Sepia Bandensis - First Round

[DWhatley]

I told him the fish is a 40" Atlantic salmon.:

 

[Reef Geek]

That's awesome!

 

[snowmaker]

Found the female dead yesterday. She was wounded a couple days ago, likely by the male. She had an injured arm and bite wounds above an eye. She measured only 2.5" which is much smaller than the male.

I pulled around 50 more eggs from their tank and have them in breeder net.

 

[monty]

RIP

 

[tonmo]

Sorry to hear about the female, snowmaker. Good luck with the eggs, keep us posted... great pics in this thread.

 

[MAKOOKAM]

Wow...sorry to hear that. Too bad you dont live on my side of the continent. I'd give you one of my females.

 

[snowmaker]

...and I might have to decline that generous offer (if I were on the West coast) as I'm currently sitting on maybe 100 eggs and 12 - 14 hatchlings.
Great news is that I've found a local source for live Mysidopsis, or Americamysis bahia at $0.10 ea. and no shipping (drive is about 2 hr round trip). Going to check out the facility for the first time today.
http://holidayjunction.com/aro/index.html
What a great little niche business. I understand they use ocean water local to the shop. The stock available to hobbyist is culled adults I think, and quantities may be limited.

 

[DWhatley]

and no shipping (drive is about 2 hr round trip)

$15-$18 shipping+time I suspect

 

[rryyddeerr]

you should call the guy at paradise pets and ask if he wants to purchase some. he said he was always waiting for them and was growing unhappy with the viability of his current supply.
and thanks for being so generous again. im going to pick up a 50 breeder this evening and am going to be experimenting with making fake live rock out of white earthenware clay fired to 2200 degrees to stock it. hopefully, if a bunch of them hatch, i will have a place for them all to live. we are also putting an addition onto the house to accommodate the new tank and ones planned for the future.

also, as a side note, i decided to try hanging the eggs this time to keep pressure off of them. i read about doing this somewhere, but have never tried it. anyone else ever do this??

 

[snowmaker]

putting an addition onto the house to accommodate the new tank and ones planned for the future.

Now that's serious.

I like the hanging eggs idea. I read that A. Calfo tumbled his. They hatched in 3 weeks - probably because they were so annoyed at being tumbled.

The ARO aquaculture facility was very neat, and the guy we met was friendly and extremely knowledgeable. He gave us a bunch of Gammarids, a species... from Chesapeake Bay I think. They were just a little too big for the hatchlings at this time, but my reef fish went nuts over them. He is also a hobbyist so I offered him a couple of hatchlings which he thought would be fun, so I'll probably make the drive again next Wed.

 

[DWhatley]

Did you get the mysids in quantity that you were hoping for? Did you make receipt of the new hatchlings contingent upon journaling them? Need some sales promotion here as it would be a real benefit to have the ARO guy as an active member

rryyddeerr everytime I see that octopus stand I wish I had the spare money to ask about the second one. I am assuming that the new addition means you were successful in your "need a bigger tank " approach Is this going to be a serious wet work room or leisure room?

 

[rryyddeerr]

The upstairs will be living space and downstairs will be basement, aka: "the sump"

 

[snowmaker]

They've retired some mysids at ARO the last 2 weeks. 3 of us have been splitting them to feed our growing armies. 14 - 1 week old hatchlings can eat 40+ mysids per day... Yikes!
One of the employees took us collecting across the parking lot. Some flats and tidal river and not much happening at high tide. We did catch 3 mummichog (where he said you could catch 100's at right tide) and 20+ tiny fish about 3/8". He also mentioned where to collect ghost shrimp in quantities.
Noah, try netting during incoming tides in any accessible marsh channels this summer.

Oh, posting this picture by request.
Smaller one is the female.

 

[snowmaker]

The solo male has been just a little goofy lately, and has a white mark on top 2 arms up near his face. Last 40 sec. is behavior I haven't seen.

Any idea what is going on here?

 

[cuttlegirl]

The white spots are from rubbing on the glass. I've never seen that behavior, kind of looks like he is hugging himself...