Balistes vetula (Queen Triggerfish) breeding log NEAq/RWU

[spawner]

Ok, well some of you know that after 10 years of wishing to work with Balistes I finally have my shot. I'll be documenting our progress as we go along. The hatch was not very good, we harvested the nest shortly after the spawn and most of the eggs did not hatch. We only had a hundred larvae or so. The nest had over 100,000 in it.

Ok so for the broodstock tank.http://www.neaq.org/animals_and_exhibits/exhibits/individual_exhibits/giant_ocean_tank/index.php

You can watch the fish spawn on the webcam. http://www.neaq.org/education_and_activities/blogs_webcams_videos_and_more/webcams/giant_ocean_tank_webcam/index.php

So everyone don't go out and buy one, I'm sure there are some DIY threads for a similar tank.


I'm very busy so I'll have to limit my posts but we'll try to keep things updated.

First the nest, as you can see they are attached to sand grains. Eggs are very small around 0.5mm. This is about 1/100 of the nest.


As you can see Trigger fish have multiple oil droplets. you can see the embryo beginning to develop, this is about 24 before hatching.


Larvae hatch very under developed, similar to those of a pelagic species and develop eggs very quickly. Yet no mouth. This picture is about 24 hours post hatch.


Larvae 48 hours post hatch. Mouth developed, still some oil present. Just at the start of first feeding.


Now I have to give you that "no more pictures were taken because of the lack of larvae" we only have a few left, so no more pictures. Maybe we can get them to day 10 or so. Next spawn we'll pull the spawn on the second day. In the past we've gotten 100% hatch rates, literally a bucket of larvae, but those were pulled the afternoon prior to hatching, not the day of the spawn.

[lance]

congrat's on the babies and egg's hope your successful rearing your babies keep me posted on your progress if you have time and thanks' for sharing with our site.

lance

[spawner]

Got another spawn, but the divers didn't see it until the afternoon it was going hatch, yesterday. Holiday weekends complicate things. Hopefully we'll get another try in 2-3 weeks.

[KathyL]

Positively green with envy!

[spawner]

It's hard to stay glued to the ground. But larvae are really good about giving lessons, esp. humility.

[spawner]

Spawned again, hopefully they are still sitting on eggs today.

[spawner]

We got a nice clutch of eggs, we took a small part of the nest, 10-20,000 eggs or so, just a guess. They were in the blastula stage, spawned this morning. We're not exactly sure how many fish are spawning, I think there are about 5-6 queen triggers in the tank. Normally the eggs hatch on the night of day two. The divers saw a spawn yesterday. That must mean that fish are spawning multiple times or making multiple nest. The eggs we pulled should hatch tomorrow night.

[Clownfish75]

Hi Andy

Im just thinking aloud here a little.

You obviously have a great association with this aquarium, I assume you work/research under them.

My local public aquarium is tight about this mostly because i suspect its in the to hard basket. Have you ever tried to figure out cameras on the location where the nesting occurs? is it in the same place each time?

I have no doubt things spawn in my local public aquarioum, but no one cares to document it.

Christian

[spawner]

Christian,

I have a joint position, I'm an Asst. Professor at a small university here in Rhode Island (Roger Williams University) and a Research Scientist at the New England Aquarium. So yea I have an inside means for getting eggs. My position was created just for this purpose, well that and creating a Minor Degree program in Aquaculture and Aquarium Science. When the GOT goes down in a few years and is remodeled the plan is to put in a few more cameras. We are mapping the spawning locations now. So we might be able to place a Handy Cam in the tank when they are suppose to spawn. Right now we're getting a spawn every two weeks. Hopefully the eggs will look good tomorrow morning.

BTW, triggerfish let you know where they spawn, they bite when they have a nest, so the divers know when they have a bunch of eggs. One got bitten today on the elbow.

[Luis A M]

I have no doubt things spawn in my local public aquarioum, but no one cares to document it.

Christian

I have no doubt most everything have ever spawned in all public aquariums´large reef tanks,but nobody cared,only the filter system

[KMB]

Andy,

What is your plan for rearing the triggers? Are the larvae large enough to feed on copepod naups or will you try something like ciliates?

Good luck with them. I'm looking forward to hearing more.

Karen

[spawner]

I have no doubt things spawn in my local public aquarioum, but no one cares to document it.

Christian

I have no doubt most everything have ever spawned in all public aquariums´large reef tanks,but nobody cared,only the filter system

Don't worry Luis, we're changing that. Actually the NEAq has alwasy been very interested in rearing its fish. For almost 25 years that have collected eggs or documented spawning. In fact I know they have reared some of their fish. Neddlefish, a species of puffers (Burrfish?), and I think a damsel. That being said it's a lot of work to keep these systems running and in good shape, budgets almost never allow for the personnel or facilities to culture fish.

