KEEPING NEMO

Ok so you've seen the film, and now you (or the kids) want to keep Nemo but how do you do it?

If you are considering buying a Clownfish for your kids, PLEASE find out as much as you possibly can about their care and seek out a specialist marine dealer like ourselves who can provide you with the information and equipment you require.   For the sake of the fish please do not buy a tiny freshwater tank from a pet superstore and put a clownfish in it :-(

There are Four important things to realise before you start;

The first thing is that "Nemo" is a marine fish, this means he lives in saltwater not tap water. 

The second thing to realise is that keeping "Nemo" will not be cheap (several hundred pounds). 

The third thing is that it won't be fast, you can’t set up the tank and add the fish the same day. The friendly bacteria that break down fish wastes need time to grow. So if you stock the tank too soon you will get a build up of ammonia and this could make your fish very ill or even kill it.

The last is that you do not need an anemone to keep Clowns, in fact tank-bred clowns have never even have seen one!  Anemones are best avoided, they are by no means easy to keep and they require highly specialised systems. There are some superb plastic replica anemones on the market which look very realistic.

Nemo is a Clownfish which is a good thing for three reasons:

1/ Clownfish are very hardy so all being well your "Nemo" should have a long and happy life. Remember, a Clownfish is a long term commitment not a short term toy, in good conditions they can live for over 10 years.

2/ Most Clowns are captive bred so we aren't hurting the environment by keeping them.  Tank-bred Clownfish are also more hardy and less prone to diseases than their wild cousins.

3/ Clowns all start life as boys.  So to get a pair all you need is any two young ones, given time one will grow larger than the other and become a girl.

What does he need?

The Aquarium:

A common clown will grow to about 3" so we don't need a huge aquarium, something about 24" cubed or larger would be fine.   If you intend to keep any other members of the cast then remember sharks and sea turtles are out :-) and "Dory" will grow to about 9" and so will require a larger tank.

It is possible to buy an "off the shelf" aquarium kit like the superb Aquamedic Chromis shown below:

A kit like this would cost £595 plus about another £100 on accessories.  This type of set up would be able to maintain most of the cast including anemones and most corals.

Too expensive?

It is possible to do this more cheaply, however it would not be possible to keep corals and anemones or large fish in a set-up like this. 

A list of all the vital equipment is shown below.

• A good book!

• 36” x 12” x 15” aquarium minimum – a tank smaller than this would be too hard to keep stable for an inexperienced marine fish keeper.
• A tank stand or cabinet. A piece of STRONG furniture would also do, but it must be flat, level, and at least the same size as the aquarium.
• Substrate - a 1" layer of fine coral sand.
• Filtration: for a pair of clownfish and a FEW other small creatures then an internal power filter would do.  If funds allow a protein skimmer would be very helpful also some liverock would be great.
• A heaterstat to keep the water at 25°C and a thermometer to check it.
• Marine salt mix. You’ll need to change 10% of the tank water every two weeks to help keep it fresh.
• A hydrometer to measure the salinity of the water (1.021 to 1.025 is fine).
• Test kits for a minimum of ammonia (zero is good), nitrite (zero is good), nitrate (under 25ppm is good) and pH (8.2 to 8.4 is fine).
• Lighting, an aquarium fluorescent tube plus control unit
• Dedicated buckets and hose for water changes
• An algae scraper to clean the tank glass and a net to fish out debris.
• Food! Clownfish do well on a combination of a good quality marine flake and some frozen marine food such as brine shrimp.  Fish do not eat much so only put in what will be eaten in a couple of minutes.  If there is ANY uneaten food lying around after 2 minutes then you fed too much!

Still too expensive? Then PLEASE don't try it, in our opinion the above is the bare minimum to do this properly.  If you intend to keep an animal, then you are accepting a duty of care towards that animal, this includes providing proper accommodation.