Candied hogfish experience

[Proteus]

I'm looking at a candied hog fish(yellow hogfish)
I have read a bit how they can be aggressive toward firefish and flasher wrasses.
Looking for insight from people who have housed them.

I have emerald crabs,fiddlercrabs,hermits,peppermint and cleaner shrimp, along with 5 clams.

I have read they will eat small shrimp.

Please help me decide.

[Leah]

Very yummy!!! :wink:

[dsaundry]

Help decide what exactly? They are nice fish but as you already know they can be aggressive towards other fish. The first question is what do you have in your tank right now? You have to decide if you are going to keep a reef tank with compatible tank mates or have a folr tank with more aggressive fish. Are you going to base what you put in the tank solely on this fish? If so then you will have to decide on the rest of the fish you add. I would suggest if you have shrimp and firefish now to give this fish a miss.:biggrin:

[Proteus]

I have a mixed reef now.
Fishes are

Lineatus wrasse
Mystery wrasse
Yellow assessor
Mandarin
Zebra barred gobies
Multiple anthias
Royal gramma
Dottybacks
Clowns
Bicolor blenny
Diamond gobie

The tank is a 180g.

I'm just looking for personal experience

[Myka]

In my 90, my Candy Hogfish harassed the McCosker's Wrasses and a Peppermint Hogfish. The Candy had to be removed.

[ponokareefer]

I got a pair of them a while back. After the larger one grew up, my cleaner shrimp dissapeared. I can't say for sure that they ate them, but I didn't add anything else and the cleaner shrimp had been there a couple of years. I thought maybe I had a crab or something in there, so bought a pest trap that I baited for a couple of weeks and didn't get anything.

I tried adding a pair of firefish, and they killed them both, never letting them come out from the rocks to eat. They also harrassed a cherub angel that was added after them, and I found the cherub angel dead outside of the tank from jumping out.

I had a mandarin goby for 2 years that was always fat and healthy. The candy hogfish were constantly on the prowl eating pods and decimated my population. The mandarin eventually starved to death.

They are beautiful, but I really regret getting them as I would rather have my shrimp and mandarin back. If you really want a pair, which are quite rare, I could see if I could try a bottle trap to get them out.

[christyf5]

I wouldn't do it with that yellow assessor in there. Any fish that looks like itself (to the candy hogfish) it will not be impressed with. I had my candy hogfish in with a royal gramma (only same sized/shaped fish in the tank) and they were totally fine. But they kept to their own parts of the tank as it was the gramma that was the aggressor. I never kept any shrimp in the tank as I had a melanurus wrasse that thought they were tasty snacks.

Beware, they can be jumpers. My last one jumped. I lost the first one to a tank move :neutral:

[ponokareefer]

Mine was in with a golden wrasse which was a little larger, but same shape and color, and they got along fine.

[phi delt reefer]

i have;

skunk cleaner shrimp
1 or 2 harlequin shrimps (dont know if one of them is still alive)
blood shrimp
tailspot blenny
mystery wrasse
2 darwin clowns
chromis
2 pyjama cardinal

i added the candied hogfish (pretty small) and he hid for a bit, then came out and him and the mystery had some choice words for one another. The next day the two were fine and the hogfish understands the mystery is the king of the tank.

i added a royal gramma just last week and she is doing fine - no harrassement whats so ever.

if anything - my two cardinals always charge at eachother. Will probably get rid of them if i can catch them.

[Proteus]

Thanks everyone I think I'll steer clear of the hogfish.

I got rid of a sohal for the same aggressiveness even though for a year he was great. Rather not loose what's in the tank