I think the best thing is that the aquarist are so focused on ensuring the fish have as natural of a system as possible. They go out of they way to ensure the fish behave as naturally as possible. That almost always leads to having the proper sex ratio and that is followed by massive amounts of spawning. That and they feed them 5 times a day. It's the larval culturist's dream really, the world's best broodstock systems and dedicated professional taking care of them.

I'll have to do a few post on our pelagic egg collector this summer. We get a lot of different eggs from the water column.


Karen,

I've got a few species of pods that I culture. One has a 50 um nauplii. The larvae seem very rubust, active swimmers. Decent size mouth. I think very little of ciliates, don't see a purpose for them. We have a oyster hatchery in house so if they don't feed on copepods I'll put in 10-20/mL of oyster eggs and see if they will take those. But I think we can get enough small copepods from the Bay and from my cultures.

[KathyL]

I am so green, I may never turn pink again....

[spawner]

Ok some more pictures. The eggs are incubating. The are developing and will hatch tonight. I think we might be shearing some of them as I can smell a bit of oil in the water.


12 hours post spawn




24 hours post spawn

[spawner]

We got a great hatch. About 10,000 larvae or so.

[lance]

We got a great hatch. About 10,000 larvae or so.

that's incredible congrat's on all the larvae.

lance

[DrHsu]

We got a great hatch. About 10,000 larvae or so.

Wow! That's what I call a great hatch How do you even estimate the number!?

[KMB]

Spawner wrote "I think very little of ciliates, don't see a purpose for them."

Ah man, not another professional dissing ciliates! Guess I'll just keep plugging away at them until you all see the light!!

Karen, the ciliate lover

ps sorry I couldn't figure out how to do the quote thing so did it my own way.

[spawner]

Spawner wrote "I think very little of ciliates, don't see a purpose for them."

Ah man, not another professional dissing ciliates! Guess I'll just keep plugging away at them until you all see the light!!

Karen, the ciliate lover

ps sorry I couldn't figure out how to do the quote thing so did it my own way.

Karen, so you guys are using ciliates to raise the snapper on coconut?

Hsu, straight guess. When they reach first feeding I'll cull them down to a few thousand per tank. We only took a very small section of the nest.

[KMB]

No, we're not using ciliates to raise the snappers at Coconut Island. My group shares your opinion of ciliates . In fact they are referred to as "ciliates smiliates" by my coworker.

Our hatchery is about 25 feet from the shore and during windy weather we get all sorts of ciliates contaminating our cultures. We have seen both negative and positive effects from this. When I see what I percieve to be a positive ciliate I take a starter home to play with. I don't really have the time to do it right but it's better than doing nothing at all.

I feel I owe the successful genicanthus rearing to ciliates so I plan on continuing to pursue them slowly but surely as a first food for larvae.

Karen

[spawner]

No, we're not using ciliates to raise the snappers at Coconut Island. My group shares your opinion of ciliates . In fact they are referred to as "ciliates smiliates" by my coworker.

Karen

I knew the answer to that question. But just had to ask

[Larry Waughon]

Thank you for sharing! I will be following along.

[Antony P.M.]

Hi Andy,

Amaizing posts (this one and the damsels' ones) and pics; I wonder what quality photos it takes to have you pleased with them

Just a question if you don't mind - are/will the paracalanid(s) you're working with be available from Algagen sooner or later?

I knew the answer to that question. But just had to ask

I bet I know how you already knew the answer to this one

[spawner]

Well I under estimated the number of larvae we had. I think we had around 50,000 or so. We thinned them down, stocked 3, 200L larval tanks out, one with 1500 or so. One with 3-4,000. One with around 6,000 larvae. They are getting a mix of wild plankton and culture copepods. We might give one tank a few million oyster eggs tomorrow. They are small and fragile. They should start feeding this evening or tomorrow morning. I'll get some pictures online later tonight or tomorrow.

We are right at the point of losing our wild plankton for the summer. Hopefully we can get another week out of the bay before all the copepods disappear.

[spawner]

Quick update.

So far the larvae are still alive and are eating a variety of plankton. Centric Diatoms are showing up in their guts along with a nauplii or two.

There is always a soup of things in wild plankton, so hopefully we can get a 1000 larvae or so passed first feeding. I would guess we still have 10-15K larvae alive at this point.
One larval tank, the warmest (26.5C) has a bit larger larvae and the start of some noticeable mortality.

I'll post some updated pictures tomorrow.