lyretail anthias streamer question

[kaiboshi]

I have a quartet of maldives lyretail anthias that I picked up from DD. I'm a bit confused about my male. After about two months it's streamer (3rd dorsal ray, whatever you want to call it) all of the sudden disappeared. I feed frozen food multiple times a day, usually mysis and spirulina brine but sometimes I feed flake and pellets (my anthias don't touch the pellets). My water quality is perfect according to my tests. All of my anthias are fat and growing, in fact the male's tail is getting fancier by the minute but the darn streamer isn't coming back very fast (if at all).

I talked to one of my LFS guys and he suggested nipping from other inhabitants. The only other fish I had in my 125 with the anthias when he lost his streamer were a sailfin tang (desjardini, 4") and a black cap basslet. I have never seen any outright major agression in my tank but there is a little bit of territoriality display from the basslet to the anthias quartet.

What do you guys think would cause the shortening of the streamer: agression, nutrition, water quality or something else?

 

[SDguy]

Mine lost it in a vortech once. Assuming he is in fact the dominant anthias of the group, no worries, it'll grow back.

 

[ROBONE20]

I also have a quartet of Maldives Lyretail Anthias, too. They were all females at the time when I put them through quarantine for a month. When I transferred them to my DT, they were still establishing their hierarchy. I noticed during this time all of them had nipped fins and chunks taken off of them. At first I thought it was my Midas Blenny, which could have been, but as time progressed I noticed the Anthias chasing each other. The bigger Anthias ended up chewing off the top fin of one of the other anthias and I think ended being the dominant male. His streamer (dorsal fin) grew longer and all the other anthias' fins regenerated. I kept feeding Mysis and Spirulina Brine soaked in Vita-Chem, which probably helped. Then they transistioned to pellets, which is 90% of their diet now. Long story short - the fins will grow back.