to change over to a male and for them to mate. Of course this never happened, but the little one did start going in the larger one's anemone. This caused fights, I got a second BTA and solved the problem. The BTA's were right next to each other also. It would have made a very cute picture if I had a digital camera. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif I do have a pic of one of my Ocellaris in the condy. HTH
Tracey

[purduemaximus]

Well this stinks. After only two days I am pretty sure the thing is dying. I know that my water conditions are pretty good (the fish are doing very well as well as the shrimp) and There should be plenty of light (two VHO's). I don't know really why he is dying. Any thoughts?

[purduemaximus]

Well it is doing better and is all inflated again. That is good. Any way Omegatran the clown I have is called a percula (I don't know the scientific name). Is that what you thought it was? Yea and the anemone is called I think a bubble tip. Sorry about the blurry pictures I am having trouble getting my camera to focus through the glass. I just got it for christmas and I dont' know really how to use it yet. Thanks for all the help
-Matt

[Katspaw]

Matt,
The false percula is Ocellaris clown, where as the True Percula is just that. They are often mistaken. True Perculas with not host a bubble tip anemone. I have a mated pair in my 255 gallon tank. I am glad you started this post, as I took the word of my LFS as to what my clown and anemone were. They do normally have a good rep. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif I have spent a good part of the day trying to find out just what clown fish I do have. I think it may be Amphiprion Akindynos, but I am not sure. But here is a picture so if anyone recognizes it please let me know.

Tracey

[Chuck S]

Tracey,

Amphiprion Akindynos looks to be about right to me. That I must say is one of the best shots I have seen you take. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Matt,

Just like Tracey said Ocellaris is commonly called Percula but is a false Percula. If you see a picture The True Percula clownfish are not even close. Even though you Anemone is as you say doing better why don't you run a full water analysis and post it here. Now a bubble tip anemone can take lower light situations more than other anemone's but still need alot of light. You say you have 2 VHO's over how big a tank?

[purduemaximus]

It is a 29 gallon tank and the VHO's are 75 watts a peice. So that gives me a five watts per gallon. I don't have the means to do a full water analysis, but my lfs does them for free so maybe I should have that done today?

[Chuck S]

Watts per gallon are just a easy means of equating things. It means nothing as intensity is relative to the Inverse Square Law and decreases rapidly in depth. You should be fine with a Entacmaea quadricolor in that lighting though. Most other anemone's might be a stretch though. I would say mostly to make it easy that ten watts a gallon would be a target for most other anemone's.

As far as a water analysis I meant the following tests.

Nitrate,PH,Ammonia,Nitrites,Alkalinity,Calcium,Pho sphate, Temperature and Salinity. ( For Salinity hopefully they have a refractometer as other hydrometers are useless unless calibrated against a refractometer to know your drift from accurate reading. )