Bartlet Anthia Agression

peiloy3196

peiloy3196

New member
So I have a trio of Bartlets in my 225G. The male normally keeps the females in check as expected but he does not bother any other fish. This weekend I added two Lyretail Anthia and a bluesided wrasse from quarantine to the DT. Since they have been added the male Bartlet has been attacking the new Anthias and also the wrasse. He as even gone as far as to chasing my Flame Hawkfish that has been in the DT with him all along. It seems that he just paces the tank looking for fish to bully now. So my question is:

1) Will this behavior subside?
2) If not should I remove him and then reintroduce him in a couple of weeks or should I just banish him from the reef all together?
 
It is covered. I am sure my wrasse would be out by now if it wasn't! Do you think that I should just find a new home for him or re introduce in a couple of weeks?
 
I'm no expert by any means, but reintroduction seems to work well a lot of times with normally well behaved fish who start picking on a newbie.
 
It is not unusual to see aggression towards newly introduced fish, regardless of species. In fact, I'd suggest that it is the rule rather than the exception. Vast majority of it subsides after a few days, and with fish that have been 'conditioned' is likely to not be a long term problem. If it persists beyond a few days to a week, and/or the new fish are hiding constantly, then intervention may be required.

That your new fish were introduced within the last day or so; I'd just wait and see what happens this week. I doubt you will have any long-term issues with the anthias (Lyretails are aggressive little buggers too), though the wrasse may be more problematic. I'm not a wrasse expert (other than leopards) as I do not find them to do particularly well in my flavor of community tank.
 
Ok. Ill give it to the end of the week for sure. The wrasse doesn't seem to mind the chasing as he comes right back out. The new anthias were confined to a corner of the tank for the last couple of days, but today the male keeps roaming the tank even though he keeps getting chased back into the corner.
 
I don't have a ton of experience but I do have 3 Bartletts and 3 lyretails together in a 180. I added them at the same time. My Bartletts seem more aggressive than my lyretails but they seem to be doing ok together. I started with two females and one male Bartletts. I'm pretty sure one of my females has become a male.

As suggested above, I'd first try to give it a little more time if nobody is getting beat up too badly. Plan B might be removing the offending Bartletts for a short period. I wouldn't keep him out too long though as I would imagine that the remaining two Bartletts will, in short order, establish an dominant/submissive relationship and, when the male is reintroduced, he may now be competing with the new dominant Bartletts. I'd probably try to limit any removal to a week to ten days.

Good luck.

Matt
 
When I had my bartlettes the male was pretty mean to all the females... though never to other. But it was so aggressive and such a "control freak" it protected its harem behind the rock so I didn't have the full pleasure to enjoy them all swim out. Personally I'd not go with Bartlett's again for my next set of anthias
 
So after a week he is still aggressive. He does not hurt any fish just chases them around. He does keep the lyretail's pinned to one corner of the tank though so they never get swim the tank. I am going to put him in time out for a bit to see if it will settle. I have a "Peacemaker" acrylic box from Melev that hangs in the tank. Should I put him in there for a week or should I remove him from the system for a week? My fear in removing him is that one of the females starts to turn male.
 
Similar, but my Bartlett is more aggressive. He keeps the Lyretails pinned to the back corner. If he sees them coming out at all he charges them.
 
peiloy3196 said:
Similar, but my Bartlett is more aggressive. He keeps the Lyretails pinned to the back corner. If he sees them coming out at all he charges them.
Click to expand...

Yeah that's mostly what mine does so far. But my bartletts is only aggressive toward the larger of the lyretails.

I wonder if it's possible that it's a male/female thing and maybe our bartletts are just looking to 'mate'?
 
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