Mid September, 2012, ORA released the news that they have developed a line of Goldflake Maroons from aberrant offspring of their Goldstripe breeding program.

This is particularly interesting, as ORA first tried working with a “Jigsaw” White Stripe Maroon, obtained from the Solomon Islands some 8 years back.  ORA wrote, “Our experience in breeding Jigsaws was much different than with breeding Picassos and unlike Matt Pedersen with his Lightning Maroon, we didn’t see uniquely patterned offspring from our fish.   After several batches of normal White Stripes we focused our efforts on Picassos,Snowflakes and the other designer clownfish we were working with at the time.  That Jigsaw is still in broodstock and he’s been spawning reliably for 7 years now!”
Meanwhile, their success with aberrant Gold-Stripe Maroons from Sumatra has really taken off.  ORA recounts the development story – “To our surprise, spawns from these select fish did result in increased numbers of uniquely barred offspring. What was once seemingly random had become a reproducible event.  We needed to come up with a name.   We couldn’t call the fish Jigsaws, because these were Gold Stripes and the pattern was quite a bit different from our wild caught White Stripe.   Internally at ORA our staff affectionately called them Funky Maroons but never intended on selling them as such.  Within the hobby it seems that Goldflake has become the accepted name for other Gold Stripes with this pattern variation.   Rather than come up with an alternate name that would confuse hobbyists we have decided to adopt it.  Each Goldflake will have a unique pattern and, depending on the degree of white on the fish, these fish will be graded as regulars or premiums.  Some of the premium fish have white that covers nearly half of their bodies.   These fish will look absolutely spectacular when the white turns to gold as they mature.   While the standard Goldflake will be readily available from ORA, the Premium Goldflakes are still exceptionally rare, perhaps one in 20,000 fish making their availability VERY limited.”
I discussed this fish briefly with Dustin Dorton at MACNA last weekend…it seems they don’t quite have the genetics nailed down yet.  When the staff at ORA does figure it out, I hope they will embrace the new tradition of genetic transparency that’s sweeping clownfish breeding and disclose their findings.  As I demonstrated at MACNA when I showed the Angelfish genetics, transparency forces breeders to focus on producing quality fish, and that’s something that helps us all.
I encourage you to read more on the initial ORA blog here:  http://www.orafarm.com/blog/2012/09/14/goldflake-maroons/ – I left at least one nice “extra” for you (think “all white goldstripe maroon clownfish”)
Be sure to check out the Goldflake Maroon Clownfish Product Page here -> http://www.orafarm.com/products/fish/clowns/goldflake-maroon/