Australian Stripey

ilikefish69 · Feb 14, 2024

125 mixed reef all kinds of fish coral it is safe to assume that yes it is in my tank. good , bad, medium , i am extremely "inclusive". the spaghetti worms freak me out, the barnicles are hilarious, the vermitid are the devil, and the aiptasia I had under control. Tons of it, so I introduce two blue kleini butterflyfish. All gone within a week, and after a year one decided to destroy a hammer coral in a day, like came home from work to see it finishing off the last few branches. i had a hunch it had been nipping at coral but not enough to kill it (the coral, I do not mean kill the fish, I am proofreading). so i move naughty fish to sump and a few encrusting coral and SPS i have looked extremely healthy. Yay , i thought. but the reason i got the butterflyfish was to eat aiptasia and now 1/2 butterflies in display the aiptasia starting to rear its ugly head.

now there are three australian stripey at LFS for $90 / piece. I love these fish (from afar) every time I see them . They eat aiptasia , but I am wondering if I would put myself right back in the same position of my corals getting nipped at.

what is the general feedback , if any , on this relatively newer fish in the hobby ? reef safe ? will eat my mushrooms ? mean ? I realize that each persons individual experiences would in a way be anecdotal evidence but hey it is an online forum and the reason we are here is to share our experiences i could argue so bring on the stripey anecdotes.

ISpeakForTheSeas · Feb 15, 2024

ilikefish69 said:
what is the general feedback , if any , on this relatively newer fish in the hobby ? reef safe ? will eat my mushrooms ? mean ? I realize that each persons individual experiences would in a way be anecdotal evidence but hey it is an online forum and the reason we are here is to share our experiences i could argue so bring on the stripey anecdotes.

No personal experience (so consider this a bump for your thread here), but from what I've heard on the forum, they seem to be coral-safe fish.

Dburr1014 · Feb 15, 2024

This says with caution. I have never seen one in person.

The Australian Stripey is a captivating little fish with a ton of personality! While often called the Australian Stripey, they actually occur in various locations worldwide. Prolific in the Pacific, they are found from Australia, to the Philippines, to Hawaii! Known for its distinctive striped...

www.marinecollectors.com

Lbrdsoxfan · Feb 15, 2024

Good price for the stripey, from 1st hand experience, they are fairly coral friendly. LPS seems to be a crapshoot.

As I brought up in a few other threads the Kleini butterfly isnt reef safe as people claim. 1st go around I lost a LOT of nice zoas to it. I have one now, I'm just running my softie tank on what it will and won't eat!

dennis romano · Feb 15, 2024

I've always liked them, but never pulled the trigger to buy one. It says that in nature, they are a schooling fish, mainly plankton eaters. The two times that I have seen them at the LFS, there was one dominant stripey beating the daylights out of the others in the tank.

ilikefish69 · Feb 15, 2024

dennis romano said:
I've always liked them, but never pulled the trigger to buy one. It says that in nature, they are a schooling fish, mainly plankton eaters. The two times that I have seen them at the LFS, there was one dominant stripey beating the daylights out of the others in the tank.

LFS has three that are $90 each , which is an outstanding price point. The gentleman who works there is weirdly an extremely knowledgable fellow who has turned the fish store a complete 180 over the last year, so I do trust what he tells me and he reports the reason he purchased three is because they are happiest in at least groups of 3. I don't have the room for three more fish and I dont want to have a scared fish in my tank. ive seen others keep them individually , and seem happy enough , but i also have some bully fish that are well established that torment new fish.

Lbrdsoxfan said:
Good price for the stripey, from 1st hand experience, they are fairly coral friendly. LPS seems to be a crapshoot.

As I brought up in a few other threads the Kleini butterfly isnt reef safe as people claim. 1st go around I lost a LOT of nice zoas to it. I have one now, I'm just running my softie tank on what it will and won't eat!

i still have one blue face kleini in the display that never bothers anything , but not nearly the appetite for aiptasia as the otheri had to move to the sump. i do believe the fish 'went rogue' in a way as once i saw it eating the hammer i decided id catch & move it. with 17 fish in the tank i put a net with a frozen cube in it, and within 5 minutes the fish swam in the net to get food and was caught , all in less than 10 minutes. that tells me this would have been the fish that ... would have been picked last for dodgeball, ill put it that way. i still love both of them and i even made him a little nori feeder and frozen feeder for the sump so he can stay well fed. ive finally had some encrusting and chunky LPS coral taking off so I am thinking I am going to pass on the stripey

I will eventually get some berghia for the aiptasia but one of the kleini is keeping it relatively at bay so far