Solomon Percula

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by temper76

hi i was wondering how much is a pair of wild caught salomon island true percula going for these days?? Anyone? Thanks

$60-$150.

[ThRoewer]

The mated pairs at Baja were $150. Those were mostly onyx and had been collected and kept together throughout the shipping and handling process. Of those pairs both, male and female were nearly identical in size.
Aquarium Concepts asked $90 for a pair but I think they just put a large and a small together. Also those were all the more of the orange color form.
Single percula go for $40 to $50. I took those and matched them to each other.

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

The mated pairs at Baja were $150. Those were mostly onyx and had been collected and kept together throughout the shipping and handling process. Of those pairs both, male and female were nearly identical in size.
Aquarium Concepts asked $90 for a pair but I think they just put a large and a small together. Also those were all the more of the orange color form.
Single percula go for $40 to $50. I took those and matched them to each other.

Basically same in Socal. $60 for two clowns that were paired up by a store and $150 for "true pairs". Cheapest individual true percs from SI are $24.99.

[temper76]

Originally Posted by CoralsAddiction

$60-$150.

Not bad.thank you

[temper76]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

The mated pairs at Baja were $150. Those were mostly onyx and had been collected and kept together throughout the shipping and handling process. Of those pairs both, male and female were nearly identical in size.
Aquarium Concepts asked $90 for a pair but I think they just put a large and a small together. Also those were all the more of the orange color form.
Single percula go for $40 to $50. I took those and matched them to each other.

Not bad at all and bonded that's a plus.thanks for the info guys.

[ThRoewer]

The big female of pair 2 still has stringy poo and looks seriously undernourished.
I got her trough one round of Prazi and started the second yesterday evening.
This morning she was breathing heavily and so did all the other fish in the QT. The water seemed also a bit milky. So I turned on the skimmer. All other fish got back to breathing normally but she was still breathing labored. Though she was eating OK.
This evening I did a near complete water change and now she seems to do better.
I kind of doubt Prazi is the right medication here.
Tomorrow I think I will start treating with metro and see if that helps.

This fish is the one I regret to have bought as Baja had nicer and healthier looking just a week later .
Though the little male I got together with her is doing fine...

[ExpertMarine]

I hope she pulls through.

[Ginger bay]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

Damn, I gotta get down there - they got all the good ones and we got the scraps

Isn't this the truth sometimes. SoCal gets to cherry pick as they walk into the wholesalers.

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

Well, the female of pair 2 still has white stringy poo. So I started another round of PraziPro.
At least she is eating a bit better by now.

Pair 3 is eating a lot better now that they are in an anemone. No more hanging around sluggishly. Now it's all excitement.

Both of pair 4 were good eaters from the start.

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

The big female of pair 2 still has stringy poo and looks seriously undernourished.
I got her trough one round of Prazi and started the second yesterday evening.
This morning she was breathing heavily and so did all the other fish in the QT. The water seemed also a bit milky. So I turned on the skimmer. All other fish got back to breathing normally but she was still breathing labored. Though she was eating OK.
This evening I did a near complete water change and now she seems to do better.
I kind of doubt Prazi is the right medication here.
Tomorrow I think I will start treating with metro and see if that helps.

This fish is the one I regret to have bought as Baja had nicer and healthier looking just a week later .
Though the little male I got together with her is doing fine...

Quaranting wildcaught is not for the faint at heart. Patience is worth it.

When you have bred them, does the offsprings carryforward the colors of the parents or do they just look like faded standard true percs?

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by Ginger bay

Isn't this the truth sometimes. SoCal gets to cherry pick as they walk into the wholesalers.

This is true and pricing seems to be slightly lower here in SoCal.

[Ginger bay]

Originally Posted by CoralsAddiction

This is true and pricing seems to be slightly lower here in SoCal.

Probably because of no shipping charge. Also, gas to pickup is less than a store driving down to hand pick their fishes.

[ThRoewer]

Originally Posted by Ginger bay

Isn't this the truth sometimes. SoCal gets to cherry pick as they walk into the wholesalers.

Yes, I know. That was one of the reasons why back in Germany I drove 3h (each way) to DeJong in the Netherlands.

Originally Posted by Ginger bay

Quaranting wildcaught is not for the faint at heart. Patience is worth it.

It's not the first time I'm doing it
Though this one looks like it has some serious internal infection going on. She is breathing rapidly and is still losing weight. I'm not sure she will make it.

Originally Posted by Ginger bay

When you have bred them, does the offsprings carryforward the colors of the parents or do they just look like faded standard true percs?

I never had the capacity to test it on a large scale but some certainly did. I kept some of the ones that showed a lot of black early on. These are offspring of the pair in my avatar:

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

Though this one looks like it has some serious internal infection going on. She is breathing rapidly and is still losing weight. I'm not sure she will make it.

How is she doing? Hope she pulls through. You are doing PraziPro so that should help tremendously with internal stuff.

[ThRoewer]

I tried Prazi but the next morning every fish in the tank was breathing heavily so I turned the skimmer back on. I will try feeding more tigger pods and see how she does.
I wish my fish would eat the damn NLS Hex-Shield pellets, but they all just spit it. I think they don't like garlic.

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

I tried Prazi but the next morning every fish in the tank was breathing heavily so I turned the skimmer back on.

I have had clownfish (ocellaris) exhibit the same symptom in QT under prazipro. Sometimes they need 48-72 hours to get used to it and start eating.

[ThRoewer]

It wasn't just the fish reacting to it. The whole tank looked a bit murky. I thought it may be ammonia but it wasn't. The other fish went back to normal pretty much right after I turned the skimmer back on. The pair 2 female took a bit longer.
To be on the safe side I did a 90% water change.
Tonight she did better and stuffed herself with Cyclops.
Let's see if she has white stringy again.

