New clown taking time acclimating to new tank

[Midnightbreeze]

I have a 12 gallon nanocube with a yellowtail damsel and an occelaris (spelling) clown. The clown is actually pretty big, maybe more than 1.5 inches. The damsel is half that. The damsel was put in about two weeks ago and is well established. I put the clown in a few days ago and it mostly just swims along the upper back wall. It gets picked on pretty much constantly by the the damsel, even though the damsel is half its size. Do clowns generally take more time to get used to a tank? I kinda wished I had a 24 gallon at this point, and I may get one eventually. Those two are definitely a max biolode. Anyways, what about the clown? Do they usually take time to settle in? I'd hate to take the clown back but I would if I had to. I would probably get a small domino damsel and let those two fight it out to a stalemate. The clowns don't seem to fight other species (but I could be wrong, I'm just a novice). Thanks.
-Tom

 

[reefman13]

Quite honestly, if what is going on, is as you described, you are going to need to take one to the two back. The damsel will (and is) cause(ing) stress for the clown, which 9 times out of 10, will lead to some kind of sickness.

If I had to choose, I would take the damsel back, firstly because they are aggressive little buggers, and at this point that one has established a territory in your NC and it will almost impossible for another similarly sized fish to compete for its own space.

HTH.

 

[Midnightbreeze]

If I don't hear any objections, I will take the damsel back tomorrow afternoon, as soon as I can catch it that is. Great fish, but yeah, too aggressive. And the yellowtail is supposed to be the more tamer of the damsels. Heh.
-Tom

 

[reefman13]

Actually, I had figured (from the books and online resources) that yellow tails are the more aggressive ones. But I am sure that was something that your LFS guy told you

But, yeah, the clown will be much happier. Another thing, is when you are trying to catch the damsel, try to catch the clown and put him/her in a separate container that way you cause the lowest amount of stress to the clown when taking the damsel out. This would also would be a good time to do some re-aquascaping, which will also give the impression to the clown that it is in a new tank and it doesn't have to worry about the damsel trying to beat her up.

 

[Midnightbreeze]

Great idea, thanks!
-Tom