40 gallon saltwater fish suggestions

[Luke76]

Hi everyone I'm about to put some fish into my new tank and I was wondering if the people who have been in the hobby for a while verify my list. I know it might be to much fish but I'm just throwing ideas around
2 ocellaris clownfish
1 fire fish
1 Royal gramma
1 purple striped dottyback
1 Fiji puffer
1 black ice ocellaris
1 single dot domino clown
Thanks for any feedback

 

[kfisc]

Hello and welcome! It really is too many- a mated pair of clownfish (i.e. you saw them hanging around quite well in the LFS's tank) and maybe one or two others would be plenty. Please take a look at the "stickies," the locked threads at the top of this page, to really get a good idea of stocking capacity. A 40g is about right for maybe three or four peaceful, small fish.

 

[Luke76]

Hello and welcome! It really is too many- a mated pair of clownfish (i.e. you saw them hanging around quite well in the LFS's tank) and maybe one or two others would be plenty. Please take a look at the "stickies," the locked threads at the top of this page, to really get a good idea of stocking capacity. A 40g is about right for maybe three or four peaceful, small fish.

Thank you so much for the response I knew it would be to much. My LFS has a clownfish pair that I think I'm going to buy. I think I'll buy the Royal gramma and fiji puffer. Would that be a reasonable number of fish?

 

[thegrun]

Keep two clowns at the absolute most, if you add more they will eventually fight to the death. I would not advise keeping more than six fish in your tank, four or five would be better.

 

[powderblue1]

engineer gobies (4), bullet goby, a couple of ocellaris (2), cleaner wrasse, and cardinals (2). First though you need 1 or 2 sand stars, a bunch of blue legged hermits (50), emerald crabs (2) and mexican turbo snails (4). Happy Reefing and Merry Christmas!

 

[jrr98002]

Your biggest problem with your list is that the different clownfish will almost certainly fight. You could get away with the ocellaris clown pair, but that is it. As mentioned, 4-5 fish is a healthy number to consider.

engineer gobies (4), bullet goby, a couple of ocellaris (2), cleaner wrasse, and cardinals (2). First though you need 1 or 2 sand stars, a bunch of blue legged hermits (50), emerald crabs (2) and mexican turbo snails (4). Happy Reefing and Merry Christmas!

Several things about this post. I'd steer clear of cleaner wrasses in general, as they have a notoriously high fatality rate in general, as most are, well, cleaners (mostly parasites). Also, do not START with sand-sifting starfish, and to be honest I'd frown upon any in that size tank to begin with. They need to consume a lot of detritus and uneaten food to survive, and one, let alone two, will surely starve, especially if introduced first off. Also, there is some debate on the reef-compatability of emerald crabs. I've personally had a couple nip at coral before; not enough to cause serious harm, but enough to notice. There's a nice picture of an emerald nipping at coral here buried somewhere here in a thread on RC.

 

[heathlindner25]

In my 40 breeder I have a sunburst anthias, barbershop goby, Blue Star leopard wrasse, black spotted Leopard wrasse, twistii wrasse, 3 red fire fish, and the psychedelic Mandarin... oh yeah and a dusky wrasse..lol. so anything is possible
Just for the record all four wrasse swim around in a pack like sharks...lol

 

[jrr98002]

In my 40 breeder I have a sunburst anthias, barbershop goby, Blue Star leopard wrasse, black spotted Leopard wrasse, twistii wrasse, 3 red fire fish, and the psychedelic Mandarin... oh yeah and a dusky wrasse..lol. so anything is possible
Just for the record all four wrasse swim around in a pack like sharks...lol

With a dragonet in that small of a tank, I hope you have an extremely well-stocked refugium on that system or are supplementing pods like crazy, and top-notch filtration. That's a hefty bioload for a 40.

 

[heathlindner25]

With a dragonet in that small of a tank, I hope you have an extremely well-stocked refugium on that system or are supplementing pods like crazy, and top-notch filtration. That's a hefty bioload for a 40.

He can barely swin around he's so fat... He needs to go on a diet, but thank you for caring...btw, no sump ,the boy eats prepared foods. I've had him over 6 years and I'm very surprised he made it over last year's three-day winter freeze out.

 

[powderblue1]

I stand behind my list. I think you are nit-picking jr. Of course you add everything slowly. To start off to me means within the span of the first couple of months. If you have live-rock and live sand and are feeding the tank (of course AFTER initial cycling procedures) then there would be little problem with a small sand star or two. The rest of your concerns aren't worth my typing. I think the reply after you shows that. I also have never known a more hardy fish than a yellow wrasse I owned for 10 years+. I drained the tank thinking he was gone. Moved the tank and then set it back up. He lived in the sand-bed!!! Merry Christmas!!!

