Barrier Reef Anemonefish - Reproduction

Reproduction

The Barrier Reef Anemonefish is a nesting fish. A few days before mating aggression from the dominant male towards the female increases, and at the same time he begins clearing a nest site, usually on a rock close to the host anemone. The rock is cleaned of algae, sometimes with the assistance of the female. When spawning takes place the female zig-zags over the nest site and the male follows fertilizing the eggs which have been deposited. Between 100 and 1000 elliptical eggs of between 3 and 4 mm in length may be laid. They are attached to the nest site by a mass of short filaments. The male guards the nest for 6 to 7 days until the eggs hatch. All the fry are born sexless - they develop into males first, and into females only if they rise to the top of the hierarchy within a particular hosted group.

Read more about this topic:  Barrier Reef Anemonefish

Famous quotes containing the word reproduction:

    The chief function of the city is to convert power into form, energy into culture, dead matter into the living symbols of art, biological reproduction into social creativity.
    Lewis Mumford (1895–1990)

    An original is a creation
    motivated by desire.
    Any reproduction of an original
    is motivated by necessity ...
    It is marvelous that we are
    the only species that creates
    gratuitous forms.
    To create is divine, to reproduce
    is human.
    Man Ray (1890–1976)

    As the twentieth century ends, commerce and culture are coming closer together. The distinction between life and art has been eroded by fifty years of enhanced communications, ever-improving reproduction technologies and increasing wealth.
    Stephen Bayley (b. 1951)