Aggressive clownfish, suddenly

[maheenio]

Hi guys. I’ve had this clownfish pair about when I started my tank (about 3ish months ago). A week or so when I got them, they fought for that time but after one week, I’m guessing they decided which one was the female and which one was the male because they stopped fighting. I got the striped clownfish first, then a naked one. They were both around the same size when I got them with the naked clown being a tiny bit smaller. Now 3 months later, they are all bullying the naked clownfish. The striped clownfish started bullying the naked clown first, biting and nipping at it. I’m not sure what to do or why this suddenly happened after months of sleeping in the same corner. For now I’ve obstructed its view and put a turkey baster (that I feed them with usually) in the middle of the tank and the naked clownfish just stays hiding on the other side of it. It’s been 2 days of constant biting and the naked clownfish has bite marks on it. Water parameters are all decent, no ammonia & low nitrates. Plenty of rocks in the tank (35lb). I can’t separate them as I only have one saltwater tank.

 

[Tahoe61]

Can you get a breeder box? Try taping a mirror to the side of the tank. Move the scape around to disrupt territories.
It's not uncommon for clowns to erupt in aggressive behavior suddenly. Sometimes it passes but your situation sounds a tad extreme.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

#reefsquad

 

[winxp_man]

You will need to remove the naked. Thats as simple as it gets. Once the bullying starts. It usually does not stop until the one being bullied is dead.

Clowns are something else. So the pair will kill the single. I tried this in my 300 gal system. My maroon pair I had for about 1.5 years now, have been in the 300 for about 2 month three tops. I then had a pair of PNG Super Blacks that I QT’s and they’re ready for a DT. I let them go over night on the opposite side of a 96” tank.

My morning the male maroon was about to murder the png female! Her fines were wrecked. The maroon male literally had never moved from the corner he was in, but after put the two png’s in it was game on!! He was front and center of the tank. The dude is a menace! I then setup a 45 aio that the png’s are now in. And they are loving life.

Point being clowns will murder eater other for sure. And the issue is that once it starts it does not stop. Other species are the same but I see fights turn off after some time. Clowns nope! Once started it’s not stopping.

 

[Rocks reef]

Agreed, remove the single one

 

[maheenio]

Can you get a breeder box? Try taping a mirror to the side of the tank. Move the scape around to disrupt territories.
It's not uncommon for clowns to erupt in aggressive behavior suddenly. Sometimes it passes but your situation sounds a tad extreme.

Will def get a breeder box. It Is a bit extreme as the clown just won’t leave the other one alone. Should I put the aggressive clown in the breeder box or the other one? Thank you. Just super worried it’ll hurt the other one badly.

The one on the left (striped) is the aggressive one, the other one on the right is just staying in that area to keep hidden.

I’ve also turned off the lights since then to hopefully calm things down.

 

[winxp_man]

One additional thing, you can get three fish, then after the pair the third wheel ends up being the bad guy for some reason.

Then again it’s not always the case. Have seen two pairs in one tank 36x24 tank and doing fine. And have seen many trios do fine.

But to your post once the infighting starts it’s time to separate.