Hippo terrorizing new Potters Angel

[meskin]

My 90 gallon has been running (mostly) smoothly and peacefully for about a year. Inhabitants, sot of which have been in the tank for over 9 months, include 1 Hippo & 1 yellow tang, 2 percs, 1 mandarin, 1 pink spotted watchman goby and 1 coral beauty, plus a few shrimp, snails, etc. The Coral beauty died a few weeks ago, and yesterday I replaced it with a small (less than 2 inch) Potters Angel. Beautiful fish. The problem is that my hippo (about 3-4 inches) is now furiously chasing it in, around and through every square inch of rock. It bites at the Potters when it can catch up with it, and aggressively lashes its tail/scalpel around when it can back itself into a crevice where the Potters is hiding.

Before this, the only real aggression the hippo had shown was occasionally nipping at the back fins of the yellow tang (not unusual to see multiple small bite marks out of the back on the yellow), but mostly they leave each other alone.

I guess what I need to know, since catching either of the Potters or the hippo in all the rockwork will be flatly impossible, is if there's anything I can do to reduce the fighting. I've tried to distract the hippo with some live brine shrimp (works for about 10 minutes), and keeping the lights on low, but other than that, every time he sees the Potter around a rock, he chases it madly. I'm worried this will result in either a very stressed Potters, or a very dead one.

Thoughts? Thanks.

 

[Zaita]

Take the potters out and consider yourself with a stocked tank. Otherwise your going to have to remove the Hippo.

 

[LargeAngels]

Hippo tangs can be very aggressive. Not a good idea to throw an potters in right away. Potters can be tricky to begin with so throwing him into with the wolf can lead to death. Search for fish traps here on RC or try catching the fish at night when the lights are off.

I always place my potters in a seperate tank first to allow them to eat again and get their strength back. Then place them in a specimen container to see if anyone shows real aggression before releasing.

 

[Zaita]

I am with LargeAngels. Hippos will rule the tank, and all decisions must be approved by them

 

[Sabre38]

True... true... take the potters out and send it to me Actually that sucks, im sorry

I always recomend the night fishing technique. Take out the tang. Place him in a friends tank or qt or anywhere untill the potters is established and thinks hes in charge, this could be a while (days, weeks) and might not work if your yellow tang is mean as well. Then at night reintroduce the tang, when they wake up hope for the best.

Ive done this a bunch of times for friends who just had to have a certain fish b4 their time line allowed them or a death and it works 50/50. It wouldnt hurt to rearange the rockwork while the tang is missing.

 

[meskin]

Thanks for the replies. Since there's no way I could ever catch either of the fish, I moved the rockwork around slightly, and while the hippo still darts after the potter periodically, things seem to have calmed down considerably. The potter is swimming a bit more in the open areas of the tank (still not eating much), and the hippo seems less focused on him at the moment. Hopefully, things will continue to settle down and everyone will get into a new rhythm...

M

 

[beetlenut33]

Good luck with your potter's. I had that fish and it died about a month latter due to ich. However, it was a really great fish!