Barelycuda Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 I thought I would start a thread on the clownfish system that I have been working on. As a lot of people know by now I have started breeding/raising clownfishes. It started with one tank on the desk & over the last 2 months has started to spiral out of control. I am now at 5 grow out tanks, 2 rotifer tanks, & some nanochloropsis cultures. Well let's just say momma said it was getting out of control. So now we are converting some space in the family room to make it look a little more presentible as we still like to have company over & it was starting to look like a science experiment gone horribly wrong. It all started last week. Here are a couple of pics of the before. Here is a photo of the family room. The first generation tank setup. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 it was starting to look like a science experiment gone horribly wrong. I don't think that the "science experiment" look is so bad. If you have kids, you can get them involved and have it count as a science fair experiment. dsoz I hope someday my clowns decide to become parents, and I can have the science experiment look at my house too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 28, 2007 Author Share Posted July 28, 2007 Thanks, I do have 2 children. A 8yr old daughter & 6 year old son. They both think that it is very cool. Here is a pic of the cabinets we installed on sunday. They are 60" sink bases so the insides are entirely open. I found the cabinets at Lowes unfinished. I thought it was worth the $200 plus savings to finish them myself. The large panels at the top are fixed but the small panels are drawers. This will give me 10ft of counter top so I figured I can install up to 11 tanks across the top. All tanks will be plumbed into a central sump with live rock, skimmer, ect. This will make the maintanence portion of the setup much easier as it is getting more difficult to maintain with each new batch. Installed in family room. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 28, 2007 Author Share Posted July 28, 2007 I thought I would post one more picture of the setup tonight. Please ignore the electrical & plumbing mess in the middle. You'd probably expect more out of an electrician. (whistle) It was kind of thrown together to get the tanks back online when we moved them back to the family room. But when it is completed it will be trick. I am talking to my boss about some old plc's at work that i might take one & build a cool lighting controller with. I am going to work on the plumbing on sunday & maybe some electrical also. Once the sump system is online a lot of the airline tubing will go away. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePremiumAquarium Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 looks like you have a pretty cool setup there. I cant wait to see how clown breeding works out for you. Thanks for sharing Garrett Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
reefgeek84 Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 That is awesome...I want some local raised clown fish (clap) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 28, 2007 Author Share Posted July 28, 2007 Thanks. It has definately been an adventure with a ton of learning. Today we are laying out the plumbing & picking up a few more tanks. I just had a huge batch of ocellaris hatch on wednesday night so they are on day three now. I have taken a bunch of photo's so far so i will start a thread on the progress of this batch. The largest batch that has hatched so far has been approx 100. The current batch is around 200 so it will be exciting. I also have a batch of approx 70 that is on day 11 now that is going through metamorphasis now. The bodies are changing shape & some are showing the first band on their head. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 Way cool! I like the setup. It is great that you are able to do that sort of thing in your house. My wife would probably have a fit and make me keep it in the basement so it is out of sight of company. Like I said, way cool. Do you think that there will be a water quality problem with having them all on a central sump? You know with all the different things that each stage needs for food, etc.? It seems to me that each stage should have it's own system. But I have never done this, so I could be completely wrong. I'll say it again. Way cool! dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 28, 2007 Author Share Posted July 28, 2007 It has taken a lot of begging to put this system in the house. (clap) If we had a basement I would have loved to put it there. It would have been a lot less expensive to create. I have been doing a lot of research on breeding systems & most all of them use a central sump. I am just hoping mine will be big enough to handle the bioload. It should be ok with a skimmer, live rock, ect. During the first few weeks the larval tanks will not run through the main system. They will get just an airstone for the first 2 weeks then a sponge filter for another week or two. Once the juvenilles are on dry food then they will be added to the system water. Then all the fish are on the same food & water just of a different size. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 OK. Thanks for the info on what you are doing. Someday I hope to refer back to this thread to get ideas for my own clownfish spawn. You probably mentioned this before, but what species of clowns are you breeding? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 29, 2007 Author Share Posted July 29, 2007 I am currently raising ocellaris clowns. They are supposed to be the hardiest & easiest to raise so I thought I would try them first. I have access to true percs & gold banded maroons also whenever I'd like to try raising them. From what I have read the true percs can take twice as long to grow out so I am not in a real big hurry to try them. The gold banded maroons have huge clutches of eggs & I don't have the rotifer cultures right now to support a batch that large. I also have a pair of pink skunk clowns now that I am hoping will spawn some day as I would like to raise some of those also. The PNWMAS meeting is scheduled here at my home in October so the system should be up & full of fish by then. