Brett's Breeder Setup

Well this project has been a long time in the making and is finally done! I thought i would post some pic of the build to show you all what i've been up to.

The build begins!


Making sure its nice and strait


Finished product!

Another angle of the finished product. 2 tanks divided into 3 chambers each giving me 6 smaller tanks of about 11 gallons each.

The install

Water test to make sure they actually hold water

Bulkheads in

Figuring out how to plumb this bad boy skimmer!

The finished product fully installed, cycled and ready to add the broodstock!

Here is a shot of the lighting, i used a 48" and a 36" panorama stunner strip

Left side

right side

right side and sump

It was hard to get a good pic of the skimmer because of where it is placed. The skimmer is a My Reef Creations MR2. its a becket style skimmer and pulls some serious gunk!

This it the blueline pump that powers the skimmer

Shot of the sump/refugium. Its a 55 gallon sump i built, huge refugium with about 20 lbs of live rock rubble with a GLO refugium light to grow the macro when i get it in this weekend. The return pump is a Mag 24 and its awesome! Both the return from the tanks and the skimmer empty into the filter sock.


Thanks for checking it out. Its been a ton of work and took me a lot longer than i thought it would. Please let me know what you think and if you have any questions!

Edited by ch3tt - May 18 2012 at 10:38am

People are more than welcome to check it out whenever. I plan on putting my broodstock in the tanks next week sometime. Right now all I have is clowns, I'm going to start with that and then try to diversify my broodstock

Wow that's impressive. I see breeding is starting to really become popular here in Utah and I'm excited about it. Looking forward to see what kind of clownfish you breed.

Looks good.
I'd remove the baffles between floss bag and Refugium, doubling the size of the Refugium (extremely important in this setup.) Room for Algae to grow is more important than LR in a Refugium. I'd also add 1/2-1" of Oolitic sand to each compartment and a tile and small rock in each, to increase the desire to spawn just in case they prefer spawning on a tile or a rock. A little Caulerpa would also make the parents feel more comfortable.
Just my 2 cents.

Spawning Clownfish is easy. The hard part is raising the larvae and Nemos. What are your plans for that? Would you like some input?

Way cool, I would also like to know the plan for raising the nemos.

WoW! Very Impressive! Bare bottom is the way to go in a system like this, it saves a ton of time on maintenance and is easier to keep water quality up, you'll love it. The live rock and sand in the sump will do fine for  bio- filtration. Caulerpa in the sump and a little in with the brood stock will help with nitrates. Good Luck!

Just wanted to do a quick update and also give a list of my broodstock.

I plan on using a standard 10 gallon tank for the Larva tank, I have read Clownfishes by Joyce Wilkerson and have gotten most my information and strategies from her book.

Current Broodstock:
Ocellaris Pair (Breeding)
Ocellaris Pair (Mated)
Percula Pair (Breeding)
Premium Snowflake Pair (Mated)
Onyx/Premium Picasso Pair (Mated)
Premium snowflake/ B&W (Mated)

Oh and i had to share this, my Percula's laid their first clutch for me yesterday!



Edited by ch3tt - February 06 2013 at 3:24am

Question, what makes black and white clowns Darwin Black & White?

Yeah I agree with you bangaii's are pretty cool and earlier to breed. I've actually got a pair in my reef that are showing signs of breeding, so hopefully I'll have some baby bangaii's soon too!

This is so cool. You've got to invite me over to check it out sometime.