SC#2: Most amusing beast in your tank

[mogurnda]

Allright, it's time for one from the suggestion box.

What critter in your marine tank entertains you the most? The clown trying to nestle with a powerhead? The urchin that covers itself with junk? Let's hear about it.

The suggestion box is sitting there, and has lots of room for good ideas!

[OrionGirl]

Hmmm...I think it would have to be the angler. To make prevent his tankmates from eating his food, we use a riser tube to drop the food right in front of him. So now, he thinks that anytime we pick up the riser tube, he's going to be fed. He zips over to one of 2 'feeding perches', and starts luring away. If we don't feed him within a few minutes, he gives us this sad look, and slowly creeps back to a hiding spot.

[Les]

This week it has to be my Royal Gramma. Win I introduced it to the tank my Blue Damsel was strutting and sniffing like a dog, Gramm snarled at him like a pisted off cat (I was amazed at the size of his mouth). The Damsel hasn’t bothered him or her sense.

[A7ESF]

Thats a toss up between the cleaner shrimp that likes to try to walk across the top of the water upside down, and the blue chromis that thinks he's in love with our False Percula and constantly wants to cuddle.



The clown trying to nestle with a powerhead?


So ours isn't the only that thinks the powerhead is mate material ;)

[mogurnda]

So ours isn't the only that thinks the powerhead is mate material ;)
Is that your clown in your avatar?

[A7ESF]

Yup, one of the two. We were originally told that they were both True Perculas but as they get bigger I'm thinking the other one (the one not in the avatar) is a False Perc. :(

[kcmo lawman]

I would have to say mine is my Prickly Leatherjacket (File Fish). He/she sort of hovers around the tank and looks like a helicopter or something from the cartoon The Jetsons. For some reason it likes to sleep by my magnetic cleaner or my powerhead at night.
I guess it could be my banana wrasse too. Every night like clockwork around 10pm he finds his hole under a big piece of liverock and goes to sleep. :look: If we ever lose power I will know what time it is by him hiding at night.

[MonoSebaelover]

I would have to say my little Teira Batfish (Platax teira). He has a lot of dog like qualities, as soon as I walk up to the tank he comes charging and starts quickly going back and forth like a dog wagging its tail! Personality plus fish! Look foward to getting some new bats at some point!

[mogurnda]

Yup, one of the two. We were originally told that they were both True Perculas but as they get bigger I'm thinking the other one (the one not in the avatar) is a False Perc. :(My guys always get mad when I call them false percs. They are lobbying for a switch to call percs "false ocellaris." Have you got a photo pf your faker?

[OrionGirl]

Oh, just thought of another candidate! A few months back, we were 'weeding' the xenia--removing the frag rocks, and peeling them off the back wall and glueing them to a chunk of rock. We missed a strand, and it floated all over the tank--we kept hoping to grab it before it settled somewhere unwanted. Finally lost it, and figured it would crop up someplace weird in a few days. When we next saw it, it had gotten caught in some tubeworms--that were growing on a snail. It attached, and has been struggling along on the snail ever since. It hates when the snails decides to clean the glass right in front of the powerheads, but otherwise seems fine. It helps the snail--if it gets knocked off the glass, the xenia acts like a parachute, and the snail always lands upright. Just looks goofy!

[A7ESF]

That is just too funny OG! Snail with a parachute... :laugh:


Mogurnda, here is a pic of the two clowns with the Chromis that thinks he's one of them. He also is a candidate as he like to swim backwards for some werd reason.

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y50/A7ESF/trio.jpg

[DansMarineTank]

Doesn't look like there is much of a size difference between the two, how long have you had them, do they hang out together alot of the time?

[A7ESF]

I've had them for about a month now, picked them both up at the same time. The smaller one is a little more then half the size of the bigger one. The bigger one is further away from the camera so they do tend to look the same size.

