Yellow Watchman Goby Pairing

[Darth_Tater]

I recently lost my Yellow Watchman Goby, who was my favorite fish. It got chased out of the tank by a newly added wrasse that hated its guts for some reason. I'll soon be removing the wrasse and covering the very tiny hole in my screen the goby somehow jumped through. I've been thinking it would be awesome to get a pair of Yellow Watchman Gobies. They're cheap and easy to find and are just plain cool! Here's the problem, my tank is pretty small (40 Breeder) so if I accidentally get two males or two females I expect bad things to happen.

I'm fairly new to marine fish and very new to the fish pairing process, but I really like the idea. I couldn't find a thread about how to create a Yellow Watchman Goby pair, but admittedly I didn't look too hard. If there is a thread, or a good resource elsewhere online, please point me to it! I have managed to pair a couple Clowns, but that's super easy and a different process.

So how do I tell the difference between males and females? If it's too hard to sex a Yellow Watchman, are there other commonly available Gobies that are easy to tell? Also, would I need to add both to the tank at the same time? The LFSs here don't really get a great variety and even something as common as Yellow Watchmans seem to only come in one at a time pretty sporadically. Will a male and a female always create a pair (given no alternatives), or are they more picky than that?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[collegereefs]

Pairing should be relatively easy. Being a goby a YWG has potential for any combination of two fish to end up as a pair. But as you said if you get two males or twother females there will likely be fighting as they try to determine who is dominant.

To increase your chances you should try to get a smaller individual and a large individual. The idea is to make it easy for the fish to determine who is dominant and who isn't and the fighting should be minimized.

Try talking to your LFS they will usually order what you want.

To my knowledge if you have a male and a female you are good to go.

 

[cougareyes]

Do you have a qt, it would be easier to pair them in quarantine and if it didn't work out, try again. That's how I paired my bluejaw triggers, keep just the 2 in 4og qt, then when they went into the 210 display they were a couple.

 

[LobsterOfJustice]

There is no easy way to determine male or female, but they can change sex in either direction. I would get two small ones and let them grow up and figure it out on their own.

That said, even mated pairs don't spend all their time together. They will still like to be able to have their own territory and will sometimes hang out together and sometimes not. A 40 should be big enough for this however.


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[bryan.wilson79]

I got a YWG and pistol shrimp pair about 2 months ago...a not so great addition IMO..the pistol has a nice network of tunnels built under my live rock and I don't see either of them except for a few seconds at feeding time..

 

[Darth_Tater]

Thanks for the info and ideas guys!

I got a YWG and pistol shrimp pair about 2 months ago...a not so great addition IMO..the pistol has a nice network of tunnels built under my live rock and I don't see either of them except for a few seconds at feeding time..

Interesting, mine wasn't reclusive at all until I added the Wrasse that hated it's guts for some reason (that Wrasse is gone to a much bigger home as of yesterday. Woohoo!).

There is no easy way to determine male or female, but they can change sex in either direction. I would get two small ones and let them grow up and figure it out on their own.

That said, even mated pairs don't spend all their time together. They will still like to be able to have their own territory and will sometimes hang out together and sometimes not. A 40 should be big enough for this however.

Also interesting, I've never heard this before (actually, looks like collegereefs also said it. I just wasn't paying attention). Thanks for the info! They'd be in the tank with a bunch of Cardinals, a Royal Gramma, and some shrimp, so they'd pretty much have the run of the sandbed. There are quite a few nooks and crannies in the rock. I think I'll give it a try! Now I just have to find a store with 2 small ones in stock, which may actually take a while.

 

[Evolve29]

I recently lost my Yellow Watchman Goby, who was my favorite fish. It got chased out of the tank by a newly added wrasse that hated its guts for some reason. I'll soon be removing the wrasse and covering the very tiny hole in my screen the goby somehow jumped through. I've been thinking it would be awesome to get a pair of Yellow Watchman Gobies. They're cheap and easy to find and are just plain cool! Here's the problem, my tank is pretty small (40 Breeder) so if I accidentally get two males or two females I expect bad things to happen.



I'm fairly new to marine fish and very new to the fish pairing process, but I really like the idea. I couldn't find a thread about how to create a Yellow Watchman Goby pair, but admittedly I didn't look too hard. If there is a thread, or a good resource elsewhere online, please point me to it! I have managed to pair a couple Clowns, but that's super easy and a different process.



So how do I tell the difference between males and females? If it's too hard to sex a Yellow Watchman, are there other commonly available Gobies that are easy to tell? Also, would I need to add both to the tank at the same time? The LFSs here don't really get a great variety and even something as common as Yellow Watchmans seem to only come in one at a time pretty sporadically. Will a male and a female always create a pair (given no alternatives), or are they more picky than that?



Thanks in advance for any advice!

I wish I could add a pic of the pairing I just did.
I rescaped my tank, and the shrimp and my female (lost her yellow coloring) ywg went about hiding as I moved the rocks careful not to hurt them.
I really don't know if it helped or needed to pair them up faster since the shrimp needed to rebuild the caves.
I went to the local fish store and got a small ywb.
Added him, and first time I think female chased him out of the newly formed caves not quite sure if that happened just a guess but he wouldn't go near the caves. I was thinking one morning I would find him missing or dead, but none of that happened. Gradually he would go closer to the caves and this morning, he pops out the cave and the larger female is right behind. The pistol shrimp is going about his/her business. Pretty cool sight. While the males tends to be more bolder and stay further from cave at times but any signs of danger. He bolts like the female into the caves. Just amazing. I wasn't quite sure how this worked since there wasn't much info on pairing them. This is what I did and it worked for me.


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[ZOAREEFTANK]

These 2 posts may help out a bit in your search for your info with breeding watchmans. They're braised on my breeding pair.

Yellow watchman pair breeding

https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink?ur...&share_tid=246004&share_fid=1020&share_type=t


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[ZOAREEFTANK]

My very fat female watchman goby

https://r.tapatalk.com/shareLink?ur...&share_tid=264261&share_fid=1020&share_type=t


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