10 flame wrasses in a tank?

[reefjunkie42]

is this a good idea in a 200 gal tank?

 

[reefjunkie42]

don't look comment

 

[snorvich]

In my opinion, it is not a good idea. The males will likely fight, the females will almost for sure fight as battle for hierarchal position occurs.

 

[dixiedog]

don't look comment

Best not to encourage people to comment who have no knowledge or experience on the subject whatsoever. You get guys like me who pipe up and waste bandwidth while contributing absolutely nothing to the thread. :spin2:

 

[NyReefNoob]

i would say no, reason being is out of the 10 say you do start with 1 true supermale and the rest straight females, not sub-males, the females will start to turn into sub-males on some and others may not turn, eventually leading to alot of chasing and harrassing, friend had 6 i think in his 450g and there is only 2 true females left out of the origanal 5 females, personally i had 1 true super male and 3 females\sub's and 2 turned quickly into sub-males and then the chasing began and i pulled 2 of the sub's and left the only true female, Granted the flames are one of the more docile of wrasse's they can be mean. mine has harrassed a couple pretty badly { namely rhomb }

 

[reefjunkie42]

all female.

 

[AuroraDrvr]

all female.

Still not going to work. They'll change sex and fight..

 

[snorvich]

Still not going to work. They'll change sex and fight..

they will fight even before changing sex. Female fairies are very aggressive.

 

[reefjunkie42]

Damn well I'm at odds with what to do now. What size harem is acceptable to keep in a 200 gallon reef.

 

[snorvich]

Damn well I'm at odds with what to do now. What size harem is acceptable to keep in a 200 gallon reef.

Tank size is not the limiting factor. What I would do is get 1 male, and three females of different sizes for best results.

 

[SDguy]

I had 4 in a 150. They all chnaged to male or sub male eventually. I still have 3. And they are pretty big fish...they take up lots of biological room in the tank. 10 in a 200 mwould be WAYYYYY too many.

 

[reefjunkie42]

what do you think about 5?

 

[SDguy]

Do you like flame wrasses that much? My whole thing with multiples like that is... do you like the fish that much....so much so that you'd rather have multiples of the same fish over different species...

 

[reefjunkie42]

well it comes down to i was going to go with lyretail anthias and decided to go with flames instead. Id like the movement they will provide. I have 2 pylei, 2 puchacaus ,2 carpeted, 1 red fin, and a luddocks in there currently.

 

[reefjunkie42]

i do like the idea of having a male a submale and females though. I mean worst comes to worst i get rid of a few? Im just trying to figure out how to orchestrate the best environment I don't want to cause harm to the fish

 

[albano]

...friend had 6 i think in his 450g and there is only 2 true females left out of the original 5 females...

I'm the friend...actually started with 2 males and 3 females, within the past year, I now have 4 & 1/2 males. There are almost 30 wrasses, total in the tank (out of 70 fish)...but the flames bother NO ONE! Among the wrasse population are 3 much 'smaller' Vanuatu hooded wrasses, and the flames don't even look at them.

 

[SDguy]

Just to clarify, I wasn't trying to say that by turning male they caused problems... I just wasn't interested in having 3-4 male flame wrasses in my tank, that's all

 

[reefjunkie42]

oh yea that makes perfect sense. From all vie read it seems they should get along. i agree 10 is overkill, but it would be sweet! I also have the option of keeping them in a 40 breeder for awhile unti one changes to male. what do you think about that?