How Much Love Is Too Much Love?

[jbacker7]

I recently acquired a haddoni carpet anemone.

It came in healthy, and has been thriving for the past 3 weeks.

Today I introduced my 4 saddleback clowns. The female is about 3.5" - 3", dominant male 3" - 2.5", subdominant male 2.5" - 2", smallest male 2"

Everything went ok today, the female and dominant male have been with the anemone mostly and have been a little rough, but nothing major.

Tonight I come downstairs and the female is thrashing around the anemone like she's stuck in a plastic bag. It's quite violent.

All 4 clowns are on / under the anemone for the night.


At what point here or what do I need to be watching for to make the call to pull the clowns? I want to make sure I get them out before they do any real damage to the anemone.


Thank you,


Jacob

 

[CrayHawk]

Sounds like typical behavior establishing immunity. Occurs frequently when clowns are exposed to a host anemone for the first time.

 

[D-Nak]

Sounds like typical behavior establishing immunity. Occurs frequently when clowns are exposed to a host anemone for the first time.

I wouldn't call it typical behavior if the OP is describing it as violent.

@jbacker7 How big are the clownfish in comparison to the haddoni? Is the haddoni in a deep sand bed and able to retract under the sand? Do the clownfish every try to "dive bomb" into the mouth?

If the haddoni is annoyed it'll try to retract under the sand. If the haddoni's mouth becomes lose or remains open, that would be an indicator that it's time to separate the clowns from the anemone.

 

[jbacker7]

Wow, thank you @D-Nak, that is very thorough.

The haddoni is 8" - 10" in diameter.

Yes, it is in approximately 3" - 4" of sand. It never looked like it was trying to retract and hide from the clowns. It was actually extended upwards for a good part of the evening which looks strange and seemed to be concerning, although that may just be my inexperience showing.

No dive bombing on this one. The anemone has been able to keep a tightly closed mouth so far.

Today the female is being much more gentle on the anemone. The dominant male is allowed to come in, but the other smaller two males have only been allowed to come to the anemone at night.

Everyone is much calmer today. The anemone's oral disk is lying much more open / relaxed closer to the sand bed. Its column is not extended upwards. Its mouth remains closed.

I think that @CrayHawk was mostly correct with the aggressive behavior being mostly attributed to new exposure. Also, I did a test a couple different times last night after I noticed the violence, and I think I may have been startling the fish by turning on lights as I entered the basement as well. When I came down in the dark I did not observe the erratic, violent behavior.

I've attached a photo (taken now) for reference on today's situation. Looking pretty good I say.

Thanks very much to you both. I'll keep an eye out and post again if anything changes.

Jacob