Trying to establish dominance or fighting?

[redwingrob40]

Was hoping that the clownfish experts could chime in with some advice about my two percs. Last week the bigger was in the RBTA and would chase the smaller around the tank, now this week the smaller has taken residence in the nem and not letting the bigger one in the nem????? They are kinda fighting, no lip locking I have seen, but they go after each other pretty good, then one or both will do the seizure dance. So my question is is this jockying for dominance or are do they need to be separated? I am attaching a video of their behavior.

Thanks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdnm5j1PbWM

 

[Tmoriarty]

I wouldn't worry to much about it now as long as you can't see to much visible damage to the fish. They look to be battling out for dominance despite one looks quite a bit larger then the other. Did you aquire these clowns at different times?

How long have they been together? From the looks of it they both appear to be pushing for dominance which leads me to believe they are both male currently (if I knew how long you had them that would help, as long as where they were before you got them, and what other clowns if any they were with).

For now though I woulnd't seperate them unless you start to see visible fin damage.

 

[redwingrob40]

I wouldn't worry to much about it now as long as you can't see to much visible damage to the fish. They look to be battling out for dominance despite one looks quite a bit larger then the other. Did you aquire these clowns at different times?

How long have they been together? From the looks of it they both appear to be pushing for dominance which leads me to believe they are both male currently (if I knew how long you had them that would help, as long as where they were before you got them, and what other clowns if any they were with).

For now though I woulnd't seperate them unless you start to see visible fin damage.

Thanks for the reply. To answer your questions, yes they were acquired at separate times. The larger one has been in the tank for about a year and a half the smaller one was added ~ a month ago give or take. At first they wouldn't even go near one another and whenever the smaller went on the nem side of the tank the bigger would chase him off. Then the smaller started to sleep at the top of the tank above the nem, and then in the past few days the smaller has taken over the nem and the bigger one doesn't go in it anymore.

There aren't any other clownfish in the tank, and haven't been since July 2012, when the occy the picasso was with moved on. The smaller guy came from one of the LFS in a tank of maybe 4-5 others, he then spent 6 weeks in QT with a melanurus wrasse, before being added to my DT. As for fin damage I have noticed some minor tears/splits in their fins.

 

[redwingrob40]

Just out of curiosity, how long should it take for them to figure this out? And how long should I give them before making a decision to leave em be or separate? They are still going at it this morning, but they fin tears appear to be healing and it doesn't look like there is any new damage, so maybe there's light at the end of the tunnel??

 

[567234ta]

Just out of curiosity, how long should it take for them to figure this out? And how long should I give them before making a decision to leave em be or separate? They are still going at it this morning, but they fin tears appear to be healing and it doesn't look like there is any new damage, so maybe there's light at the end of the tunnel??

Anytime i have problems with matching clowns up i put them in jail so to speak.
Remove them both and put them in a 5 gallon bucket or cooler for a day with heat and waterflow of course, after that day move them into a small tank that neither have been in for about a week. put them back in the tank but make sure everything is different with landscape, change the landscape daily if they continue fighting so they have no territory to fight over. They will eventually get used to each other being thru so much together and the dominance issue will be much less. I have gotten several to pair up like this, even a yellow stripe maroon and a regular maroon.

 

[redwingrob40]

Anytime i have problems with matching clowns up i put them in jail so to speak.
Remove them both and put them in a 5 gallon bucket or cooler for a day with heat and waterflow of course, after that day move them into a small tank that neither have been in for about a week. put them back in the tank but make sure everything is different with landscape, change the landscape daily if they continue fighting so they have no territory to fight over. They will eventually get used to each other being thru so much together and the dominance issue will be much less. I have gotten several to pair up like this, even a yellow stripe maroon and a regular maroon.

Hmm, well I do have a 20 long set up as a QT that is all cycled and ready to go. Do you think it would work if I moved them over to that for a while???? Right now it has a melanurus wrasse that got banned form the DT for nipping at my clams, at least until i figure out what to do with him...

 

[567234ta]

Hmm, well I do have a 20 long set up as a QT that is all cycled and ready to go. Do you think it would work if I moved them over to that for a while???? Right now it has a melanurus wrasse that got banned form the DT for nipping at my clams, at least until i figure out what to do with him...

yeah put them in a bucket for a day first though

 

[567234ta]

it took bit to get these guys to become friends.

 

[redwingrob40]

it took bit to get these guys to become friends.

Out of curiosity, what is a while?

 

[567234ta]

a while= until they are clearly not fighting with each other. It is stressful on them to put them in a bucket, places they are unfamiliar with, but my methods are from experience. I've heard the let them fight it out on here and one will win and it will all be okay. 2 dead clowns later I had to find my own way to do it.
Be glad they aren't maroons lol, your perc guys are pretty easy, for some reason the black and whites seem the least aggressive and easiest to pair.

 

[Tmoriarty]

I would just leave them in the tank, if you havn't seen to much damage give them a couple weeks to work it out. When I added my B/W darwin to my Onyx they fought it out for a couple weeks.

If you got the small one from a tank with quite a few others more than likely he is a juvenile (unless he was the largest in the group and they were older). If that is the case then he could have made the transition to female (I don't think that is the case though).

Your larger one with how long you have had it is def a female, so give them some more time to work it out. I wouldn't re-do your rock work yet, that is if you like the way your rocks are (I know I can't redo the rocks in my 203g, they are set how they are).

 

[redwingrob40]

Thanks for the responses, for now I am going to leave them be and see what happens after a couple of weeks. Will keep an eye on them to make sure it doesn't escalate to full out lip locking. If it does I will get one of them moved.

Yeah my rocks are pretty much set too, so that isn't even a possibility, but if it gets worse I have the 20 long QT... So hopefully they will get this worked out....

 

[Tmoriarty]

If you have to you can move them both or singly a couple times. But I would definately wait a couple weeks as long as the damage isn't life endangering.

 

[redwingrob40]

I would prefer not to move them if I can, just because I know how stressful it is for them to catch them and move em. If they can work it out on their own I think that would be the best, but only time will tell. I will just keep a close eye on them for now and see what happens.... And then go from there. At least now I have pretty good idea that they are both not female, but again I guess only time will tell.

Thanks again for the advice, and wish me luck...

 

[redwingrob40]

Sorry, Double post

 

[Ssteve]

How did things play out?