Blenny id?

[Josh Carter]

Awesome! That would sure help us out. I'll pm you the details once I speak with my advisor about details. Would you be open to learning our tissue processing protocol? I have a lot of fun with and in short it involves taking a photo of the fish in a squeeze box (that's how I get the photos I sent you) followed by tying a tag # through the mouth and finally removing a piece of tissue with a scalpel. The fish can then be frozen and sent to us where I'll place it in preservative. I have a video of the process that I can send to you if you're feeling up to it? This way we can get the tissues as fresh as possible as DNA starts to degrade after death. It's a pretty cool process and you may be interested to work with the photo box and use one yourself for fishes you collect down the road. You can get some really nice pictures with it and it's how museums photograph there fish.

And certainly no rush and at your convenience, it's cold down here as well and makes it difficult to collect until spring/summer.

As far as my stocking goes, it's just Chesapeake Bay critters for me for this tank. C. bosquianus, H. hentz if I'm lucky, naked gobies, skilletfish, maybe a hogchoker and a few killifish or sheephead minnows. Once the tank is well established, I may keep seahorses in the fuge if I'm lucky to catch them.

However, I might be able to talk my wife into a Gulf blenny tank Also, I'd love to keep some H. invemar in a nano since they don't get very big.

Nice! I almost forgot the skilletfish. I may add one of those to my tank. I was think about having some midwater fish like killifish or sheepshead minnows but I'm not a huge fan of those fish and being a 10 gallon I'd rather my bioload be mostly blennies and gobies. Perfect for a tank your size though, you could have a nice little school of midwater fish.

Bump for the gulf blenny tank! I've wanted an invemar for some time now, they're gorgeous. Maybe a few of those in some barnacles and some seaweeds would be great or the nano with a couple invemar.

 

[happyhourhero]

Awesome! That would sure help us out. I'll pm you the details once I speak with my advisor about details. Would you be open to learning our tissue processing protocol? I have a lot of fun with and in short it involves taking a photo of the fish in a squeeze box (that's how I get the photos I sent you) followed by tying a tag # through the mouth and finally removing a piece of tissue with a scalpel. The fish can then be frozen and sent to us where I'll place it in preservative. I have a video of the process that I can send to you if you're feeling up to it? This way we can get the tissues as fresh as possible as DNA starts to degrade after death. It's a pretty cool process and you may be interested to work with the photo box and use one yourself for fishes you collect down the road. You can get some really nice pictures with it and it's how museums photograph there fish.

And certainly no rush and at your convenience, it's cold down here as well and makes it difficult to collect until spring/summer.



Nice! I almost forgot the skilletfish. I may add one of those to my tank. I was think about having some midwater fish like killifish or sheepshead minnows but I'm not a huge fan of those fish and being a 10 gallon I'd rather my bioload be mostly blennies and gobies. Perfect for a tank your size though, you could have a nice little school of midwater fish.

Bump for the gulf blenny tank! I've wanted an invemar for some time now, they're gorgeous. Maybe a few of those in some barnacles and some seaweeds would be great or the nano with a couple invemar.

I wish you luck with the invemar! They always go poof in my display and seem to be nocturnal. I do think they would work well in a species or nano tank though.

 

[Josh Carter]

I wish you luck with the invemar! They always go poof in my display and seem to be nocturnal. I do think they would work well in a species or nano tank though.

Cool, where are you getting them? offshore rigs of Florida?

 

[happyhourhero]

A diver I met selling frags made a couple of trips for me and he was getting them off wrecks offshore from Pensacola. Joe Patti Barge is one spot.

I have a strong hunch they are mixed in with the others on the pier pilings. He accidentally brought 2 bycatch blennies one time and both of those live in the barnacles at the pier. Of course the invemar are gone in my tank but the others are doing well still.

 

[Josh Carter]

A diver I met selling frags made a couple of trips for me and he was getting them off wrecks offshore from Pensacola. Joe Patti Barge is one spot.

I have a strong hunch they are mixed in with the others on the pier pilings. He accidentally brought 2 bycatch blennies one time and both of those live in the barnacles at the pier. Of course the invemar are gone in my tank but the others are doing well still.

Interesting, I haven't heard of any making it to shore yet but they very well could. Not sure if you're aware or not but there's a Hypleurochilus blenny the orange-spotted blenny (H. springeri) that lives alongside invemar and looks similar but without the iridescent blue and those too are not found in shore very often either but it'd be interesting to see if they have made it in. If I get a chance to get over there again this summer I'll check the pier and see what's mixed in there.

Thanks for the info!

 

[Chasmodes]

Awesome! That would sure help us out. I'll pm you the details once I speak with my advisor about details. Would you be open to learning our tissue processing protocol? I have a lot of fun with and in short it involves taking a photo of the fish in a squeeze box (that's how I get the photos I sent you) followed by tying a tag # through the mouth and finally removing a piece of tissue with a scalpel. The fish can then be frozen and sent to us where I'll place it in preservative. I have a video of the process that I can send to you if you're feeling up to it? This way we can get the tissues as fresh as possible as DNA starts to degrade after death. It's a pretty cool process and you may be interested to work with the photo box and use one yourself for fishes you collect down the road. You can get some really nice pictures with it and it's how museums photograph there fish.

Sure, I think it would be cool to learn about this!

 

[happyhourhero]

Just to add to this thread...I just watched it consume a whole zoanthid. It scraped it twice and then pulled the whole thing off the rock and then swallowed it.

 

[Chasmodes]

That stinks HHH. Sorry to hear that.

 

[happyhourhero]

Ehhh... it's always a gamble mixing things like this.

 

[Chasmodes]

I guess it becomes a choice of the direction of your tank, or a more suitable tank for that blenny. Was the blenny feeding on zoas all along and you caught it in the act? Or, is this a new thing?

 

[happyhourhero]

I guess it becomes a choice of the direction of your tank, or a more suitable tank for that blenny. Was the blenny feeding on zoas all along and you caught it in the act? Or, is this a new thing?

Not too sure. I have watched it eat my mini maxi anemone, hydroids, aiptasia and acans so it's not terribly surprising. The mini maxi and the acan recovered but it straight up pulled these zoas off the rock.