Clownfish sitting on sand bed

villz

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Hello everyone,

I have a question, that I hope I can find some assistance with on here. I included some photos below, or my female clownfish. I will say this is now the 3rd time she’s exhibited this behavior and it’s quite strange to me, but she basically will stop eating, abandon the male clownfish, she will swim either close to the sand bed or as shown on the pictures below just sit on the sand bed and now she is sitting almost exclusively next to the watchman goby’s two burrow holes.

The first time I experienced this I was frightened thinking she was dying, but now she’s done this 3 times where she’ll seemingly to my untrained eye seem like she’s dying and in a day or two she’ll be swimming in the water column. My clowns are both occellaris and but don’t really pair or host a specific portion of the tank they kind of just wander. Aside from that I brought my water to local IFS for them test, which there were no issues. My flow is pretty moderate, since I have some acans and hammer corals growing pretty so I’m not really sure what this behavior could be. If anyone could help me give me some advice or ideas I would greatly appreciate.

IMG_8213.jpeg IMG_8250.jpeg
 

KrisReef

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My limited observations of designer clownfish is that a lot of the wild type behaviors seem to be missing in these fishes.

The clownfish have lots of behavioral cues that got them dwelling inside anemones and dancing for mates in the wild. Designer clowns were selected for their visual deformation - or other traits by breeders in tanks without nems.

What to expect from these new breeds isn’t really well known yet, but they are often reported to be acting “weird” by many posters in threads on this site.

My observations are not validated by rigorous scientific testing, just casual observations that I have made.
 

mimi117

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some fish just weird, when my flow is at its highest for the day, my watchmen goby swims at the overflow and lets the current keep him suspended where the slats are, then he will just randomly swim back to the sand and chill, perfectly healthy, eats everyday.
 

bluemon

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My limited observations of designer clownfish is that a lot of the wild type behaviors seem to be missing in these fishes.

The clownfish have lots of behavioral cues that got them dwelling inside anemones and dancing for mates in the wild. Designer clowns were selected for their visual deformation - or other traits by breeders in tanks without nems.

What to expect from these new breeds isn’t really well known yet, but they are often reported to be acting “weird” by many posters in threads on this site.

My observations are not validated by rigorous scientific testing, just casual observations that I have made.
I wouldn’t even say this is unique for designer clownfish.

I’m pretty sure most wild phenotype clownfish are CB as well.

Unless we can tie down weird behaviors to be gene linked to certain patterns, it’s just a clown thing.
 
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villz

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some fish just weird, when my flow is at its highest for the day, my watchmen goby swims at the overflow and lets the current keep him suspended where the slats are, then he will just randomly swim back to the sand and chill, perfectly healthy, eats everyday.
That is what my friend has said that clownfish are just weird, especially the designer ones. But it such a scary little behavior like it makes me think she's dying when she's on the sand bed and like i said this is the 3rd time she's done this, in this year.
 

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