Hmmm.... my female clown sometimes gets something weird and rough looking near her mouth, just noticed it in the past few months. I wondered if it coincided with her new spawning behaviors.

My best guess for you is that it is part of the sorting out of dominance / gender issues as they mature. It was surprising to me how long it took my clowns to fully mature to be ready for spawning (a couple years), although you could clearly tell which was the female. Some species of clowns seem to make that more apparent than others and with maroons, you can really tell early on.