Common fish show off!!!

wasabi bean · Dec 17, 2024

voelter76 said:
These guys

I love my gramma especially because of its wierd swimming style and almost chequered transition from purple to yellow

Slocke · Dec 17, 2024

Royal gramma are beautiful and incredibly common. When I dive the Caribbean they are everywhere!

Zionas · Dec 18, 2024

I have seen Royal Grammas with yellow on their heads, or unusually yellow bodies in proportion to the purple. I believe they’re hybrids with the Cuban Gramma (now bred by Biota NC), which Bruce Carlson documented in one of his videos. The Cuba Grammas aren’t “rare” in the wild but you never see big numbers of them like with the Royal Grammas. Usually you’ll find a few of them among a much larger group of G. Loreto.

Same goes for Black Caps. You see them among G. Loreto but never in big numbers.

You often see people keep Shrimp / Goby pairs but you don’t often see people keep the Gobies in pairs, when that’s how they prefer to live and they do readily form pair bonds in captivity, being capable of sex change. Other than some people who keep the Yasha Goby in pairs, when was the last time you saw a pair of the common YWGs?

A pair of Flame or Longnose Hawks would also be more interesting than a single specimen.

Clowns seem to be the only fish that people consistently keep multiples of. I believe this should be changed.

Watchman Gobies, other Shrimp Gobies and many types of Gobies readily pair (I’d make an exception for tanks that can’t sustain more than one of the sand-sifting species). I don’t know much about Pistol Shrimp in pairs but I think most pairs of Gobies stick to a single shrimp from what I have seen in images.

Flame and Longnose Hawks live in pairs, and are better as such.

Genicanthus Angels should be kept as a male / female, the sexual dimorphism is too notable to miss out on.

Many of the Centropyge, Paracentropyge, maybe Apolemichthys and Chaetodontoplus are attractive as single fish, but a pair / harem would be even better IMO if the tank allows.

Chalk Basslets, the smaller Serranus Basslets are confirmed hermaphrodites and IMO do better as pairs / trios.

Mandarin Dragonets, whenever possible, should be kept as a pair unless the tank doesn’t have the pods and microfauna to sustain both, or you can’t find one of the opposite sex.

Not sure about Gramma, Liopropoma and Assessors but I have seen several people do more than 1 Gramma. They seem to spawn in pairs, and the breeding behavior is interesting to watch it seems.

Not sure about Damsels and Chromis (not the Blue-Green) but a pair of the smaller Chrysiptera and some of the Pomacentrus would look nice.

Dottybacks are confirmed hermaphrodites, although there was an old user here from the UK who mentioned that males exhaust themselves looking after eggs and die early. Not sure how true that is.

If one can sex them, a pair of Matted Filefish / Radial Filefish.

Wrasses I heard you can start off with a male and female or 1 male and 2 females and you risk the females changing to males. Not sure how true this is across the board. I have seen a few people keep pairs of common Cleaner Wrasses before and they seemed to do fine.

Personally not a fan of Anthias except some of the larger and deepwater ones, but I don’t see why you can’t keep a pair of them (this doesn’t include most of the Pseudanthias).

Tangs, Butterflies, I believe would be more difficult due to needing more specialized knowledge on how to sex them.

But I believe in most tanks, other than pairs of Clownfish, I believe we’re able to keep more fish in social units than one realizes.

Barncat · 2024-12-28T04:57:04-0500

Zionas said:
I have seen Royal Grammas with yellow on their heads, or unusually yellow bodies in proportion to the purple. I believe they’re hybrids with the Cuban Gramma (now bred by Biota NC), which Bruce Carlson documented in one of his videos. The Cuba Grammas aren’t “rare” in the wild but you never see big numbers of them like with the Royal Grammas. Usually you’ll find a few of them among a much larger group of G. Loreto.

Same goes for Black Caps. You see them among G. Loreto but never in big numbers.

You often see people keep Shrimp / Goby pairs but you don’t often see people keep the Gobies in pairs, when that’s how they prefer to live and they do readily form pair bonds in captivity, being capable of sex change. Other than some people who keep the Yasha Goby in pairs, when was the last time you saw a pair of the common YWGs?

A pair of Flame or Longnose Hawks would also be more interesting than a single specimen.

