Clown Trigger and angel fish mood.

[patrck17]

Hi I have a 6” clown trigger and 5” or so. My tank is 6ft and 150 gallons. The trigger is pretty voracious these days but isn’t necessarily too aggressive. The angelfish doesn’t really mess with the clown but he has been going after a small yellow tang I just added.

Anyway I think it is about time to rehome the trigger but I’m sort of wondering if i
Do that the angel will become a bigger *******. I don’t have a huge reason. To think so except that right now the trigger is the big dog so when he is gone who will take the throne.

Also what do you think the trigger is worth? My local pet store will give me 100.

 

[W31Olds]

What Angel are you talking about? What species? All I see is a Hippo Tang.

 

[Joj]

You wont get much for a trade in but a 6” clown trigger will usually run ~$250+ bought from LFS or Online

 

[patrck17]

This is the angel. He antagonizes the small yellow tang but otherwise doesn’t seem to be causing trouble. Just don’t want him to get more aggressive.

 

[i cant think]

Hi I have a 6” clown trigger and 5” or so. My tank is 6ft and 150 gallons. The trigger is pretty voracious these days but isn’t necessarily too aggressive. The angelfish doesn’t really mess with the clown but he has been going after a small yellow tang I just added.

Anyway I think it is about time to rehome the trigger but I’m sort of wondering if i
Do that the angel will become a bigger *******. I don’t have a huge reason. To think so except that right now the trigger is the big dog so when he is gone who will take the throne.

Also what do you think the trigger is worth? My local pet store will give me 100.

The question of who will take the throne is based on who is currently second in command in the hierarchy, the likelihood is your Emperor will take control of the tank. Now, this is likely to end up in a fish which is mellow in comparison to now as it has nobody to compete with and nobody will attempt to dethrone him.

The issue with trading into an LFS is we have a markup we have to go by to get profit.
You’ll find you get 100 from an LFS, but that same LFS will then sell it at 250, which is where the markup comes in. Not all shops have the same exact markup but generally you’ll find it’s a minimum of twice the price the shop buys it in at.
If you sold it yourself, you’d possibly get 250 after a while. But it won’t be an instant sale unlike if you went the LFS route.

 

[kboogie]

I’m hoping to better understand your situation. You have a nice sized Clown Trigger in a community tank who is being a good citizen. You also have an Emperor Angelfish in that same community tank who on occasion demonstrates some normal territorial behavior. As a result of the angelfish’s behavior you want to rehome the Clown Trigger?

Do you practice “Ich Management” or “Ich Eradication”? This is important because if you practice ich management then small stressors like being chased out of a dominants fishes territory has a good chance of eventually coming an outbreak. If you practice ich eradication then you only have to worry about if the chased fish continues to eat well and if it is getting nipped. Focus on the frequency and the degree of the chasing. If it happens more than once every 30 minutes or if it involves physical damage to the chased fish then it is a problem regardless if you practice ich management or not.

Regarding the value of your Clown Trigger that is dependent on multiple factors. The biggest factor is how quickly do you want to sell it and how much effort are you willing to put into selling it. If you need to dump it quickly with little effort then you will get 25% to 40% of retail. If you have time and or are willing to put into some work you can 40% to 60% of retail. If you have a ton of time and are willing to put in a lot of work you can get 100% of retail but that will involve listing your fish with good promotions materials (photos and videos) and being willing to ship the fish.

Back in the day when I was in the industry, our store operated on a 50% margin for marine live stock and an 80% margins for freshwater. We provided 25% discount on days we went to the wholesaler or got a shipment from our direct imports we provided a 25% discount for fish bought in their original bag. When you factor in the normal loss and upkeep these margins are fair.

What we did that was uncommon is we provide a full retail value store credit on fish trade-ins and rarely did cash. This way our margin was factored in and the customer got higher perceived value.

99% of our trade-ins went into client tanks we maintained for clients.

We also had many customers who would donate fish to ensure they got a good home. This was frequent with larger fish where the placement options were limited and the retail value of the fish was high.

 

[patrck17]

Thanks for the response. Ultimately I think the clown Trigger is getting too big for this tank, and it is becoming increasingly aggressive. So I expect I'd eventually need to rehome him. The dynamic with the Emporer and the Yellow Tang is more of a separate issue. The emporer may be getting too big for this tank as well and it may be that I rehome him too.

I had not even considered the thing about ich. I read up on it some after your response. I have a UV sterilizer but I have not tuned it to target ich yet. I just got this tank from a previous owner and it has been established for a while, but I have added other animals so it is possible ich may have been introduced, or that it was even present when I got it. I'll have to do more homework on this. Thanks again.