 

[jrr98002]

It's your tank, do what you want. But having done this for over 20 years with my own tanks, plus several dozen other tanks for other people, I was just giving you advice from my experiences. If you do what you want to do with your tank and it works, good for you and I'm very glad. If it doesn't, oh well and I'm sorry you weren't more receptive.

 

[e048]

engineer gobies (4), bullet goby, a couple of ocellaris (2), cleaner wrasse, and cardinals (2). First though you need 1 or 2 sand stars, a bunch of blue legged hermits (50), emerald crabs (2) and mexican turbo snails (4). Happy Reefing and Merry Christmas!

Sorry but this list is horrible
First off engineer gobies will wreck your tank and they get big and mean, sand stars I'm assuming you mean sand sifting stars are also not a good choice for anything smaller than a 6 foot tank that's been establishes for a long time (they starve and die in small tanks) cleaner wrasse? Those guys have a horrible reputation for starving in tanks and they pester fish to death trying to clean them, not to mention the shear size of them and the fact that this tank is too small. Skip crabs go for snails, snails won't kill your fish when they run out of food

Now that that potential train wreck(stock suggestion) is dealt with like everyone else has said ditch one of the clowns, one pair per tank period unless your tank is huge 300+g, second pick either the dottyback or the gramma, dottyback will kill the grama, ditch the puffer unless you're okay with doing all the clean up yourself since puffers will eat or kill your clean up crew (snails, crabs, etc)

Good luck

 

[powderblue1]

Sorry but this list is horrible
First off engineer gobies will wreck your tank and they get big and mean, sand stars I'm assuming you mean sand sifting stars are also not a good choice for anything smaller than a 6 foot tank that's been establishes for a long time (they starve and die in small tanks) cleaner wrasse? Those guys have a horrible reputation for starving in tanks and they pester fish to death trying to clean them, not to mention the shear size of them


Wow you must be a real pro. I have had 4 sand sifters in a 55 for 3-years, never did die yet. Engineer gobies school nice and take forever to get to the size you are claiming. Finally, cleaner wrasses have a symbiotic relationship with the fish they clean and they like it.. Also they aren't big fish at all, nor do they get so (5.5" is the biggest they are ever known to grow and I have yet to see one over 3" which took years to get that big. They normally come around 1 - 1.5" or smaller). Please read a book.:jester:

 

[e048]

Sorry but this list is horrible
First off engineer gobies will wreck your tank and they get big and mean, sand stars I'm assuming you mean sand sifting stars are also not a good choice for anything smaller than a 6 foot tank that's been establishes for a long time (they starve and die in small tanks) cleaner wrasse? Those guys have a horrible reputation for starving in tanks and they pester fish to death trying to clean them, not to mention the shear size of them


Wow you must be a real pro. I have had 4 sand sifters in a 55 for 3-years, never did die yet. Engineer gobies school nice and take forever to get to the size you are claiming. Finally, cleaner wrasses have a symbiotic relationship with the fish they clean and they like it.. Also they aren't big fish at all, nor do they get so (5.5" is the biggest they are ever known to grow and I have yet to see one over 3" which took years to get that big. They normally come around 1 - 1.5" or smaller). Please read a book.:jester:

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/just-say-no-to-cleaner-wrasses


http://www.saltwatersmarts.com/sand-sifting-starfish-job-too-well-done-astropecten-4399/

http://www.*********.com/threads/any-engineer-goby-owners-here.65242/

I guess I'm the one who needs to read....

 

[WaReefer458]

I have a pair of Darwin clowns, 3 fairy wrasses, sand sifting star, 1 chromis, conch, lawnmower blenny, snails and crabs in my 40. Only got 1 mean fish in the tank and it's my mccoskers wrasse. I run a big skimmer and feed heavy but as long as you do it right you can get a pretty healthy bioload

 

[TangingOut]

Sick brag. Oh yeah, have a happy New Year.

 

[monkeysee1]

:sad2:Your 2 Ocelleris Clowns might give the Firefish a hard time! Had that happen to me once!
I have also have two ocelleris clowns (1 black, 1 orange) and they bullied the poor thing (my Firefish)!

Had to give it to my brother - he put it in his quarantine, nursed it back to health and put it in HIS Butterfly FOWLR.

 

[powderblue1]

 

[powderblue1]

Sick brag. Oh yeah, have a happy New Year.

Cowabunga Dude! It's capitalized to make a point Shakespeare. :wildone:

 

[TangingOut]

Haha, I wasn't trying to make a point. I was wishing you a happy New Year.

Do you always take a defensive point of view?