• Folks, if you've recently upgraded or renewed your annual club membership but it's still not active, please reach out to the BOD or a moderator. The PayPal system has a slight bug which it doesn't allow it to activate the account on it's own.

clowns & anemone

AngelPete

AngelPete

I picked up a pair of percula clowns a week ago from AO and put them in the tank where i have an LT anemone . the clowns have not even approached the anemone yet. how long does it usually take for an anemone to host clowns?
 
J

jonathan.

pistolpete said:
I picked up a pair of percula clowns a week ago from AO and put them in the tank where i have an LT anemone . the clowns have not even approached the anemone yet. how long does it usually take for an anemone to host clowns?
Click to expand...

They might never pair up. They could pair up in 5 minutes. It's different with every clown.

Perculas/False Perculas usually take the longest and have seem to not take more often than not as well.
 
A

animal house

How large is the tank they are in? I suggest from my personal success to get the clowns and anemone into a confined space. Either within your current tank or....I put them into a 10 gallon with an adjustable divider to confine them to close quarters with the anemone. My experience has been that within a few hours to a few days they were familiarizing themselves with the anemone. As soon as that occurred I returned them to the display tank and they were an inseparable trio...This was after the pair showed no interest in my 120 display for over 6 months. My LFS had made this suggestion...good luck
 
R

ReeferNets

Clowns seek out anemones for shelter and protection. It may take some time but a LTA is a natural host of percs and occelaris. Give it time it will not be immediate. They literally need to find the anemone. You mught wanna try and release their food by it as well.

Post up some pics lets see um.
 
AngelPete

AngelPete

I have a 210 DT. I saw the smaller clown hide in the LTA yesterday when i went to move a few rocks. otherwise they clowns have not bonded to the LTA at all. though i must say Ive only had the clowns for two weeks now.
 
R

ReeferNets

Give it time, that anemone is for shelter and protection. Consider it a good thing that your clowns are frightened. With most WC clowns i reccomend an anemone to ease their accilmation and make them comfortable.

Trust me they will sooner or later. Add some more fish in awhile and they will.
 
D

drummer606

You can also try adding another anemone. I have LTA's that have split into a group (so much so that I sell them when there are too many) but my clown was not to interested until the anemone did that. Now they are clearly its home.
 
AngelPete

AngelPete

ok now ive witnessed something i never seen.. the cleaner shrimp, (not the clowns) is the now hosting the LTA...go figure ??? I just put a piece of krill in the lta the shrimp is all over him!!
 
D

ds4x4

i'm sure he is just stealing from the slower Nem rather than hosting it.. i think i'll have to try putting a bta and the clowns in a small tank for a few days
 
D

drummer606

I always have to feed my cleaner shrimp a little something when feeding my anemones. The shrimp will always take food from one of them if I don't.
 
C

calaxa

Yeah I used to have a hawkfish that would steal food and give it to the cleaner shrimp. When he died, the shrimp became a lot more bold and would just steal it directly from the anemone. My hippo tang steals from the anemone too. There is a shrimp that does host some anemone. I don't remember it offhand.

Just fyi, if these were CB percs, you may never get it to host. A wild caught pair will eventually find the anemone (how long....who knows). Try the confining situation. That should work. My clowns have decided to host my cabbage coral. Either that or they sleep sideways right in the top corner with half their bodies out of the water.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top