Cleaner Wrasse and Large Fish

Cu455

New member
Has anyone put a cleaner wrasse in with larger fish? How did it turn out?

I have a cleaner wrasse ready to be released into my tank. The tank has a ~7in panther grouper, ~5 in minius grouper, ~7 in New Gunea puffer and a 12 in coral catshark. I don't want to add him if he will become food.
 
Cleaner Wrasse and Large Fish

Has anyone put a cleaner wrasse in with larger fish? How did it turn out?



I have a cleaner wrasse ready to be released into my tank. The tank has a ~7in panther grouper, ~5 in minius grouper, ~7 in New Gunea puffer and a 12 in coral catshark. I don't want to add him if he will become food.


Release the cleaner wrasse at night, then it should be fine unless your big predator fish aren't fed well. I've had a cleaner wrasse with an 8" black Hawaiian trigger for years without problem. I also once had a clearer wrasse picking on a large porcupine puffer so much that I had to separate the two.
 
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It should be fine but to add a cleaner wrasse i would put a couple more fish in the tank because they tend to starve to death after a few months. The required amount of fish for a cleaner is 10 average size fish.
 
It should be fine but to add a cleaner wrasse i would put a couple more fish in the tank because they tend to starve to death after a few months. The required amount of fish for a cleaner is 10 average size fish.

Where did you get his info? Cleaner wrasses need food that you give to them to survive, not a set number of fish. They will never survive on cleaning fish only, no matter the size tank or number of fish.
 
Where did you get his info? Cleaner wrasses need food that you give to them to survive, not a set number of fish. They will never survive on cleaning fish only, no matter the size tank or number of fish.

I agree, IMO cleaners are one of those fish better left in the ocean due to survival rates.
 
I do not know about the ORA ones. But they have a very specific diet and as a result their survival rate is pretty dismal.
 
The only problem I ever had with regular blue cleaner wrasses is sometimes jumping out of tank. The ones I kept were always hearty and aside from cleaning fish ate regular fish food. The only one that it would be "responsible" to avoid IMO is the Hawaiian cleaner wrasse which is much more colorful and harder to keep. That fish I could not get to survive. I probably had two in the past 20+ years and probably would not buy another.
 
I just had one harrass my stock to the point that they got sick and wiped out :(
Never again would I risk a CW. Cleaner shrimp are much safer. The Wrasses also ate frozen but continually pecked at the others.
 
your fish will not eat the cleaner wrasse.

cleaner wrasse itself ... if you are lucky and it eats, then it will last forever. if not then ..
 
your fish will not eat the cleaner wrasse.

cleaner wrasse itself ... if you are lucky and it eats, then it will last forever. if not then ..


I thought the same and once dropped a cleaner wrasse into an aggressive tank during day time. Well it looks like silver side that I fed them so I couldn't blame them to go after it. I learned from that exp to always introduce new fish at night.
 
I thought the same and once dropped a cleaner wrasse into an aggressive tank during day time. Well it looks like silver side that I fed them so I couldn't blame them to go after it. I learned from that exp to always introduce new fish at night.

it doesnt look like silver side fish. the blue and white marking, tells other fish its there for cleaning.

but of course, dropping anything in front of aggressive fish, in the same manner that food is presented, would make them think food at first ... always have to take time introducing a new fish ... that goes without saying.
 
I think these (the cleaner wrasses) are fish best left in the ocean. They provide such an important service. I have a tank bred neon goby that rides around on my BT Tang and this is a much better solution to the desire of watching cleaning behavior. Large fish seem to know not to eat these cleaners too.

If you doubt how important cleaner wrasses are, check out my recent video in the Scuba/Snorkel section here on Reef Central.
 
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