Clowns seem to be the only fish that people consistently keep multiples of. I believe this should be changed.

Watchman Gobies, other Shrimp Gobies and many types of Gobies readily pair (I’d make an exception for tanks that can’t sustain more than one of the sand-sifting species). I don’t know much about Pistol Shrimp in pairs but I think most pairs of Gobies stick to a single shrimp from what I have seen in images.

Flame and Longnose Hawks live in pairs, and are better as such.

Genicanthus Angels should be kept as a male / female, the sexual dimorphism is too notable to miss out on.

Many of the Centropyge, Paracentropyge, maybe Apolemichthys and Chaetodontoplus are attractive as single fish, but a pair / harem would be even better IMO if the tank allows.

Chalk Basslets, the smaller Serranus Basslets are confirmed hermaphrodites and IMO do better as pairs / trios.

Mandarin Dragonets, whenever possible, should be kept as a pair unless the tank doesn’t have the pods and microfauna to sustain both, or you can’t find one of the opposite sex.

Not sure about Gramma, Liopropoma and Assessors but I have seen several people do more than 1 Gramma. They seem to spawn in pairs, and the breeding behavior is interesting to watch it seems.

Not sure about Damsels and Chromis (not the Blue-Green) but a pair of the smaller Chrysiptera and some of the Pomacentrus would look nice.

Dottybacks are confirmed hermaphrodites, although there was an old user here from the UK who mentioned that males exhaust themselves looking after eggs and die early. Not sure how true that is.

If one can sex them, a pair of Matted Filefish / Radial Filefish.

Wrasses I heard you can start off with a male and female or 1 male and 2 females and you risk the females changing to males. Not sure how true this is across the board. I have seen a few people keep pairs of common Cleaner Wrasses before and they seemed to do fine.

Personally not a fan of Anthias except some of the larger and deepwater ones, but I don’t see why you can’t keep a pair of them (this doesn’t include most of the Pseudanthias).

Tangs, Butterflies, I believe would be more difficult due to needing more specialized knowledge on how to sex them.

But I believe in most tanks, other than pairs of Clownfish, I believe we’re able to keep more fish in social units than one realizes.

Good gosh, this! This so much!! Also here I've been worrying about somehow getting a male YWG mate for my female and the whole time the darn fish was a hermaphrodite?! This explains so much - when I first got her, I swore Clyde looked like a male, but after a while I noticed that her colouration had gone drab which I read meant that she was actually a girl.

This was Clyde when I first got her - glorious blue dots, pure lemony yellow colouration.

Clyde now; much duller colours and banding?! You telling me that she really is a Bonny?!

Joking aside, Australian Aquarist on YT (no idea how people feel about his videos but he seems like a guy who genuinely loves his animals) keeps a mated pair of blue devil damsels in his one tank which to me is just so inspiring! Having acquired a female I now want to give her a boyfriend once I upgrade, because while the lady blue devils are just blue the males have truly spectacular (in my opinion anyway) golden markings!

So, I'm completely on board with keeping mated pairs of fish species other than clownfish, and back on topic with this thread I dearly recommend keeping damsels! Compared to angelfish they generally only cost (in Canada) $10-$30 but they come in completely beautiful vivid shades of blue (blues easily rivalling that of regal tangs) with gold markings or black with white markings, all while looking extremely similar to many angelfishes!

I only have personal experience with yellow tailed damsels and blue devil damsels but both Jewel (RIP) and Lazuli were/are perfectly good reef citizens. They/'ve get along just fine with everyone from my clownfish to my blue-green chromis Mer (who is the most beautiful fish on my reef,) to my sixline wrasse Tangelo, who has also been a great reef citizen despite the reputation of his species! (And who is arguably much prettier than most other far more expensive wrasses with his veritable rainbow of orange, purple, blue, and lime green!)

In fact, I swear that my yellow tailed damsel Jewel saved my normal phase ocellaris clownfish Moby from depression since I took absolutely forever to find Moby a mate. Within hours of Jewel's introduction Moby and Jewel became inseperable; it was only after I finally intriduced Moby's husband Cousteau that she and Jewel stopped hanging out so closely.

And now, with Lazuli's introduction (whom I got free from another reefer,) Mer the blue-green chromis' open water confidence seems to have bloomed!

So, damsels rock!