Yellow Stripped Maroon Unusual Behavior

[SumpDiver]

I have a Maroon Clown who is acting a bit strange: I introduced this fish with two others, a Midas Blenny, and a Coral Beauty at the same time into a new tank. A Forty-seven gallon, one month old tank with 30 pounds of live rock and 20 pounds of live sand. All water parameters are perfect, 79 degrees. Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢m using a CPR, Bak-Pac skimmer with one big powerhead. The three fish were doing well from the beginning; each immediately found their own spot in three different corners of the tank right away. However, last week I added a new piece of live rock, a 10 pound piece of three year old Marshall Island rock from an established reef system at my LFS. I had to slightly rearrange some rock to make room for the new piece. The Blenny and CB adapted right away each finding new caves, but every since changing the rockwork, the Clown has been swimming around the surface hiding behind the bubbles of the skimmer outlet. He is eating well, has no apparent signs of sickness or stress, but simply wants to swim close to the surface hiding in the bubbles. He swims so close to the top his dorsal fin comes out of the water. The only time he dives down is to retrieve a piece of food. Does this sound like a sick fish to anyone?

Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢m thinking about getting a Blue Tip Anemone for him, but the tank is too new for inverts at this time, perhaps a mate, but I understand an established Maroon can be aggressive to other Clowns introduced later.

Although this is basically a FOWLR tank for now, Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢ve had pretty good luck keeping some Mushroom corals alive that hitchhiked in on the live rock I was wondering if Clown fish ever host in anything like Ricordia Mushroom Polyps shown here.

http://www.saltwaterfish.com/site_1...ategory=4&category_search=62&root_parent_id=4

Iââ"šÂ¬Ã¢"žÂ¢ve read these corals are easy to keep and to me this looks like something my surface dwelling Clown might find a home in until the tank is established well enough for a BTA.


Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[dantodd]

Clowns will host anything, powerheads, mushrooms, soft corals and anemones. My pink skunks are currently hosting some hairy mushrooms.

 

[SumpDiver]

Thanks Dan:

Mine seems to have adopted the Skimmer outlet as his new home. I guess that is fine, it's just kind of hard to keep an eye on him up there and it is pretty close to the intake of my power head and skimmer. I'm looking for some of the filter cloth Karen mentions in her RBTA piece. May also try the Shroom coral maybe he will prefer it over the Skimmer outlet.

 

[TOURKID]

when i first added my maroon, she immediately went to the top of a powerhead, close to the top of the tank, would barely leave the spot, and slept there too. I related it to the fact they she was tank bred and hadent seem much else besides a powerhead.

she'd never go NEAR a piece of rock.

I added a bta awhile later, and she left her powerhead buddy within minutes and shes been hosting the bta ever since. she still wont explore the tank much, only when the bta moved she went back to the old spot to see if there was another one.

very cool fish. very agressive fish.

 

[SumpDiver]

You guys are making me feel better. I was sure I had a sick fish on my hands. Come to think of it, when I bought this fish (Little Elvis) from a LFS he was hiding behind a bubbling outlet there also at the top of an empty holding tank. Makes sense. Guess I'll have to find him an anemone that blows bubbles.

 

[SumpDiver]

Tourkid:

You're right. My Maroon is now sleeping right by the powerhead, won't budge for anything short of food but then goes right back. Last night right before the lights went out I felt sorry for him struggling against the current so I turned the powerhead off for the night and it looked like he relaxed some. This morning when the lights came on at the first feeding he left the powerhead and swam down to the rock cave where he used to reside. But after getting a full belly he went right back to his bubbling hide out. I turned the powerhead back on, guess there is no sense depriving the others a nice current just so he can have it easy.

 

[TOURKID]

lol yeah, i worried she wasent getting any rest because she was sleeping vertaclly head faceing top.

donno how old your tank is, but I should not have bought an anemone when i did. I dident have a stable enough tank, and still dident know what I was doing so my bta was quite uncomfortable at times. maroon sure wasent though!!

I learned mostly everything thru here and the bta is doing good. but Id have been better off getting it maybe next month instead of 2 months ago

 

[stykthyn]

sounds like hosting, as long as it is eating you should be fine