well i'm glad i bought i Royal Gramma......

[Naperville Reef]

i know these fish are shy but the one in my tank hides in the rock work ALL DAY LONG. he only shows himself when he comes out to eat.

is this normal behavior or will it become more social as time passes? it has been in my tank for a few days and the other inhabitants (blue reef chromis and neon blue goby) leave it alone.

 

[eckrynock]

Mine hid all of the time as well.

 

[supersantay]

I have not had that same experience. I put one in about 2 months ago and it is all over my tank. Does not hide and eats great. Hopefully yours will warm up to the tank and come out and play more.

 

[jwblocal701]

i had mine for a few weeks now and for the first few days i never saw him once.. he still hides but also only comes out when feeding tme

to bad to they got great color would be nice tosee him more

 

[bboersma79]

mine comes out, he does hide sometimes but his home is in front of my tank so I can see him in there...I have only seen mine "roar" once but it was pretty crazy...now him and the fish he didn't like (Potters Angel) are friends.

 

[little_squid]

get another they are hermaphrodites that should bring him/her out to play

 

[carpediem360]

My royal gramma was very shy at first but, it seems to be out all the time except when I first walk up to the tank. But he'll come back out with in mins.

 

[suliaman007]

give it time, it'll start to come out more and more.

 

[ChicagoReefMan]

mine hid all the time in the same cave and he created a huge garbage pile in his cave and later i noticed a hair algae outbreak around his hole. WOW!

 

[Teremei]

I've had mine in my 125 for 4 months. It was in a 55 before that. Basically I will see it out swimming about 20% of the time. It's not an out in the open swimmer type fish. Just get used it it.

If you want swimmers get dwarf angels, wrasse, chromis, tangs (tank size notwithstanding)

 

[TheGent]

I have a similar issue with an orchid dotty back. He's so reclusive I was sure he was dead when I didn't see him for 2 weeks. I finally added a cleaner shrimp and he came out to see what was going on.

Thankfully he left the shrimp alone, and is back in his rocks to be rarely seen.

 

[joroscoe]

They are shy, but get braver over time. When I first got mine, he hid for a LONG time. Even now, he's not always out. I kind of like that about him though. I think that visitors consistently like him the best out of all my fish, and it's kind of a surprise to them when he comes out of the rock!

 

[RobChuck]

I've had my Royal Gramma for about 5 years now in several different tanks and all I can say is this is a really moody fish. Sometimes I won't see it for a month or so and then for a few weeks it will spend the days hanging out in the open guarding it's cave.

 

[ostrow]

Mine only hides to sleep at night, otherwise I see it all the time and always have. I guess mine is the outlier on the bell curve.

 

[jcm1229]

I have a royal gramma in my 37 and he's out swimming most of the time.

However, anything I try to add (unless bigger) he kills. He's also the only fish that has evaded my fish trap. I had another one when I started my reef 6+ years ago and was very docile. I guess its hot or miss in a smaller tank, but the one I have now is a real bas%&$d! Be careful if you try to add anything else.

 

[revenge53142]

i recently got one
and he is AWSOME

comes right to the glass whenever i'm near the tank
"FEED ME REVENGE!"

 

[desjardiniidj]

Had one that was out all of the time. He got very aggressive towards others already in the tank as well as the newbies. So I netted him out. Great looking fish with a curious personality. I might try another one.

 

[Naperville Reef]

thanks for all the input. for the first few days it would stay in the rocks and wait for the food to drift past him. now he at least darts out when i feed the tank and even pops his head out when i approach the tank. hopefully it becomes more social as time passes because, imo, it really is a beautiful fish.