Gaaaa!.... No More Clowns for Me!

firecrackerbob

firecrackerbob

New member
Well, its been on of those fishy weekends that makes you wonder what you've gotten yourself into...

I noticed on Friday that the surviving clown from the pair I got at the sale at TPP wasn't looking so good and was still taking a beating from the angry territorial damsel... so i decided to head back up on Sat night and take care of the return of the dead one. I picked up another clown and another damsel( i figured the angry damsel would be more interested in being territorial over the new damsel than the clowns...)
I woke up yesterday and the first clown was on deaths door and went later in the day... i decided I had had it with the old damsel and caught him to try and help out the new clown.... did a water change and moved some stuff in the tank ( more problems ensued ) but when i got everything back together, noticed that the new clown had developed a case of Ick as well... checked this morning to find him being eaten by a green emerald.... GAAAAA!!! !@$#!@ :(

I give up on clowns... I have tried to have them in the past with no luck, but this time im done... maybe if i set up a bigger tank in the future or something ill give it a go again.... from here on im sticking to damsels and Chromis...cheap and seem to do fine in my tank...

sorry, just needed to rant.... wish I knew what I was doing so wrong... Oh well

Eric
 
That sucks. Sorry you're not haveing any luck with them. Have you thought about borrowing someone's SFE for a couple days to take care of the damsels all together and set up a nice peaceful clown tank?
 
Yea, Still pretty bummed... just don't seem to have much luck with clowns on my current system. I was almost to the point of tearing everything down yesterday and starting fresh for my display tank....

everyone says clowns are easy to keep.... I dont get it though, my system is a 20L reef, parameters seem good, great coral growth, tank has been established for almost 2yrs now, good flow.....

obviously im missing something crucial about clown care though in my system... anyone with ideas please let me know..
thanks
 
Except for the last 2 clowns from TPP, I have done everything imaginable to clowns. I have: cycled a tank, Tore a tank down and threw them in, traveled to VA in a bucket and all but abused them. This last batch from TPP just had issues. They are in the same family as damsels and are almost as hardy.
Al
 
My puffer took a bite out of the back of my new tomato clown - you can still see the semi-circle chomp mark but the tomato lived and is doing fine.

But it is not being continually harrassed. Maybe the damsels are just not leaving the clowns alone and causing too much stress. Do you have an anemone for them to host in by chance?
 
i thought i was the only one. i have tried twice with pairs of tank raised ocellaris. i was under the same impression that these guys were pretty much saltwater goldfish. the first were from DFS and then from TPP. the first two had some sort of bacterial infection the other perished quickly from apparently no reason at all. i finally bought my white stripe maroon a little over a month ago and he is thriving and hosted instantly with my BTA. my 2yo still recoginizes that he is a clown and waves at him and says " hi nemo" and thats all that really matters for me.


shawn:bum:
 
i thought i was the only one. i have tried twice with pairs of tank raised ocellaris. i was under the same impression that these guys were pretty much saltwater goldfish. the first were from DFS and then from TPP. the first two had some sort of bacterial infection the other perished quickly from apparently no reason at all. i finally bought my white stripe maroon a little over a month ago and he is thriving and hosted instantly with my BTA. my 2yo still recoginizes that he is a clown and waves at him and says " hi nemo" and thats all that really matters for me.


shawn:bum:
 
wow? that is unfortunate. I too have had great luck with percs. the first pair i got from newark tropicals about 8 years ago. they were about 5 years old when that 5 day power outage 3 years ago soured my tanks. but the clowns survived that bad water . for a while after. i got another pair. really small, from newark tropicals and petco. two different batches and stores. they are over 3 years old now. getting fat. buti dont have damsels in the tank anymore. the old blue one used to harras them all the time. and same with a big royal gramma. but the first pair worked together to defend their corner of the tank. the new ones just hang out in the left corner of rocks. too. dump the damsels if you want to keep them. i guess there is not enough space for them both.
one trick to pair damsels is to buy juveniles of different sizes. one bigger than the other. the big one will be come female and the small one male. then they bond and hang out together as a pair.

I have 3 or 4 green chromis in the reef too. at times they fight over the hydnphora for hiding space. ive seen the clowns grab a chromis by the lip and drag it out of the coral and chase it away. over and over again, until it got the message. real funny. that coral was in the clown's teritory.
 
I had a clown a long long time ago. When I first got my tank and didn't know what I was doing. I think I had got it from a retail store and it survived acclimation and lived for several months till my tank crashed.

I would be willing to bet you would have much better luck with fish from Dr. Mac. And I would be shocked if anything that came from him ever had ick on it.

Jon
 
Damsels are major A holes! Mine chased everything around. Luckily my clown was big enough to hold his own. The damsels still tried to mess with him though. If my clown was smaller, he surely would have died. I bet your clown deaths have a lot to do with your damsels fighting them, TPP might also have had a bad batch. Still damsels are terrors, unless you have a tank with large angels for them to chase, then they are great!!!
 
well see what the future brings... i would still love to have a anemone with a hosting clown pair, but it just doest seem to be in the cards for the setup I currently have... I don't know if its solely my tank or if I have just had bad luck in my clowns that I have purchased.... I have had this episode with TPP; previously I have had a maroon clown and another percula pair from Newark Tropicals.... all died quickly from Ick... given the problems everyone else is having with their TPP buys I am inclined to not feel so bad... but its still frustrating!

I know how DPS feels... I was about to just tear everything down on Sunday and start from scratch... I am still considering a new setup, but that wont be for a while...

As far as the damsels go, I have definitely seen first had how obnoxious they can be! too bad too since they have some great coloring and are easy to keep... I still kick around the idea of having a damsel only tank, but I am getting mixed info on of you can have multiple types of damsels in the same tank... from what i am reading, it seems like they will even beat each other up, basically until there is only one left.... anyone else have experience with this?? would a damsel only tank with lots of damsels be a bad idea??

thanks
Eric
 
I keep the following damsels in my tank:

1 yellowtail
1 yellow back
2 sergeant majors
2 blue devils

All co-habitate nicely together and with my other fish.
 
I just picked up 2 alleni damsels at exotic yesterday, come to find out they are one of the least aggressive damsels you can check. If you can snag em' they are very nice damsels...I'm not a damsel fan but the metallic blue was calling...
 
Hey Serranid-Ill have to look for some of those! sounds good

im giving some real thought to setting up a 45 that I have in the basement and tearing down my 20L... kind of thinking it might be a damsel reef tank, but we'll see....
 
I tried and lost 2 wild caught ocellaris before I caught on that the captive raised ones are much hardier. I now have a black and white ocellaris that I have had over a year and its doing great. I have also had much better luck with mail order fish...I never buy fish from a LFS anymore.
 
Wow! mail order? really??
I haven't looked into mail order fish, but I kind of assumed that the odds of survival wouldn't be so great and it would be thought to deal with the sale if they croaked... I will have to look at that option..
thanks,
Eric
 
mail order is definitely the way to go. i buy 90% of my fish from DFS with a MUCH higher survival rate than those at the LFS. DFS also refunds any loss within the first 14 days hassle free. i have never been asked to mail back my fish....the credit or refund me promptly. the downside is the dreaded costs of shipping thats why group orders are so great.


shawn:bum:
 
I personally like saltwaterfish.com - shipping is "free" but you have to order $79 worth of live goods, but then you get the $10 fuel surcharge.

They offer the 14 day guaruntee as well. They even replaced my snails after I told them they died because the hermits ate them.
 
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