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 29, 2007 Share Posted July 29, 2007 The PNWMAS meeting is scheduled here at my home in October so the system should be up & full of fish by then. Cuda Are you giving away "free samples?" I really like those misbars. Just kidding. I already have a pair of ocellaris clowns that seem to be happy together. dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted July 29, 2007 Author Share Posted July 29, 2007 I would throw this out to any teacher affiliated with this club that if they wanted a pair of ocellaris clowns that were for a classroom tank that I would donate a pair. Most of the clowns from my first batch were misbars. The second batch looks much better but there are a few misbars there also. I am finding out that the misbars are associated with water quality during metamorphasis. I don't mind them much as they all have character but are not as desireable. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dsoz Posted July 30, 2007 Share Posted July 30, 2007 Are they almost ready to sell? Last night one of my ocellaris clowns went carpet surfing and I am down to one. :( I would love to get one of your misbars to replace my jumper. How much are you asking for them? I am sending you a PM dsoz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
modularduck Posted July 30, 2007 Share Posted July 30, 2007 WOW super cool stuff..you must have a very understanding wife...or she has lots of jewelry lol. very cool! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted August 2, 2007 Author Share Posted August 2, 2007 OK the last few nights have been filled with plumbing but tonight I fired the system up & started running water through the first two tanks. Here's what's been happening. First we started by drilling out some 10g tanks for the drains. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted August 2, 2007 Author Share Posted August 2, 2007 After a couple of tanks were drilled out we could start drilling the top for the drain holes. I found a cool drain system on another site that is referred to as an open drain. I like the idea so it was modified to my situation. By having the open drain a tank can simply be removed from the system by turning off the supply & lifting it out so that it can be cleaned. The normal installation leaves a pipe sticking up but since I have a finished countertop I decided to use some pvc box adapters to finish the counter off a little. Here is a shot of the drains dumping into the counter drain. Next was to start laying out & building the supply mainfold. Since I can lift the tank off the drain for cleaning I needed to be able to remove the plumbing over the tank so I built these standpipes. The union was installed between the 45 & 90 to remove the pipe over the tank so it could be lifted off & cleaned. I ran out of 1/2" pvc so I stopped the stanpipes at 6. All the ball valves are installed so I can start filling tanks. Finally some water!!! After I got some water running we started moving the tanks back to the family room. Momma wanted her kitchen counters back.(whistle) Now that all the tanks are moved back I can start to transfer the fish to the new tanks over the next couple of days. Then once the existing fish are moved over I'll drill the other tanks & get them plumbed into the system also. The next time you see this all of the tanks should be online the new system. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePremiumAquarium Posted August 2, 2007 Share Posted August 2, 2007 Super nice. You are giving me lots of good ideas for my plumbing ventures. Great work and keep those pics coming. Garrett Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coker98 Posted August 2, 2007 Share Posted August 2, 2007 Wow, you are really getting after it arent you. That is a great setup and it looks to be a great application for breeding. Great job dude!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evansbr Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 how about some drain/sump photos. also how about some baby shots, especially the firefish!!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Holly Posted August 6, 2007 Share Posted August 6, 2007 You have baby firefish too? Do you intend to try to breed any other kinds of fish? I LOVE the set-up. Looks so professionally done. Very clean. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted August 7, 2007 Author Share Posted August 7, 2007 Thanks for the feedback. Yes I have one batch of approx 20 firefish. Pat @ fanta-seas had a customer that had firefish babies & didn't know what to do with them so I took them in to try to raise them. they are about 16 days old now & are barely the same size as a 1-2 day old ocellaris baby. The first 5 or 6 days you hardly couldn't even see them. Now they are a little bigger & easier to see. Definately different than raising clowns. I'll try to get some pics up of them. I have moved the first 3 batches of clowns over to the system now so I'll try to get pics of them up also. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evansbr Posted August 10, 2007 Share Posted August 10, 2007 still waiting for pics(whistle) , I would love to see some updated shots of the firefish. Don't forget the party Sunday.(rock2) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spectra Posted August 10, 2007 Share Posted August 10, 2007 Went over to his house a few days ago and what a nice set up. As for the firefish babies they are real small. The clowns are bigger at the same age. He still has a ways to go to get everything on the same sump and water system but once it is all done it will be nice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Barelycuda Posted August 11, 2007 Author Share Posted August 11, 2007 I have tried to take a few pics of the firesfish babies but they are still too small to get the camera to focus on. They were hatched on 7/21/07 so they are approx 20 days old now. I have 3 day old ocellaris fry that are larger. As soon as I can get a pic I will get it posted. Cuda Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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