Fish suddenly hiding after feeding ... ?

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Yeah. We humans quickly learn that every fish has as much personality as any other living being

I wonder if in the rush to grab the food she got poked by accident with one of the Foxface's spines? just a little accidental collision.. she looked distressed last night and this was the fish, in the bag before I got her into the tank was just so chill, looking around like "sup dude?" ... I put her in the tank and within 1 minute she was grazing and acting like a veteran resident. Crazy... I just fed some pellets and everyone looks pretty much back to normal now.. whew. I might have overreacted a bit but it was pretty weird. Thanks for all of the responses!
 

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I wonder if in the rush to grab the food she got poked by accident with one of the Foxface's spines? just a little accidental collision.. she looked distressed last night and this was the fish, in the bag before I got her into the tank was just so chill, looking around like "sup dude?" ... I put her in the tank and within 1 minute she was grazing and acting like a veteran resident. Crazy... I just fed some pellets and everyone looks pretty much back to normal now.. whew. I might have overreacted a bit but it was pretty weird. Thanks for all of the responses!

I suppose it’s possible. Although from what I’ve seen and read fish get pretty stunned and messed up for a good while from a foxface sting. I’m not sure if they can give dry stings like some vipers can (bite without injecting venom). And my pleasure. That’s what R2R is here for!
 
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I suppose it’s possible. Although from what I’ve seen and read fish get pretty stunned and messed up for a good while from a foxface sting. I’m not sure if they can give dry stings like some vipers can (bite without injecting venom). And my pleasure. That’s what R2R is here for!
Gotcha that makes sense.. yeah I was reading ff sting can be deadly on another thread here.. idk something happened but seems to be sorted... maybe new tank syndrome hah... just going to wait another couple weeks at least before adding more.. my LFS is hunting down a six line wrasse and flame hawk for adding next.. but going to let things chill here for a while before doing that.
 
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So I think it might have been the lighting.. I upped the lights that day and forgot to write that in my log.. went from blue35 to 45 and white25 to 40.. yesterday things seemed ok ish but today everyone was hiding until I turned the lights back to 35/30. I'll up them very very slowly in increments of 1 per channel when I do. I was just trying to get the coraline algae going but should be fine at this level. As soon as I dropped the lights the kole and foxface came out.. the sailfin is still be very timid and kind of going in and out of it's hide-ee-hole. Looking around a bit and then going back in.. weird. as I said everyone had been grazing the rocks all day every day since about a day after I put them in.. it's coming up on two weeks. Yeah still really new I know.
 
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So... they’re still doing this.. it’s so weird. I let them go all day without feeding. They were all out acting free and normal.. grazing and chill.. then fed them some theta A pellets around 3pm and they ate them very ... uhh. Sort of frantically a bit.. darting after food and scaring each other in the process... then they all hide ... it’s like feeding time is stressful ... how can I make this less stressful for them??
 

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So... they’re still doing this.. it’s so weird. I let them go all day without feeding. They were all out acting free and normal.. grazing and chill.. then fed them some theta A pellets around 3pm and they ate them very ... uhh. Sort of frantically a bit.. darting after food and scaring each other in the process... then they all hide ... it’s like feeding time is stressful ... how can I make this less stressful for them??

how big is your tank? Perhaps having a couple areas where you put the food in would help? I admit I’m just spitballing here but I do want to help
 
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how big is your tank? Perhaps having a couple areas where you put the food in would help? I admit I’m just spitballing here but I do want to help
It’s a 100g 60x18x20... long and not too high.. maybe I need to turn the circulation pumps off during feeding time??
 
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They’re terrified of going out of hiding after that first feeding... I feel like I need more fish to balance the community... so they know it’s ok out there...
 

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They’re terrified of going out of hiding after that first feeding... I feel like I need more fish to balance the community... so they know it’s ok out there...

actually that’s a good point whats your stock list? I recall you saying you have a sailfin. Do you have any dither fish (fish that just hang out in the water column)? For whatever reason, others and in this case even I, have found it helps having such fish because it helps other tankmates feel more secure about going out and about
 
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actually that’s a good point whats your stock list? I recall you saying you have a sailfin. Do you have any dither fish (fish that just hang out in the water column)? For whatever reason, others and in this case even I, have found it helps having such fish because it helps other tankmates feel more secure about going out and about
No dither fish.. it’s a sailfin, foxface, and kole tang... I’m looking to add more soon.. I think I need more so the community feels more comfortable... what are good dither fish??
 
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Also I might need to change the flow I have in front of the rock structure... it’s pretty strong but not ridiculous ...
 
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I adjusted my flow and been raising my salinity ... silly plastic hydrometer was reading high - got a floating glass one and it read 1.020!!! Crazy.. it’s up to 1.024ish now... the fish seem better... they’re still skittish but are out grazing mostly all day.. I’ve watched my fire shrimp cleaning them all too... I saw one jumping on the sailfin and sort of riding it but it couldn’t swim well with a shrimp hanging on the side lol. Still it’s nice to see my tank mates all getting along better... need to think about adding more fish soon... maybe a pair of clowns and a six line wrasse. .
 
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So.. I just wanted to follow up on this. I got my water salinity under control and finally had to get rid of the kole tang.. it was being super aggressive with it's two tank mates at times... swimming rapidly from one end of the tank to the other - sort of frantically.. then hiding in a cave. When I tried to add more fish it went berserk - looked like it was going to kill the coral beauty and chased the flame hawk a lot too... so I bit the bullet and pulled all of the rock, caught it, took it to the LFS, then went home and re-scaped. As soon as I got that one out of the tank the whole mood relaxed like 10x... even while I re-scaped. Everyone is doing great now... Just wanted to follow up on this.
 
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