carpenter's flasher wrasse ??

salt newbie01

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I have been looking at the diff wrasses and I have gotten so interested in them I think I would like to add some to my 58 as well! I have decided on a pair of the carpenter's flashers. My 58 is an LPS tank that so far is goby dominated. It has approx a 2 1/2 inch sand bed and is not jam packed with rock. but there is enough rockwork to give ample hiding places. I hope their peaceful disposition will help them get along with my gobies and add some color and movement to the tank.

My question is how to tell if the 2 wrasses my lfs gets in for me are male or female? If they morph from female to male how can I tell if one or both have changed already? I do not want to get 2 males and have them fight and kill each other. Any tips you could give would be greatly apreciated.

Thanks in advance
 

Rickyrooz

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Male Fairy wrasses are very colorful. Males have long fins that flare up when frightened and are much more colorful than females. They are easily distinguishable.
Here is my male McCosker's wrasse.
Flash.jpg



www.rickysreef.com
 
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salt newbie01

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Those are really sweet as well. Very nice pic!!

I thought about some of those instead of the carpenters but I can't seem to find out how to tell the males and females apart. anyone know??
 

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He kind of told you, they have long fins and are very brightly colored compared to the females. But you have to look closely because a lot of times the males have their fins down at the lfs. There's a really good book on wrasses out there that has pics of most male/female wrasses.

I personally wouldn't recommend Carpenter's as a first wrasse. They are very cheap but don't always do well. I've had some trouble keeping them in the past. They tend to come with parasites and waste away after awhile. You can get guppy deworm flake online that will help. This is also helpful for leopard wrasses and new tangs as some come with parasites as well.

I would recommend getting wrasses like the yellow coris, christmas, radiant, japanese, Lubbock's, Yellow-fin fairy, etc. These are all really good "starter" wrasses. These are all hardy and for the most part easy to keep. They are also commonly available.

A lot of the other fairy wrasses are hard to acclimate and don't always survive the truama of transit from Indo, so its good to have a little experience with wrasses before attempting those. I don't want you to feel sad if the wrasses you start off with don't do so well or are hard to keep healthy.

I wrote a big thing awhile ago on wrasse compatiblity, I'll see if I can find it for you.

Cheers,
Morgan
 
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salt newbie01

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Cool thanks for the info! I really like a lot of the flashers over the fairies. Any way to tell if they have a problem before purchase?? Would the mccoskers fall into that hard to keep catagory? It would be great if you could find that piece you wrote, thanks for looking for it. In my 75 I would like to put few different males. But I am still trying to decide between a few diff males and one male with a small harem.
 

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This is a yellow fin flasher, they are hardy. Fairy/flasher wrasse in general can be very shy. I have several flashers and fairies and they all seem to be somewhat shy. Carpenter, Mckoskeri, and Yellow Fin all kinda look alike. The yellow fin IMO is a good choice. Like everyone stated above. The males have the long fin and more coloration on thier fins.

Yellow Fin




Running for dear life from cleaner wrasse at a speed of mach 5
 

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That yellow fin is beautiful, but I haven't seen one in my area ever. I used to have a mated pair of Secheylles flasher wrasses, they were beautiful. I just got a 4.25" male Scott's fairy that is amazing. I'll have to post pics.

I can't find the compatibility write up pm. I can't remember who I sent to before, maybe they'll see this thread and post it.

You can mix a lot of different fairy wrasses if you have a good sized system. Its one of those things you have to experiment though because some don't get along when you think they will. I wouldn't put more than one haliocheres sp per med sized system. When keeping non-fairy wrasses its good not to mix similiar body size/colors together as most non-fairy wrasses are much more aggressive.

I have a 4 different tanks so its always been easy to remove a fish if it doesn't get along with the others.