[mogurnda]

They both look like percs to me. The patterns are different, but not out of the range I've seen. The main difference the texts cite is the number of spines in the first dorsal fin: 9-10 in percula, 10-11 in ocellaris.

It's hard to say who amuses me more. For a while, all the porcelain crabs lined up at dinnertime and waved like a chorus line.

The most entertaining is probably the mantis, though. His tank is in the room we use as an office, on a rack above a FW growout tank. I'll be working away at the computer or on the other tank and look into his rock pile, and he's always looking back, the beady eyes sweeping back and forth at odd angles. I swear he's planning to kill me and take over the bank account.

[Lorna]

I swear he's planning to kill me and take over the bank account.


Now that is funny. I am suprised that you still have a bank account! What with the cost of this hobby :Angel:

[mogurnda]

Now that is funny. I am suprised that you still have a bank account! What with the cost of this hobby :Angel:Yeah, maybe he wouldn't look so greedy if he realized he'd also get the bills.

[DansMarineTank]

sorry the lack of depth perception ;-) lovely looking fish though, i guess i am in the same boat i was sold mine as "Percula Clowns" any other ways you can tell??

The funniest thing in my tank is the Coral Bandded shrimp! he often picks up the hermit crabs and trys to shake them out of thier shell, he looks like a cocktail waiter shaking a martini!

[Pterois2004]

The most entertaining would have to be the Fire Shrimp. It runs out everytime I put my hands in the tank, and seems to do backflips for food. They're not compatible with Coral Banded Shrimp, by the way.

The strangest behavior is the Damsel and Dwarf Fuzzy Lionfish sharing a cave.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v376/oldsmellybloomers/Bloodshrimp.jpg

[renman]

I have a Corl Banded Shrimp and two Fire Shrimp in a 55 gal tank and had no problems with them.

Interestingly enough though, my Cream Angel, Bi-Colored Angel and Niger Trigger all pull up to "The Fish Wash" where the two Fire Shrimp hang out. They come in for "Cleanings" and actually let the Fire Shrimp crawl all over then and clean, I presume, parasites. Kind of "The itch that I can't scratch" kind of symbiosis.

[mogurnda]

One thing I was hoping for when I got the tang last year was to see some "tang surfing," where the shrimp ride on tangs while they swim. The tang didn't seem interested in being cleaned at first, and then the shrimp were victims of a few hitchhiking mantises. It's time to try again now that I'm mantis-free (I hope).

Pterois, your fish almost sound like the lion and lamb lying down together. Except I guess nobody's ever likened a damsel to a lamb :rolleyes:

[Max]

Got to be one of my cheap guys. I have a bi-color blenny that must check out every new tank mate and then put them in their place. Either that or one of the mollies I have in my 100 gal ," I can't seem to catch them all no matter how hard I try." He well.. umh lets just say he likes the ladies too much. He also isn't the brightest bulb in the box because he decided one day that my female tomato clown was the girl of his dreams. She wasn't too keen on the idea though and has the teeth to back it up. Poor old,"probably shouldn't use his name here, to protect the innocent," survived the experience sans most of his tail. You'd think he'd learn from the experience nope. Not two weeks later he went after an urchin," I think I already said he's not the brightest bulb in the box right. He's also attempted to mate with my cardinals, tang, cleaner shrimp, " they played along probably thought it was a cleaning display, and last ,"and I do mean last" my clown while she was in her b.t.a .

[scooter2725]

i think the chromis and the clown "couple'' are really cool.

[wastememphis]

My Golden Midas Blenny has decided to take naps in my toadstool leather coral, within the last few weeks. But he’s very nervous and he always darts out of it when i walk in the room (as if I couldn't see him there... even though the polyps retract only in the area he was laying'). Another funny thing is that he can recognize the food container so every time I come up to the tank and put it by the glass he goes crazy, and waits at the top of the tank. I love him. His name is Pepsi by the way. If he stays there long enough, my girlfriend will take a picture of him today.