Need Stocking Advice

[KYsteer]

I have a 29 gal tank that has been set up for 3 years. I have slowly over the past year lost some fish and have wanted to wait for a while and make sure my water is where it needs to be before restocking with new fish.
I currently have
1 Maroon Clown
1 Skunk Cleaner Shrimp
30lbs of live rock
number blue and scarlet legged hermits
a few turbo and margarita snails
a few detirius snails

What i would like to do is add some color and more movement to my tank. I was thinking a small group of 3 damsels, but not sure if they would get along with the Maroon clown. I plan on adding a BTA when I add my new lights for him. Who knows this might make him more aggresive. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

[Larry Copperband]

You have an established Maroon Clown..A Spunky fish to say the least.IMO,any new addition is gonna have to be ready to hold it's own.
Let me give it some thought & I'll reply in a bit.

How big is the Clown?

[wwest]

Larry has a great point about the maroon clown. The larger the clown gets the more ,......putting it nicely, the more evil it gets. lol I ended up trading my maroon off because it went after everything including my hand lol

If you do decide to add something to tank with the maroon make sure you have hole in your rock work for the new inhabitant to hide for awhile.

[Snail Freak]

Guppies FTW!


Oh wait, wrong type of forum


I'd say get another maroon clown and hope for babies, if you would have a place t keep babies that is. although they do have good points, it would be tough adding hardly anything with a big maroon, i heard amroons are one of the more aggressive types also. but another maroon may do better with a maroon then a goby IMO. of course i could be compeltely wrong on this. note, i'm still kind of a newbie to most saltwater. so i don't have much experience with that, just from what 've read.

[wwest]

I wouldn't try the baby thing. Maroons are very hard to breed and then keep alive and 9 times out of 10 if you introduce a new maroon with a maroon that has his territory marked the new maroon will be killed. Chances are very high anyways.

[lReef lKeeper]

why not try some type of LPS coral ?? they are colorful and move quite a bit. as everyone else said, it is gonna be next to impossible to add a fish unless you get rid of the maroon. LPS come in all colors and sizes, so you could start with a frag of say ... pink tipped frogspawn, and just keep growing that or add hammers or torches. they will all give great movement in a small tank.

[Larry Copperband]

Here's what I would do,contingent on the fact that this is a well established tank,full of live rock,and the Maroon isn't over 2" already:

All fish need to be simultaneously introduced.

Have your new inhabitants waiting in bags from the LFS.I'd suggest 2 or 3 of the following fish:Small Niger Trigger,Flame Hawkfish,Bi Color Blenny,Spotted Watchman Goby.While you're there,ask for an extra bag & rubberband.

The key is to have a game plan,because the clown has to come out for this to work.
Set up 2 clean buckets. One for the clown & one for some of the live rock that needs to come out if necessary.
One more bucket full of freshly made salt water to replace what comes out in the process.
Siphon out a couple gallons of tank water,catch the clown,place him in this bucket.
Rearrange the rockwork in the tank.
Bag the clown and acclimate all the fish,float method.
This may or may not be what you had in mind,I'd really like to see a pic of the tank sometime!!

[lReef lKeeper]

good plan Larry, but the Maroon is still going to get more and more aggressive as it grows. the Niger will get WAY to big for a 29 gallon tank, and the others will likely still be picked on or bullied as the clown grows.

[Larry Copperband]

Ok Bobby....what'cha say to omitting the Niger,and sticking with the others?
If it were anything other than a Maroon(oops..Tomatos are a kick in the pants too)
Ok...I think I'm answering my own question here.
Best case scenario..The potential for some major scrapping is high.
A 55 would be a different story.
But I'd bet a clown would leave a big,tough sand sifting goby alone,if Introduced together.
BTW...That 125 in your pic is Kikkin !!!!!

[lReef lKeeper]

thanks Larry.

i agree that in a bigger tank the circumstance's would be different.

[KYsteer]

The Maroon clown is about 3 inches. He had his little spot, but for the most part got along ok with the pair of Bar Gobies and a small yellow tang that I had for a long time. I know that this is kinda an in between size of tank, but it is what I have to work with for now. Thanks for the info. I will just leave it the way it is for a while. If I do add anything I will add some more rock for hiding places and take him out and rearrange the rock when adding new tankmates. Thanks for the help though.

[itsme8719]

I don't see why adding 2 or 3 damsels wouldn't work. I mean there are a variety of colors to chose from and they are pretty active fish. From the two I have I would think that they could hold their own against the maroon.

What does everyone else think?

[lReef lKeeper]

with DAMNsels and the maroon, you will eventually have at least a few dead fish. DAMNsels get extremely aggressive when older to (especially the black and white ones), but the other colors get aggressive too.

what part of KY are you from Megan ??

[itsme8719]

I understand damsels can become very aggressive........but honestly I still don't see why it wouldn't work. The maroon already has its "spot," which I'm sure it rarely leaves from, so I couldn't really see it leaving its spot to go out and terrorize the damsels. Also, since the damsels are obviously going to be added to the tank after the maroon already has his territory staked out then I just couldn't see them terrorizing the maroon.

