Tomato sweeping sand bed below nem?

[psykokid]

I've got a single mature (5yr old) tomato clown that has been solo in the tank forever. Lately its been going down and sweeping out the sand with its tail creating a depression in the sand? Is this a breeding behaviour? Thinking about going and picking up the smallest juvi I can find and see what happens.. Also contemplating putting a couple of tiles down there just to keep it from making a huge mess, breeding behavior or not.. I've got a colony of zoa's that i've had to un-bury 3 or 4 times now..

 

[graveyardworm]

Its pretty typical behavior. I'm not entirely sure if its necessarily a breeding behavior or not, but does make sense to clean an area to lay eggs if a nearby clean spot isnt available.

 

[reefstew]

My breeding tomato has the oraganite moved down to the glass in front of it's breeding pot.

 

[davocean]

Yep, typical of most clowns.
My best guess is it's grooming the area around it on instinct, possibly for egg laying.
You can try to put tile down, but IME you'll have better luck moving things away from her.
Anything I put next to my maroons nem got moved, head butted, broken.
They are pretty stubborn when it comes to their territory.

 

[psykokid]

lol, unfortunately its not just stuff near her, its anything five to eight inches to either side gets sprayed with sand.

 

[Slickcg33]

lol, unfortunately its not just stuff near her, its anything five to eight inches to either side gets sprayed with sand.

this is the most irritating thing my clowns do. I think they are trying to kill their LTA by digging up the sand around it. Such a pain in the *** to try to keep enough sand for the lta to be happy in my tank. i have to put different small rocks around the anemone base so they dont unearth it....

 

[RockinSmall]

i have a single clark and she does this to the welsophylia i have.....

 

[wakeboardgeek]

this is the most irritating thing my clowns do. I think they are trying to kill their LTA by digging up the sand around it. Such a pain in the *** to try to keep enough sand for the lta to be happy in my tank. i have to put different small rocks around the anemone base so they dont unearth it....

my female does the same thing. right now the LTA's base is exposed and you can see the bottom of the tank. i've come to the point where i'm just gonna leave it and just continue blowing off the rocks every couple of days (to make sure no sand is on the rocks/corals).

 

[Slickcg33]

my female does the same thing. right now the LTA's base is exposed and you can see the bottom of the tank. i've come to the point where i'm just gonna leave it and just continue blowing off the rocks every couple of days (to make sure no sand is on the rocks/corals).

my small rock aproach around the perimeter of the anemone is working well. ive had to toy with it a couple times as the male clown seems to always find a small spot he can fit into and get some sand out. While the anemone is expanded i have no problems, its when it shrinks some at night that sometimes i have to rework my rockwork around the nem.

 

[wakeboardgeek]

my small rock aproach around the perimeter of the anemone is working well. ive had to toy with it a couple times as the male clown seems to always find a small spot he can fit into and get some sand out. While the anemone is expanded i have no problems, its when it shrinks some at night that sometimes i have to rework my rockwork around the nem.

i might try that. at one point i tried moving the nem around some rocks but it wasn't completey surrounded. i just really hate messing with the rock. thanks for the idea.

 

[DeathWish302]

I only ever have kept clowns (except for that annoying yellow tail damsel). Every species, except the skunk has dug in the sand. I currently have a tomato that has dug a pit to the bottom glass in my 2-3" sand bed in my reef. It happens often enough that the really fine sand is accumulating in the sump. I'm not annoyed with it, as the sand quickly settles. If anything, the females sandbed grooming has reduced hydrogen sulfide build-up in a majority of the bed. I do not think this is necessarily a 'nesting' reaction, but more of a house-cleaning chore. My tomato female doesn't have just one grooming spot, but both back corners of the tank and her rock cave. JME with my clowns.

 

[psykokid]

So a little update, the day I originally created this thread i said wth and went out and got the smallest juvi tomato i could find.

The pairing went well, I put the little guy in and the established clown went over and checked it out, swam away and paid it no mind. So about 15-20 min after adding the new clown it discovered the nem and went right in. The established clown seemed kind of miffed for a moment, and the lil one went and hid in the rockwork behind the nem for about 10 min. After the new one came out the established one was indifferent and they were sharing the nem no problems.

The last week or so i'd seen the clowns grooming the rock behind the nem, cleaning off any coraline and getting any crap out of the way. I come home yesterday in the morning and look at the spot behind the nem they had been grooming, at first i thought it was some sort of odd algae then i looked closer and:

first clutch of eggs.. Not bad for 2.5 weeks