Pair 3 is eating better now. They now go after Mysis if they come close enough by the anemone. They just dart out, snap it and dive right back into the anemone. Otherwise they never leave it. Their favorite foods are Cyclops and live tigger pods. For those they don't really need to leave the anemone, they just wait until they drift by.

The two of pair 4 are the only ones that eat whatever at throw at them. And they eat like pigs until they have round bellies. I feel those two have already grown a bit in the week I have them now.

Even the two of pair 1 that I have now for almost 5 months are still finicky eaters, especially the female. They have grown a bit but not quite as much as I would have expected them to grow if they had eaten like I knew it from clownfish in the past.

[ExpertMarine]

ProziPro turns the water murky as an indicator that it's doing its job. It clears up little by little day by day. The first time it happened to me I almost freaked out, and also did a water change. It's good that you did what you did from observing their altered breathing patterns. The dose might have possibly been too strong, not enough aeration, there's so many variables...
General Cure also works good as a dewormer, and is a little broader spectrum.
I'm happy to hear all is going well.

[ThRoewer]

Is this the general cure you mentioned?: APH Powder General Cure


I was a Baja Reef today and they still have a bunch of the percula, including most of the mated pairs. Most of them seem to be in good health. They also still have all the really nice Solomon clarki.
I wish I had more space (and money).

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

Tonight she did better and stuffed herself with Cyclops.

Sometimes this is all you need to start going in the right direction.

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

It wasn't just the fish reacting to it. The whole tank looked a bit murky.

I did a water change yesterday in my QT and added PraziPro. The QT was murky this morning but the clowns are doing ok in it. You can hardly see the clowns in the top left corner of the photo. So it is probably normal.

[Ginger bay]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

It's not the first time I'm doing it
Though this one looks like it has some serious internal infection going on. She is breathing rapidly and is still losing weight. I'm not sure she will make it.



I never had the capacity to test it on a large scale but some certainly did. I kept some of the ones that showed a lot of black early on.

When I QT clownfishes in CP and PraziPro and heavy breathing shows up, I usually add General Cure or Metronidazole. General cure is just a mix of praziquantel and metronidazole. The metro releaves the labor breathing (saw this suggestion on disease management thread years ago).

Nice. We need a new strain of captive bred nice percs.

[ExpertMarine]

Yes, API General Cure.

Ginger- you have added general cure into QT with CP in it already?
No adverse reactions between the Metronidazole and CP? What dosage of CP were you running.

Here is a list of other QT mends I have experience with and could recommend.

CP- is also known to alter taste of food when feeding possibly adding to the reluctant ness of aggressive feeding. Start with the low dose and increase over time.

ProziPro - does cloud the water as a normal part of the treatment. A good dewormer.

The following is great because it feeds the fish the medicine and doesn't treat the whole tank.
DR.G medicated caviar. They have 3 formulas that need to be refrigerated..
Anti Bacterial - Kanamycin & Metronidazole
De Wormer - Praziquantel
Anti Perasitic - has CP

[ExpertMarine]

CA, I'm wondering if you adding bacteria like Dr Tims is contributing to the cloudiness as part of a bacterial bloom. If you only have two clowns in a 10g you should be fine with water changes at the medicated intervals. The combination of everything might be throwing something off. Just use an airline to siphon out excess food and waste every day...

I only dose microbacter 7 in the big tanks that are not medicated.

[CoralsAddiction]

Originally Posted by ExpertMarine

CA, I'm wondering if you adding bacteria like Dr Tims is contributing to the cloudiness as part of a bacterial bloom. Just use an airline to siphon out excess food and waste every day...

Could be. I just a turkey baster to clean waste.

[ThRoewer]

It looks she is better now - no white stringy poo today.
For now I will feed them all with small sized feeds like fish roe, Cyclops, tigger pods and the Hikkari Marine S pellets (those are for ease of automatic feeding when I'm not home).
Small feeds are more natural for clowns who in nature live mostly of plankton, small crustacean and algae. It's just more work.

Originally Posted by Ginger bay

Nice. We need a new strain of captive bred nice percs.

I hope I can contribute to that.

Colorwise pair 1, 3 and 4 are the nicest.
Especially pair 1 has the deepest black that doesn't gray out at night or when stressed and a very nice and clean orange.
The only thing to worry about with them is missbars. The male has a greyish 3 band which may have been caused some lack of nutrition or illness during early larval development, but I don't think this is genetic so he should be good.
The female is the one I worry a bit more about as her 2dn band is pretty much straight and lacks the forward pointing bar that is kind of typical for percula.
Unfortunately these two are still not fully bonded - the female still kicks the male out of the pot at night and he sleeps up at the skimmer pump.
Also these two constantly feel itchy without showing any symptoms of parasites and all other fish in the tank are fine. I simply don't know what is bugging them.

Pair 3 also has a nice, clean orange and nicely shaped bars. Only the black isn't that perfect (yet). Especially the females black turns to grey at night or when stressed.
These two bonded instantly when I put them together and so far there has been not the slightest tension between them.

Pair 4 is closest to what I consider true onyx though their orange is more towards yellow and pretty bright. They are also not fully bonded yet.

Pair 2 is more the standard percula variety.
When the female pulls through they may be the first to spawn as she is close to fully grown size.

[ThRoewer]

Originally Posted by ThRoewer

Originally Posted by CoralsAddiction

Man, your pair of clowns is super orange too.

Pair 1 is pretty much the same.

The interesting thing I observed is the black. On these two it has clearly retreated and lightened a bit. My suspicion is that this is caused by the pretty white anemone.