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Hmm, that's interesting... perhaps that's why they go end to end, chasing a reflection that's always in front of them rather than fighting in one spot like with a actual mirror? But no, they wouldn't be seeing themselves in the reflection @90*. But mine will definitely not do it if the glass is very dirty, they must see something. Hmm, very interesting...
Lol, no. The inside of the aquarium glass is not mirrored. If it was, you would see a mirror when you looked through the tank front to back or from one side through to the other side. The water adds the refractive effect when viewed from an angle.Hmm, that's interesting... perhaps that's why they go end to end, chasing a reflection that's always in front of them rather than fighting in one spot like with a actual mirror? But no, they wouldn't be seeing themselves in the reflection @90*. But mine will definitely not do it if the glass is very dirty, they must see something. Hmm, very interesting...
Guess I need to get a tank big enough that I can climb inside to fully understand thisLol, no. The inside of the aquarium glass is not mirrored. If it was, you would see a mirror when you looked through the tank front to back or from one side through to the other side. The water adds the refractive effect when viewed from an angle.
If I’m looking from side to side, that’s not 90 degrees, is it ? Rather 180 ?The mirror effect we see when we look through one pane and view the one 90 degrees from it is a refractive phenomenon. It's not what the fish see.
That’s too dense for me to read and understand tonight. I was never good at physics either so I wouldn’t dare try to argument…
glass shows reflections when there's a substantial difference in the amount of light on both sides (i.e. when one side is light and the other dark, the side with more light will start reflecting). So, if the lights are off outside of the tank but you have moonlighting or something on the inside of the tank, it's possible that the amount of light in the tank is enough to cause reflections on the glass.
I have no idea if this is the problem for your tank, but if it is you could just light up the dark side and the reflection would go away, or you could block the light from hitting the light side and that should get rid of the reflection as well. For it being lighter in the tank and darker out of it, I've seen someone put a white piece of paper on the outside of the their tank to reduce the light difference inside vs. outside, and that successfully eliminated the reflection they were getting; some other suggestions include blocking the light from hitting the glass inside, or putting little LED's around the outside to light it out and decrease the difference in light.
Regardless of if this is what's causing problems for you or not, though, I hope you're able to figure out what's wrong soon - best of luck!
As I mentioned in my initial post, these reflections appear when one side of the glass is brightly lit and the other side is much darker.
So, to get rid of the reflection, try lighting up the outside of the tank and see if that helps. One way you could do this is by running some LED strips around the outside of the tank so that they light up the glass. This thread might give you some more ideas too:
Moorish Idol attacking reflection
Added a Moorish Idol into my tank maybe 3 months ago now, knock on wood he's been great so far and made it through QT like a champ. In the last 2 days though I noticed he's starting to constantly attack the left side of my tank, like adamantly fighting with what I assume is his reflection. I...www.reef2reef.com
^^^^^Have you tried literally lighting up just the outside of the tank where the tang glass surfs?
Thank you! You beat me to it.The mirror effect we see when we look through one pane and view the one 90 degrees from it is a refractive phenomenon. It's not what the fish see.
I haven’t but I will give it a shot tomorrow. And also try blocking the lighter side instead of the darker side, as you suggest.Have you tried literally lighting up just the outside of the tank where the tang glass surfs? It sounds like you've already partially tested this, but another possibility for the light/reflection thing:
That makes sense.I think it is trying to find a way out of the tank with the hopes of finding a suitable mate for routine spawning purposes.
Yes, that's due to the refraction I posted about earlier. But the fish is not looking at the right side glass through the front glass. If you stand on the left side of your tank and look through the left glass to the right glass, there will be no reflection.Here you can see reflection on the right side, where the fish surfs. You can clearly see the powerheads and firefish have relections.
Yes, that’s right.Yes, that's due to the refraction I posted about earlier. But the fish is not looking at the right side glass through the front glass. If you stand on the left side of your tank and look through the left glass to the right glass, there will be no reflection.
I think it’s just a coincidence everyone was there when I took the video. He’s all on his own now and most of the time.Looks like many of the fish are enjoying swimming in that area of the tank.
Here is the tang glass surfing (turn your volume down, I was on hold on the phone).
I had to step away from the tank or else he came to be fed.
eta : I can’t seem to be able to post this video like I always do.
No, I didn’t have a chance yet. Too much to do today.Did you try putting a light outside the tank yet?
@Reefering1 prompted me to take a second look at this in another thread, so I've been re-reading a bit and this got me thinking: I doubt the fish would be trying to avoid the shrimp (to my understanding, cleaner shrimp can annoy fish, but they shouldn't scare the fish to the other side of the tank; and pistol shrimp aren't aggressive like they're often portrayed to be, rather they really seem to just be defensive of their burrows, so they shouldn't scare fish to the other side of a tank either).No, I didn’t have a chance yet. Too much to do today.
I’ll report when I do it.
@KrisReef I kept thinking about what you said about the fish liking the right side of the tank. I had noticed it too a few weeks ago and started feeding in the middle, instead of this side. So far it hasn’t changed their behavior.
The cleaner shrimp hangs out on the other side, and so does the pistol shrimp. I wonder if they are just trying to avoid them? It’s kind of sad to have a big tank and the fish only use half of it.
It might not have anything to do with the tang surfing though.