I mean I'm no expert by all means.....and I've never had first had experience with maroons and damsels together but just from the little I know about fish I still don't understand why that wouldn't work.

Feel free to let me know what you all think......i'm just throwing my 2 cents in.

By the way Bobby i'm from meade co......a few minutes from ft. knox.

[lReef lKeeper]

sounds like you shop at e-town pets for you saltwater needs. i sometimes supply frags to them. if you dont already shop there, you should check them out. it is a small store, but they usually have some pretty nice stuff.

just knowing how DAMNsels are, and adding them to a an established Maroon clown tank, is taking a pretty big chance of having alot of fighting later on down the road. just my opinion, but there WILL be major losses eventually. whether it is the clown or the DAMNsels ... some WILL be killed in the fighting. if it was a percula or pink skunk clown ... we would be talking about a completely different situation.

[bubbletip]

How about a six line and a dwarf angel. The dwarf angel should be big enogh that the maroon clown won't bother. The six line will be able to hide in the interim and is too fast for the maroon to catch. It is risky but it can and has been done. I agree that the only way to do this is to take the clown out of the tank and aquascape much differnetly than before making it appear that the clown is in a different home itself. Tangs are way to big for a tank of this size. A dwarf angel(Coral Beauty, Elibi, or large pygmy) would be alright. Careful of coral picking though, not sure what you have in your tank.

Good luck Kysteer!

[ice30]

absolutely true, I have had my 75 gallon custom 3 feet wide tank for three years now and when I first started I started with 1 blue damsel and 1 black and white stripe one, then after a month I added a maroon clown to tank also then after about 1 year or longer the black and white damsel started biting me and attacking me when I would clean my tank and I noticed that the maroon clown had no fins on the bottom but did not know at the time it was this black and white damsel doing it thought it was awful strange that my puffers would even think of this because they were so tame and had good foods to eat, but my puffer's died as I bought another one from a different store and it had ick well after they died , I seen that my maroon was still being picked on and I caught this damn black and white damsel doing it trying to kill my maroon, it took me along time to get him out of my tank due to 50lb. of live rock but he is gone and all is well, and my tang and maroon gets along good as my tang is a little bigger than the maroon.
I do not test my waters I did one time and sent me into a frenzuy and had an expert come to my home and he said throw the test strips away, just do my water changes and keep a watch and feel for my tank and all will be fine, as test strips seem to be wrong half the time. now I have a 4 stage osmosis system in the kitchen so I won't have to buy water now that is a hassel just going to get it.

[CarmieJo]

I absolutely agree that the test strips are not accurate enough to be useful. And I am a firm believer that routine water changes will go a long way to keeping your tank healthy and parameters in line.

However, I also believe that testing is an important part of preventive maintenance. Regular testing can show a trend and indicate a problem before it is critical. For instance growing corals may increase the demand for calcium in your tank and outpace what water changes can supply. If you are testing you will see the Ca levels start falling off and be able to supplement before it has a negative effect on your corals.

[Shananagans]

I don't know if anyone suggested this, I am a skimmer and read only every few words. I have never had a maroon clown but as you have heard I have also heard they are alittle agressive I do not disagree with anything above. If you dont want to get rid of it, as I am sure you are attached to your sole survivor. As I am to my yellow tang (my longest lasting fish). You could remove the clown for several hrs, if you have another place to put him for a bit. Try to stress him as little as possible, use the same water from your tank, keep the temp the same etc... You could rearange your rock then add the newbie and then later your clown again. This will then give the newbie a chance to get established first. And wheh you add the clown he will have to re establish himself as it will seem to be a diff unexplored part of the reef. That is if you think the newbie is a peaceful fish. That will let him find a home first. If the newbie is as "aggresive" as the maroon or you are simply adding another maroon as some have suggested, you may want to put them in at the same time af the rthe rock work is rearranged. In thier confusion they will both have to establish themselvs at the same time. Because if your newbie is"aggresive" as well and you put him in first then your maroon, you will find yourself in the boat, as the maroon may get picked on then when he trys to find a home.

If any1 sees any flaws or disagrees with this, fell free to correct me.

[ice30]

add all my supplements to my tank but I have had this tank like I said for 3 years now and haven't had a problem with corals or anything else yet I add iodine calcium reef plus and black magic once a week but only if I feel it really needs it , everything seems to just do fine in my tank, but I had a friend give me a maroon clown the other day and I put this little fish in my tank and my bigger maroon tried to kill him so I quarantined him in a net trap that wal-mart sells for around 4.00 and pretty good size one and put him in there in front of my bigger clown and he is fine so far with him in the tank trap so in about a week gonna try letting him lose again to see what happens, if he tries to kill him again then I am just gonna set up the other tank I have .

I absolutely agree that the test strips are not accurate enough to be useful. And I am a firm believer that routine water changes will go a long way to keeping your tank healthy and parameters in line.

However, I also believe that testing is an important part of preventive maintenance. Regular testing can show a trend and indicate a problem before it is critical. For instance growing corals may increase the demand for calcium in your tank and outpace what water changes can supply. If you are testing you will see the Ca levels start falling off and be able to supplement before it has a negative effect on your corals.