New Fish

[1bigstud]

Quick q, After adding a new fish how long do u go without seeing him till u call it a death??? The reason I ask is yesterday I added a neon goby to my tank. usually when I add new fish to my tank they dont bother to hide and start exploring right away. The goby did the same thing at first but when I came back to the tank a couple hours later it was nowhere to be found today is day 2 and no sign of it. So at what point do I call it a death?

[niloc16]

neon goby will find a small hole to call home and it will probably show up sometime. give it time.

[Delphinus]

I've gone weeks, literally - weeks, without seeing some fish after introducing them. The one that blew me away was my Red Sea Sailfin tang when I first got him. How can you lose a tang in a tank?? But he found a pretty good hiding spot. Couple weeks before he was comfortable swimming around.

Same with fairy wrasses -- man, I never saw my lubbock's wrasse for a solid MONTH. I thought he was a goner for sure, I was sooooooooo depressed, like you wouldn't believe. One day I saw the loser's face poking out. It took him several months to get used to the idea of people looking in the tank. I lost him in an anemone incident. :(

My newest fish is a potter's angel I got from Willito about 6 weeks ago, and she was pretty shy for a solid 2-3 weeks. Again, could see no trace of her. But she's out all the time now.

Take it as a compliment, you've obviously done aquascaping well enough to give them a good choice of hiding spots. :) Hopefully that's all it is. Good luck.

[1bigstud]

Actually I cant even begin to count how many crevices, nooks, caverns and caves are in my tank. I've got about 100 pounds of live rock in a 77 gallon tank. A couple things that have me worried is the longest any of my fish have been shy for is about a day (bi-colour blenny) and I'm also concerned he may not be getting food, that and theres a chance one of my fish may have taken his attempts to clean the wrong way :(

[1bigstud]

Well theres good news and bad news. I found my neon goby this morning he was just barely poking out of a piece of rock(which must have tunnels runing right through the middle cause he would go in one side and pop out the other)!! unfortunatley when he tried to come out and go exploring the 6 line terrorized him back into hiding. I've seen my 6 line go after my clown fish a couple times over the past 6 months or so, but other than that he's pretty chill towards the other fish. I hope he drops the attitude. I am wondering if the neon went to try and clean the 6 line but it felt threatened and decided the best defence is a good offence. Hopefully not.

[Beverly]

IME, six lines are very aggressive. Had to get rid of mine when it harrassed our pair of skunk clowns so badly they were not allowed to eat.

[Moogled]

Yeah, Six-lines seem to get pretty aggro after a certain amount of time.

BTW Tony, I had the same problem with my Lubbock's Wrasse as well. He's a shy little bugger and only swims along the back of the tank.

[1bigstud]

So I guess I should get rid of my six line. Any suggestions how to get him out?

[Delphinus]

Gooooooood luck with that one! :lol:

You can read about my escapades in the same situation.
http://www.canreef.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=27132

If it's any consolation, although I gave up trying to remove my sixline (he is just way too smart to fall for any trap or be fished out, and far too fast to be netted out), he's better behaved towards the newest-addition (potter's angel) now, so I don't feel the pressure anymore to remove and isolate him like I did at the beginning of that thread. Although I still have my fishing rig ready to go "just in case." (I had to get a very small hook from a fishing store, they looked at me like they thought I was an idiot, going in there and asking for "one hook please.")

Of course I have tankmates in there that shouldn't theoretically be threatened by a sixline smaller than them anyhow. Smaller fish might be at perpetual risk so you might need to remove him if you can. I know my sixline is responsible for killing a mandarin, I imagine a small goby wouldn't fare a lot better in a full out assault like what happened there. (Stupid fish..)

[Beverly]

Here's an article with several fish catching methods ....

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2006-06/sp/index.php

[revgeoff]

The only way to make a 6line behave is for it to have a near death experience. Mine had a serious attitude until it survived electrocution and two or three weeks of me thinking everything had died and trying to decide if I would stay in the hobby (no lights, just enough disgusting water to cover all the rocks flattened on the bottom, no heat and no food). After that, he is nice to every new fish that comes in.

[1bigstud]

Thanks for the advice everyone. Not sure what I'm gonna do yet. probably gonna try a trap.

[shadowboy]

Just simply get a wrasse that is 3 times his size, I did this and it smartend him right up, fortunetly the big wrasse is a model citizen....actually thinking back alot could have went wrong with that plan....oh well

tb

[1bigstud]

Well the neon goby is actually exploring the tank alot more today and it actually got some food at feeding time. The six line is still harassing it a bit but it doesnt seem to be as high on his priority list anymore