I have a maroon clownfish that eats extremely well. I feed him a solution of mysids, brine shrimp, selcon, and several other types of frozen foods about twice a day, I keep it refrigerated and just pour it into the tank. Recently he was sharing my 20 gallon reef tank with a blue devil damsel but the blue devil was returned to the LFS today. The maroon clown seems to be loosing color at the tips of his fins. They are turning clear and it looks like he is getting small brownish/red blotches on his body it is hard to see unless you carefully examine him. I got a neon goby in hopes it would eat some parasites in the tank as well as off my clownfish. I have been doing water changes and all of the normal things that are necessary to maintain a fish tank. Do the experts think this is a micro organism causing this stress or something with the tank or my feeding methods? I am thoroughly confused although the maroon does not seem to be in any immediate danger.
clownfish losing color?
- Thread starter Hades
- Start date
chrisstie
Premium Member
If it were me I would feed a little bit differently.
First I would mix my food in a small container with a tiny bit of tank water to defrost it and possibly strain out a lot of the "juice" that comes from the melting food. Unless you have a lot of corals and filter feeders to eat this it can just make your water a bit on the dirty side potentially increasing nitrates and phosphates- and potentially leading to algae problems.
I would recommend to stay away from brine as they have very little nutirional value unless they're newly hatched within a few hours. I use a product called "decap'd brine" which are eggs you can just simply add to your tank. They will either get eaten or hatch and the baby brine will be eaten. use sparingly
For the diet itself mysis shrimp is great. if you like making a little mix of food I would go with some cyclopeez and also add a little formula 2 in there (or some kind of "veggie" brand of food)
I believe clownfish are omnivores and will benefit from some greens in their diet. This will help give them any extra vitamins they aren't getting through the meaty foods.
Without a picture of what your clown looks like with its color fading it is very hard for me to tell what is wrong with the fish.
In a 20g though taking the damsel out is probably good- in a larger tank they'd probably be fine since both are technically damsels but in a tank so "small" it could have been stressing out your clown and its natural instinct to keep its own territory.
Can you get a picture of whats going on?
First I would mix my food in a small container with a tiny bit of tank water to defrost it and possibly strain out a lot of the "juice" that comes from the melting food. Unless you have a lot of corals and filter feeders to eat this it can just make your water a bit on the dirty side potentially increasing nitrates and phosphates- and potentially leading to algae problems.
I would recommend to stay away from brine as they have very little nutirional value unless they're newly hatched within a few hours. I use a product called "decap'd brine" which are eggs you can just simply add to your tank. They will either get eaten or hatch and the baby brine will be eaten. use sparingly
For the diet itself mysis shrimp is great. if you like making a little mix of food I would go with some cyclopeez and also add a little formula 2 in there (or some kind of "veggie" brand of food)
I believe clownfish are omnivores and will benefit from some greens in their diet. This will help give them any extra vitamins they aren't getting through the meaty foods.
Without a picture of what your clown looks like with its color fading it is very hard for me to tell what is wrong with the fish.
In a 20g though taking the damsel out is probably good- in a larger tank they'd probably be fine since both are technically damsels but in a tank so "small" it could have been stressing out your clown and its natural instinct to keep its own territory.
Can you get a picture of whats going on?
hahaitzmickey
New member
try feeding him something with OMEGA 3 in it. i notice before one of my maroon died it faded color . i started changing its diet to some marine flakes with omega 3 in it . in like 2 or 3 days i notice it the color got bolder and brighter.
hahaitzmickey
New member
just get any just make sure it has OMEGA 3 & 6 Hufa in it... i feed them flakes by OMEGA ONE or OMEGASEA, i hardly can feed mine pellets cause they can't even fit some of them into their mouths. u gotta break it up to lil bite size pieces for them
SNAKEMANVET
PREMIUM MEMBER
I have a maroon doing the same thing, i have feed it all kinds of flake food, and frozen this has not helped it at all. Mine started like yours is doing, now it has gotten to the point to where the fins look like they have fin rot. The blotchs will turn more white with time, on my clown it started getting what looked like small white worms sticking out around the head area.I am going to do the freshwater/ formalin dip tonight.They say this will fix the problem.
hahaitzmickey
New member
yea that might help, if you can get a picture of it. does it look like fungus or ich? kind of like this lil guy. yea snakemanvet, a formalin dip might help. call your LFS see if they got it in stock but mostly likey u might just have to order it. ask for Formalin 3
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SNAKEMANVET
PREMIUM MEMBER
I ordered it from dr foster/smith,I did the dip about an hour ago, i guess i will just wait and see any results in the next day or two.Is there a differance between formalin and formalin3.
hahaitzmickey
New member
not really. its just formalin, just a brand thats all
