Help with my green bird wrasse

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Ev8siveaz

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This and its cousin the brown bird wrasse seem to be lazy until food hits the water and then theyre wind-up toys
Not mine. For the last year and a half he is non stop. He never stops swimming until lights out. He such a picky eater and honestly always has been. He eats when he wants to. He's the most difficult fish I've dealt with in my years of fish keeping.
 
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@vetteguy53081 @MnFish1 unfortunately the moving the rocks didnt work. The bird wrasse is back to non stop attacking the yellow tang. This has been my final straw with this tank. My last 2 (which I had for years at a time) I did not have the issues I do with the upgrade to this tank. It has been a year and a half of just stress. I am going to call my lfs today and make plans to donate my whole setup. I really appreciate all the help.
 

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@vetteguy53081 @MnFish1 unfortunately the moving the rocks didnt work. The bird wrasse is back to non stop attacking the yellow tang. This has been my final straw with this tank. My last 2 (which I had for years at a time) I did not have the issues I do with the upgrade to this tank. It has been a year and a half of just stress. I am going to call my lfs today and make plans to donate my whole setup. I really appreciate all the help.
Aggression war is not uncommon and I would not let a fish take you down. I have 20 tangs and they can be real Jerks. As hard as it is to do, I would eliminate the tang or both and start with a new grouping such as school of chromis, firefish or dwarf angels mixed with other smaller fish.
 
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Aggression war is not uncommon and I would not let a fish take you down. I have 20 tangs and they can be real Jerks. As hard as it is to do, I would eliminate the tang or both and start with a new grouping such as school of chromis, firefish or dwarf angels mixed with other smaller fish.
@vetteguy53081 It is hard because I've had the tang for 4 plus years and multiple setups and the bird wrasse is my absolute favorite fish and why I ended up getting a bigger tank to accommodate. I did have a thought. About a month ago I took a friend's orange back fairy wrasse since he was rehoming. Now neither show aggression towards it but is it possible that it could be female and is triggering the burd wrasse to pick on "competition ". Not sure how all that works but I realized it was a recent change made to the tank.
 

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@vetteguy53081 It is hard because I've had the tang for 4 plus years and multiple setups and the bird wrasse is my absolute favorite fish and why I ended up getting a bigger tank to accommodate. I did have a thought. About a month ago I took a friend's orange back fairy wrasse since he was rehoming. Now neither show aggression towards it but is it possible that it could be female and is triggering the burd wrasse to pick on "competition ". Not sure how all that works but I realized it was a recent change made to the tank.
I have 6 yellows going on 6 years and despite their attitudes, I too cannot separate from them. It is very possible Fairy wrasse has triggered Hierarchy and caused behavioral issue. You could separate it or place in acclimation box or even have LFS hold onto it and see if everything changes
 
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I have 6 yellows going on 6 years and despite their attitudes, I too cannot separate from them. It is very possible Fairy wrasse has triggered Hierarchy and caused behavioral issue. You could separate it or place in acclimation box or even have LFS hold onto it and see if everything changes
@vetteguy53081 I noticed still that the yellow tang would not let the bird wrasse out of his hiding spot. Every time he tried to leave the tang would attack with his tail. I decided to break the tank down and captured the yellow tang and Niger trigger. I took them to my lfs and he suggested that I leave them there for a week and then reintroduce back into my tank. He said this most likely would fix the territorial issues with them as they would now be the "new fish". Do you think that's a good process going forward or will things most likely go back to how they were? Curious on your thoughts.
 

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@vetteguy53081 I noticed still that the yellow tang would not let the bird wrasse out of his hiding spot. Every time he tried to leave the tang would attack with his tail. I decided to break the tank down and captured the yellow tang and Niger trigger. I took them to my lfs and he suggested that I leave them there for a week and then reintroduce back into my tank. He said this most likely would fix the territorial issues with them as they would now be the "new fish". Do you think that's a good process going forward or will things most likely go back to how they were? Curious on your thoughts.
Maybe- two weeks would be more of a separation period
 

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When I have a problem fish, especially one that has grown up and developed a problem I take those to the LFS and let them rehome it. I know the bird is your favorite fish and the yellow is fighting with it so I would get rid of at least one of those fishes to establish peace back home. I don't like watching fish fight either and some fish just have a mean streak that causes them to be warriors 24/7 as they grow. Give it away and hopefully someone with a large agressive tank will take it in and it will have to learn to behave in the new ocean home. It gives the fish a chance at happiness that it isn't finding in your tank, sorry.

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otherwise you are just going to have to learn to enjoy the battle. :)
 
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When I have a problem fish, especially one that has grown up and developed a problem I take those to the LFS and let them rehome it. I know the bird is your favorite fish and the yellow is fighting with it so I would get rid of at least one of those fishes to establish peace back home. I don't like watching fish fight either and some fish just have a mean streak that causes them to be warriors 24/7 as they grow. Give it away and hopefully someone with a large agressive tank will take it in and it will have to learn to behave in the new ocean home. It gives the fish a chance at happiness that it isn't finding in your tank, sorry.

princess love GIF
otherwise you are just going to have to learn to enjoy the battle. :)
@KrisReef Thanks for the input. I appreciate it. I agree with this and it was my mindset the whole way. I honestly took them both originally to have them rehomed (as much as I didn't want to do it). I had dealt with numerous issues with my trigger being aggressive from time to time so I made the decision that if I was going to take the time to break down the tank to get the tang I may as well get him out too and start fresh. The owner of the lfs was the one that suggested I do a timeout when I took them in to rehome. As much as it pains me to give them away, I feel that it was what I needed to do. My fear was that I'd give them away and all this time my bird wrasse really was sick or something and then he passes and I don't have my other fish either. He's still not eating much and won't go for food when I feed the others. He only will take food that I leave in the sand or on rocks for him when nothing else is around. I would imagine this behavior is more from the stress and aggression than being sick but I wanted to make sure. He is definitely out and swimming a lot more like he used to. Just not eating like a pig like he used to. Hopefully that all makes sense.
 

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