Coral Beauty angelfish are one of the most common species of Centropyge and finally, this iconic fish has been captive bred. In personal communication with Tom Bowling we knew that Biota Palau was working with some pre-settlement Coral Beauty larvae, but a video posted last night shows the results of their hard work.
The clip shared on Facebook shows a cloud of about 50 small captive bred coral beauties in an aquarium. Since they are right at the settlement stage, the group of Centropyge bispinosa show a range of color development; most of them are colored a regal purple but a few are still silvery brown and transitioning to fully colored juveniles.
This is the first second successful captive breeding of the Coral Beauty angelfish, coming right on the heels of Kathy’s Clowns this summer, and certainly in any kind of commercial quantity. It’s not surprising that Biota Palau is responsible for the recent breakthrough, having given us captive bred Mandarin Gobies and Bristletail filefish earlier this year, and so many others previously.
At this rate Biota Palau’s aquaculture efforts are growing at an amazing rate, it seems like they are successful with every fish they work with. These early triumphs with the popular coral beauty bodes well for Biota to work with more angelfish species; Palau is one of the few places where Abei angelfish are known to exist, so we’re keeping our fins crossed that Biota can source some Centropyge abei broodstock to work with.
At present the newly settled captive-bred coral beauty angelfish are probably barely scratching a half inch long, so it will probably be a couple more months until we see these released into the aquarium market. Hopefully this is the first of many successes for Biota in breeding pygmy angelfish because surely they will make a fantastic addition to Biota Aquariums.
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