Butterflyfish

[Delphinus]

Great comments VFX. I second the notion that "too small" is not a good purchase decision, I've had the exact same experience. I also read it somewhere (think is was wetwebmedia but might be wrong) that medium sized is the best bet - too small and too large tend not to make it. I tried a pair of baby sized raccoons (around 1") and neither of them lived very long. Had a midsized raccoon for a while but he perished in a mysterious tank problem (I *think* it was a clam spawn but never did confirm it, and what's weird is I've never had fatalities following a clam spawn event before and I lost 4 or 5 in that event - O2 depletion maybe ?? Anyhow sorry getting off track here). The raccoon was an awesome little butterfly and I want to try another but I did find he was destructive to my LPS.

For that matter my old CBB was pretty destructive to small LPS - blastos, acan's, etc. - couldn't keep any of those.

What I've observed with my ulietensis (the false-falcula or double-saddlebacks) is that anything that has tentacles (eg. feeder tentacles) is irresistable to them. So things like aiptasia and majano anemones are toast instantly, whereas things that put out those tentacles only at night, like brain corals, when the fish are sleeping, will last longer but not indefinitely). They WERE ok with a larger RBTA for a few months however literally that changed overnight. I never noticed any picking at it but BAM, literally one day it disappeared and I have a pretty good idea it was the butterflies, it's not a case of it crawled into the rockwork and is hiding.

They're so dang pretty though. I really want to try a tank with the saddlebacks, an auriga and a raccoon or two and then call it done. My dream FOWLR (or BOWLR - butterflies only with live rock) tank.

Since threads are always better with pickchurs.. I took these photos on my last vacation:










Noticed a very interesting behaviour with the raccoons. They loved snorkelers and divers and would follow along. The reason being is they know that damsels with egg broods will try to chase away divers and in their distraction the butterflies will snack away at the eggs. Did get a video of this but I can't find it, I can post it later if I find where I uploaded it to...