Pipefish in a mixed reef?

[wii64brawl]

I have gotten mixed reports on this. I'm either looking to keep a banded or blue stripe in my 35 gallon mixed reef. I have a bunch of soft corals, fungia, caulastrea, euphyllia, gorgonians, one trachyphyllia, and two maxi mini anemones and one rock anemone.

I have had a multitude of fish swim through and sit on many of the anemones/LPS with no problems. The maxi minis usually retract when a fish touches them.

Some people say it will not work out, while others say it has worked for them. I can't see how any of the corals could catch it unless its sick. They are fairly agile I believe.

So anyone with actual experience? I don't want people quoting Live Aquaria or anything though... Thanks.

 

[tjdouglas]

I have a pair of banded pipefish and a pair of blue striped pipefish in my mixed reef tank and have had no problems. But I only have sps, blastos and acans.... do not have any euphylias or anemones which might be a higher threat level?

 

[Scridifer]

I have a blue stripe in with an assortment of LPS but don't have any anemones.
Seems fine.

HTH

Chris

 

[Bratyboy2]

i had the blue stripe pipes in my mixed reef and they never got near the anemones...even when they were in a 10 gallon with a large condy...they are smart fish

 

[mchud]

I have a blue stripe in my 90 mixed reef and have never had any issues. Pretty cool fish. Dont see him a lot but when it does come out it is fun to watch.

 

[mfinn]

I have a yellow multibanded pipe in my 50 gallon lps/sps tank.
It's mostly branching type lps.

I don't think I'd put a pipe in with any anemones.
I've seen pictures of half a fish sticky out of a mini maxi before.

 

[wii64brawl]

Yeah... I decided against it after seeing that one of my maxi minis decided to move around and is now sticking out in the water column, and at least 4" across.

 

[SushiGirl]

I think the bigger issue is more that they have a hard time competing for food.

 

[TamiW]

I think the bigger issue is more that they have a hard time competing for food.

Depends on what the tankmates are, but really, the flagtail pipefish mentioned above are pretty agile so competing for food usually isn't a problem. As long as you're feeding something they'd eat. I doubt they'd ever take flake, but frozen mysis, cyclop-eeze, nutramar ova are all taken greedily once they're trained to frozen food.

 

[small alien]

I think they would be okay. You won't see them much.

 

[rssjsb]

Bluestripes should be fine with your anemones and corals. Unlike some pipes, they don't really slither or sit on the substrate or on corals.

As small alien says, these fish are a little cryptic. You may see them out and swimming after lights out.

 

[SushiGirl]

Flagtails are the ones I always see in reef tanks at LFS, they're beautiful.

 

[wii64brawl]

I was also pondering a small tank for them. Would a pair of any species fare well in a tank this size? 35.4 x 8.3 x 9.4 Inch

 

[rssjsb]

Bluestripes would definitely do ok in that size tank with a decently sized fuge. Janns would probably be ok too, but I would wait until the tank is mature for either.

I've kept bluestripes in a well established 40 gallon for a long time (somewhere between and five years, I lost track). They never seemed to eat anything I put into the tank, but survived quite well with what they were able to forage. They had no competition, though.

 

[GratefulReef]

I have a banded pipefish in my mixed reef. I have a great pod population, and I also supplement with brightwell aquatics microvore, but other brands have similar foods. I have a very large rbta, and a maxi mini carpet nem and the pipefish has no issue staying far enough away. It seems to be more of a nocturnal fish, which makes sense with its feeding habits but occasionally will be seen in the day in my tank. I really like the way they swim, its almost as if theyre not even moving their body.

 

[small alien]

My orange multiband is out much more than my banded or bluestripe.

 

[pledosophy]

IME the anemone would be the problem.

Feeding them is not hard, they do well competing for food, but they also compete for food and something in the nems mouth just looks like food, and then the pipefish is food.

JME

Blasto's, Acans, etc, have different types of feeding methods that are fine with pipes or seahorses IME.

JME

 

[small alien]

I've had many pipes and have never seen one go near an anemone. In my opinion, when people find a fish in an anemones mouth, often the fish was dead or dying first.

 

[mfinn]

I've had many pipes and have never seen one go near an anemone. In my opinion, when people find a fish in an anemones mouth, often the fish was dead or dying first.

I've seen two different pictures of supposed heathy fish in a maxi mini.
One was in my area and it was a picasso clown. The other was also a clown.


I have my yellow multibanded in my branching lps and monti sps tank.
The pipefish does nothing but hunt all day, getting sooo close to the corals.
I would not have it in this tank if I had a maxi mini collection like some do.


Before I bought the pipefish, I asked the question about keeping a pipefish around branching lps and I did get alot of warnings., and that so far hasn't been a problem.

 

[small alien]

Sounds like reasonable caution to me. I've not had problems.