Cleaner shrimp attacking my Clownfish

[Cheebs]

Hello,
I've got a tank thats a few weeks old, 75 gallons, about 90 lbs of live rock, some zoos, xenia, mushrooms, bunch of crabs and snails, etc.. Anyways a week and a half or so ago I introduce a maroon clownfish, which is seems to be loving the tank, swimming everywhere in the current and whatnot. He's around 2 1/2 - 3 inches.

About 3-4 days ago I added a cleaner shrimp which seems to like the conditions as well, he was even eating mysis out of my hand. Last night I noticed a little chunk of the clown's top fin missing, but thought nothing of it because it was so small. Today when I go home I caught my cleaner shrimp and maroon clownfish going at it pretty bad it seems, I only saw it for a second, but now the clowns fins have a few good chunk missing. He doesn't seem to be in any discomfort, but it looks pretty messy. Is this normal behavior? If not, how can I stop it? I seem to be feeding them plenty of food. Also, will the torn parts of the fins grow back?

Thank you,

Cheebs.

 

[SuperNerd]

The cleaner shrimp could be trying to pick off the infected flesh, not attacking the clown. :lol: The clown probably just doesn't like it. The clown also could have had an infection coming before you bought it and the infection wasn't evident/symptomatic until now.

 

[Haddonisreef]

Put the shrimp in the corner ahd tell him to stop picking on th e clown!
The shrimp is just doing its job!

 

[Lance M.]

I'd be more worried about the maroon killing the cleaner shrimp.

I don't know what to say about the piece of the fin missing. Is it possible you just didn't notice it until now? The cleaner shrimp would be trying to get infected skin just like everyone else has said.

 

[Cheebs]

By piece of the fins missing I eman big chunks, somehting I notice geting worse every day. I can understand that the shrimp is doing it's job, maybe there was an infection, but all of his fins now are chopped up around the edges, they used to be untouched. Anyways I guess I'll wait it out and see what hapens

thanks!

 

[Haddonisreef]

thers some type of disease that causes fin rot! Look in to it if you want to save the fish!

 

[RainbowTurtle]

I disagree

I disagree

I have a cleaner shrimp attacking my clowns too and my clowns are too young to be aggressive. They are about an inch long (one slightly larger than the other). The shrimp, on the other hand, is over two inches long and is actively going after the clowns. It is certainly not trying to clean them. I think they are typically not aggressive but they are all a bit different. The cleaner shrimps acts different with me. He will climb on me, eat out of my hand and clean my glove, but with the clowns it is obvious aggression. I am going to try to get a video because no one is going to believe it.

 

[pcorona]

cleaner shrimp after clown fish

cleaner shrimp after clown fish

Just because it has not been yet officially documented by the pros, does not mean that cleaner shrimp do not eat on smaller fish and clowns. I had a wrasse, and a blenny, along with a cleaner shrimp. For the first few days, all seemed well. Then one day the wrasse was no more. I thought maybe it had died all of a sudden, although it never seems ill. I assumed the crabs and the shrimp had taken care of the carcass, even though it's disappearance was a mystery. I then bought two small clown fish. The minute they were free to swim in the tank, the cleaner shrimp went after them as if they were food. After reading similar incidents on this forum, I said, "I don't think so!". I have enjoyed watching the shrimp, but I wasn't about to let it have my clowns. So, I caught the dude and bagged him to take to our pet store. Yes, I whole heartily am convinced the shrimp eat live fish.

 

[Rover88]

I have a cleaner shrimp attacking my clowns too and my clowns are too young to be aggressive. They are about an inch long (one slightly larger than the other). The shrimp, on the other hand, is over two inches long and is actively going after the clowns. It is certainly not trying to clean them. I think they are typically not aggressive but they are all a bit different. The cleaner shrimps acts different with me. He will climb on me, eat out of my hand and clean my glove, but with the clowns it is obvious aggression. I am going to try to get a video because no one is going to believe it.

I would be super interested in seeing a video of this!

 

[RainbowTurtle]

I ended up rehoming the shrimp, but I think I know what was going on. My clowns had ick. So they were sick. I rehomed my shrimp to a hospital tank and then a new owner after I found soneone to agree to take him from an ick tank. Then I used the tank swapping method to eliminate the ick from the fish in the lowest stress possible by breaking the cycle of the ick. Then I removed all of the sand fron the bottom of ny display tank. I am now a huge bare bottom tank fan. I never had ick again. It has been years since that post. Clowns are doing great. I steer clear of shrimp because they take foos from my coral... will take it right out of their mouths, so I decided against it. Coral are challanging enough to feed without that kind of "help". I stick to non-agressive snails and my sea urchin.

 

[RainbowTurtle]

I ended up rehoming the shrimp, but I think I know what was going on. My clowns had ick. So they were sick. I rehomed my shrimp to a hospital tank and then a new owner after I found someone to agree to take him from an ick tank. Then I used the tank swapping method to eliminate the ick from the fish in the lowest stress possible by breaking the cycle of the ick. Then I removed all of the sand fron the bottom of ny display tank. I am now a huge bare bottom tank fan. I never had ick again. It has been years since that post. Clowns are doing great. I steer clear of shrimp because they take foos from my coral... will take it right out of their mouths, so I decided against it. Coral are challanging enough to feed without that kind of "help". I stick to non-agressive snails and my sea urchin.

 

[jd371]

Cleaner shrimp aren't hunters they're scavengers, be it parasites on the fish or uneaten food. Most likely the Cleaner was very enthusiastic at trying to clean the fish. I had a Flasher Wrasse that I thought was being aggressive towards my other fish but soon realised that what looked like to be aggression was actually flashing.