Yellow wrasse missing

[carriej]

Hi Folks,

A few months ago I lost my yellow wrasse. This past weekend I decided to replace him with another. I brought him home Sunday, he was pretty stressed out acclimating and kept trying to "bury" himself in the acclimation bucket.

As soon as he hit my tank he buried himself. To be expected.

Monday afternoon he came out and was zooming around the tank in normal yellow wrasse fashion. He ate with the rest of the fish and seemed pretty comfortable. I have a 130 gallon tank with only 5 other small fish and a cleaner shrimp, so there isn't much to fear!

Anyway that night I went down and he must have buried himself. My other yellow wrasse buried pretty early too so I didn't think much of it.

He hasn't been out since. I know sometimes these guys don't come out for a week but where he was out all day Monday I just have a bad feeling about it. He was a pretty small little guy.

Thoughts?

 

[evolved]

I wouldn't be overly worried just yet. Buried for a couple weeks is far from unheard of.

 

[Justletters7]

I heard of a story were somebody bought one and it disappeared for three months. One day they were cleaning the sand bed and out it came still alive and healthy. Sure yours is doing the same thing.

 

[carriej]

Hope you guys are right. Just seems weird he was out on Monday and then poof!

 

[PirateToast]

Do you have a lid on the tank?

Is it possible that he's coming out when you're not around? My yellow wrasse is always the last one up, first one to bed. The first week or so, he was super skittish and kept very short hours.

(I actually bought a security camera just so I could check in to see if he was alive (yep) while I was at work!)

 

[carriej]

Yeah, I have a screen on the tank; I did check the floor though as even with the screen I did have a clown escape somehow a few months ago. I work from home half the week so I have been camped out all week in the basement working infront of the tank, I don't think I missed him but you never know.

 

[carriej]

Seen him out cruising for about 10 minutes this morning... Then went right back into the sand. Atleast he's still kickin!

 

[Triggerfish]

anything harrassing it?. normally i think they stay out all the time constantly searching the rocks.

 

[PirateToast]

Seen him out cruising for about 10 minutes this morning... Then went right back into the sand. Atleast he's still kickin!

Ah thats great news! They are very skittish fish at first, especially scared of people. Im sure he just needs some time to adjust and will be out and about soon!

 

[carriej]

Well, hadn't seen him for a few more days. Found him being digested by my XL Aussie Duncan.

I think this is the last yellow wrasse for me, not sure why I have such terrible luck with them.

 

[PirateToast]

Ah bummer, how many have you tried? Is it possible you have a predator in there scaring them/killing them?

 

[carriej]

This will be the fifth one I think. The last one I had lived a few months... I know I have some really big bristleworms and a polyclad flatworm that I've seen lurking about, but the fish look relatively alright when I find them. This one was half dissolved because the duncan was trying to eat it; and some of the rest have had missing eyes. Not sure if the missing eyes is a sign of any particular killer, or if other critters just like to eat fish eyes once a fish is dead.