As a response to this I have added a new page to my site:
My guide to buying marine fish.
As with everything on my site it is just my ideas and experience.
Over the last couple of weeks I have overhead some of the conversations people have with the LFS when looking to buy a new fish. It is no wonder so many fish are lost and so many people despair of the their tanks. I personally find it difficult to understand how people spend their hard earned cash without really knowing what they are doing. Basic research before buying a fish is a must! As a response to this I have added a new page to my site: My guide to buying marine fish. As with everything on my site it is just my ideas and experience.
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Step1I have room for one last wrasse in my little community and it is a difficult choice with many factors being taken into consideration. My choice several months ago was an Anampses twistii but this has been very difficult to get hold of. I had a conversation with one of my LFS who goes to handpick fish from a major importer and gave him a couple of alternatives, well four actually. C. solorensis, H. richmondi, H iridis and the A twistii. Well guess what he got hold of three lovely specimens, only the C solorensis was missing. I went to view the fish and spent a good hour watching their behaviour, watched them feed and tried to check their general health and demeanor. All looked lovely but I decided to go for the A twistii. The LFS is going to hold the fish for two weeks so that I can see that it is settled, well and feeding. This is a brilliant arrangement for me and helps to lesson the risk of my purchase. This process of buying a fish is about as good as it gets I reckon. I have read a number of articles recently describing ways of restoring and regrowing our coral reefs. There are some really interesting projects and a variety of techniques being used. This article on the BBC Earth website was particularly interesting and hopeful. Read article A week or so ago I saw a lovely pink/purple coral encrusting the bottom glass in the coral table at my LFS. He kindly gave me a piece to bring home. I duly used some cotton to tie it to a small piece of rock and placed it part way up on my reef. All was good for a couple of days and then it disappeared leaving cotton tied on the rock. Now I have a beautiful, vain and very dressy tuxedo urchin wandering around my little reef dressed in what I think is some form of little xenia coral!! Brings a whole new meaning to coral placement! I have gone mad and made a second YouTube video! This time it is a kind of simple care guide for my lovely Halichoeres melanurus or Hoeven's Wrasse, or Tail spot wrasse or whatever else people may call her, or possibly him. Think I will need to improve on the quality of my video taking but it is a start. Halichoeres melanurus Since the addition of my new sump light I have had a big increase in cheato growth and harvesting followed by an almost complete dieback. This has coincided with a big drop in both nitrates and phosphates in my tank as well as the eradication of Bryopsis and hair algae. I am hoping the cheato dieback is as a result of a lack of nutrients in the water which is good. "Start a YouTube channel for your wrasse tank," the man said. "What's a YouTube channel?" said this ageing blogger. "Its easy said the man. You make videos about your wrasse and your tank and upload them to YouTube." "Sounds like a lot of work and a pain in the ****," the ageing blogger replied. "But I like a challenge," he thought. Check out my first new video. Chris' Reef wrasse tank
Strange things going on in my little reef community. I'm not sure in my Halichoeres timorensis isn't also undergoing a transition from female to male. The photographs don't really show the very definite dark or black dots forming diamond shapes on the flanks of the fish. I am lead to believe this is indicative of a male timorensis wrasse. I will wait and see as they seem to be darker and more pronounced on pictures I have seen. There is obviously some social dynamic going on between my two Halichoeres wrasse. My H. timorensis was the dominant fish in the tank a few months ago but I think this situation may be changing.
My Halichoeres melanurus is a real beauty but I think she may be beginning the transition from a female to a male. The colouration is superb but she has lost the spot on her dorsal fin. She is also developing what look like very faint saddle bars on her back and flanks. I have never seen this happen before so am fascinated by the process but not quite sure whether it is a gender transition or not. If it is it would be interesting to know what has stimulated the change. I know that Halichoeres wrasses in common with all other wrasse are protogynous hermaphrodites, meaning that they start off as juveniles, then are females, then transition into males. I think I understand that social dynamics in a group can trigger the transition into a male but thought this would only happen with other wrasse of the same species. Could wrasse of another species, my H. timorensis or even wrasse from another genus, my Macropharyngodon leopards, trigger this change?
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AuthorI have always enjoyed keeping fish and began this website when doing the research before setting up my own modest reef. I couldn't find this type of site so decided to make my own. Archives
December 2020
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