M&M
 
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Wow! that yellow fin is beautiful!! Those three are actually my first choice - carpenter's, Mccoskers & yellow fin. The carpenter's flasher is just easy for my lfs to get. That's why I was going with them over the others. They do all look very similar...I guess that's why I like all three!haha! I guess I mainly like the Paracheilinus & Cirrhilabrus species of wrasses. I think they would get along the best in my 2 systems. I will see if my lfs can get the yellow fin or Mccoskers in if they are more hardy (or less likely to come in with parasites or excessive shipping trama) .than the carpenters. I would be happy with either one. I don't plan on mixing those - I just want 1 male and either 1 or 2 females. I want them for my 58 tank. Not near big enough to mix. I thought about mixing one from each species in my 75 gallon but I am not sure yet. I plan to get the ones in the smaller tank and see how it goes first.

I hope you will get some pics up of your Scott's fairy - they are awesome!! Either those or the exquisite fairy's are 2 of my favorite fairy's!!

Thanks for the help!!
Patrick
 

Pitcom

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Most wrasses will get along if they are different colors. I have Lubbuki, Yellow Fin, Exquisite, Yellow Coris, and a possum all in the same tank with no problem. My exquisite is a juvi female, so she is purple with the white nose and black square on her anal fin. I have a blue sided juvi femal fairy wrasse in my nano. She's in the nano cause both times i put her in the main tank, the exquisite actually digs her up from out of the sand and tries to kill her. They look very alike and this is probably why.
 

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Well at least that's not as bad as my Japanese wrasse. I had my japanese wrasse in with my halfblack tang and the other wrasse that was in there died recently from natural causes/stress from us moving. They're in a 40 long and both fish are small.

So on Weds I added 4 red firefish to the tank, that I'm planning to put in a customer's tank in a few weeks. I don't have time to watch my tanks all day but everything seemed to be fine. I found one firefish on the floor later that day and the next day two more dead in the tank with rips around their gills. I've always liked japanese wrasses but know they can become a bit territorial. However I couldn't believe that my japanese could do this to the firefish. I was thinking maybe they died of stress and a crab munched on them or something.

Well, we were shutting down our 30 long prop tanks yesterday cause we're setting up larger more effcient tanks. So I put my yellow fin wrasse in the tank with the japanese for the time being. I saw the japanese pestering him a bit but didn't seem too bad.
This morning I found my poor yellow fin barely alive with both eyes nearly ripped out and several gashes on his body. I'm so upset because this guy was in great health and is such a cool little fish. ;[ He is also larger than the japanese. If I was a little more mean spirited I would turn that stupid fish into sushi, err!

So I took my serial killer fish and put him in my sump with no one. I'm not taking any chances on him with my new radiant wrasse. sigh... Say a little prayer for my yellow fin, maybe he'll pull through. sniff, sniff.
 
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salt newbie01

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yeh 6-lines are nasty little guys once they are established - they will pick on fish 2-3 times their size. Great community fish so long as they are added last.
 

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Yeah, that's what I ****. lol I've kept a few in the past, they've been territorial but have never murdered anyone. This guy did it 3 times! Hopefully my yellow fin will make it and not be #4.

I'll post some pics of my Scott's and Radiant once I'm done with work.
 

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The females dont have the yellow fins that ive ever seen. Live Aquaria has one but its a female.
 

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My six line is a big bully. I got my little bully good. He use to like to pick on my blenny. One day I was sitting on the couch and seen the bully being really bad, Everytime my bleeny would poke its head out or move the six line would charge it biting it. In my other tank I had a blenny that is the same as this one. So I can't have both blennys in the same tank cause they fight each other too. So I caught the blenny that was being bullied. and switched it with the one in the 55. Along came the six line and it was trying to bully this one thinking it was the same one. The six line nipped this bleeny, well the blenny got a little upset about it. It charged the sixline nipped it back then everytime he seen the six line for a couple days would charge it. The six line decided to leave the blenny alone after that and I have harmony between my 4 fish.
 
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