# My Clownfish / Anemone Situation



## marblerye (Jul 25, 2010)

a few months back there was a thread about everyone posting their clownfish but i forgot to post my pics. at the time i just bought a tiny pair (less than an inch long) of tank-bred ocellaris clownfish and i remember talking about how i had a rose bubble-tipped anemone in the tank and i wanted the clowns to take it as a host. i've read that since they were tank-bred, the chances of that happening were pretty slim to almost none because first off it wasn't natural for a false percula to host in a bubble tipped anemone in the wild and second because these were tank-bred they wouldn't know what the heck an anemone was.

i think weeks went by and nothing happened, but in that thread i posted that i tried the picture method and got excited that it could literally happen ANY day now (then). for those of you who don't know what the picture method is, it's basically posting a picture of a clownfish hosted in an anemone on the glass of the tank and hoping the clownfish would see it and learn that the big ball of tentacles in the tank was its friend. well it didn't happen for me and i got kinda pissed so i read that a veggie clip in the shape of a clownfish could work if i put it near the anemone. that was another idea someone else on a different forum had a good experience with. that was a total waste as well.. i doubt they recognized it as a clownfish because i sorta didn't either unless it was from far away. if you have one you probably know what i'm talking about..

well after reading countless threads on other forums about ways other people had success with their clowns (mostly wild caught) in my head i filtered out the ones that would stress the fish out. i've read people catch the clowns and put them in a tiny bucket and then move the rock the anemone is on into that bucket and leave them in there for a while.. no thanks..  the amount of skepticism people had about the picture method kinda turned me off that idea; one or two people would say it could work while a whole bunch of people say do nothing and let nature do its thing. i tried to invent my own method called 'turkey baster some of the clownfish's food into the anemone and hope it follows it in there method' but they watched me do it and turned around and had this look as if they were thinking.. 'ohh that's fresh! you might as well not feed us because we're NOT going in there to get it.. and btw we're still hungry!'

after some frustration i gave that idea up. i googled some pictures of rose bubble-tipped anemones that looked like mine with clowns hosted in them that looked like mine to try the picture method again but it was kinda tough.. it was always one but not the other. so i had an idea and proceded to pull out the camera and snapped a good picture of my rbta, and used a stock image of a ocellaris clownfish from the web and PHOTOSHOPPED them into the picture..  lol

i had a photocopy store print the picture out on glossy photo paper in color and proceded with the picture method. after a while i noticed some strange behaviour happening with one of the clowns similar to what happened the first time i tried the picture method; the clowns would hang around above the area of the anemone or at least that side of the tank. as per usual i got excited and thought ANY DAY NOW!!! well a week went by and i got crafty and revised my tactic.. only put the picture up while the powerheads were off during feeding and after that keep it up for a few hours. that seems to be the only time i have their attention and after an hour of watching, slowly one clown would swim down and TOUCH a tentacle before swimming off. a week of this happening and then the day it WORKED! one of the two clowns swam into the anemone without touching any of the tentacles for 5 minutes at a time. a few hours later it was complete! they swam into it, wiggled around, nibbled on the tentacles, laid dead wedged between the bulbs and everything!

so i'm here to confirm that the picture method really works! clownfish really DO learn from seeing, said by the master of the clown himself vaporize (hubert). you just have to play with the fish's psyche a bit and implement the idea at the right time (INCEPTION  lol). i don't have the clowns or the anemone anymore but here are some pictures of them doing their thing!









*Clowns before hosting. *









*Clowns after the host.*









*They seem pretty happy!*


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## caker_chris (Apr 22, 2010)

thats awsome man, too bad you don't have them anymore.

I know my first pair of clowns wouldn't host anything. I now have a true perc and 2 false percs and they are all hosting in a long tentacle anemone. In fact its going to well that the true perc was displaying signs that she is going to lay eggs any day now. So I might be a god father, LOL.

Out of curiousity, how come you don't have the clowns or BTA anymore? After all that work I would have thought you would never let them go.


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## Kweli (Jun 2, 2010)

Awesome work, ill have to give it a try..

Can you send me the picture that you created?


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## Kweli (Jun 2, 2010)

marblerye said:


> i tried to invent my own method called 'turkey baster some of the clownfish's food into the anemone and hope it follows it in there method' but they watched me do it and turned around and had this look as if they were thinking.. 'ohh that's fresh! you might as well not feed us because we're NOT going in there to get it.. and btw we're still hungry!'


Thanks for the monday laugh = )


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