Show off your tilefish!

[christinna77]

I'm both confused and intrigued by this behavior I've been noticing with my new purple tilefish They're still in QT at the moment (suspected flukes).

They started hovering vertically together a lot in the last day or two, very close or even touching each other, often with one facing head down and the other facing head up. Sometimes they'll give each other little "kisses" or small nips too. One of them may swim away, but usually returns in a bit and the hovering resumes.

I can't tell if this means I've got a pair or if they're two males/females fighting. Wouldn't it be more aggressive if they were fighting? Is this a good or bad sign? Perhaps @i cant think you've seen this before?

 

[i cant think]

I'm both confused and intrigued by this behavior I've been noticing with my new purple tilefish They're still in QT at the moment (suspected flukes).

They started hovering vertically together a lot in the last day or two, very close or even touching each other, often with one facing head down and the other facing head up. Sometimes they'll give each other little "kisses" or small nips too. One of them may swim away, but usually returns in a bit and the hovering resumes.

I can't tell if this means I've got a pair or if they're two males/females fighting. Wouldn't it be more aggressive if they were fighting? Is this a good or bad sign? Perhaps @i cant think you've seen this before?

It looks to me as though they are possibly pairing, fighting would usually be much more up front and clear, whilst minor territorial disputes or pairing IME is usually more what you’re seeing.

Id say if it was territorial, they'd be on other sides of the tank as opposed to being together.

 

[christinna77]

I'm both confused and intrigued by this behavior I've been noticing with my new purple tilefish They're still in QT at the moment (suspected flukes).

They started hovering vertically together a lot in the last day or two, very close or even touching each other, often with one facing head down and the other facing head up. Sometimes they'll give each other little "kisses" or small nips too. One of them may swim away, but usually returns in a bit and the hovering resumes.

I can't tell if this means I've got a pair or if they're two males/females fighting. Wouldn't it be more aggressive if they were fighting? Is this a good or bad sign? Perhaps @i cant think you've seen this before?

It looks to me as though they are possibly pairing, fighting would usually be much more up front and clear, whilst minor territorial disputes or pairing IME is usually more what you’re seeing.

Id say if it was territorial, they'd be on other sides of the tank as opposed to being together.

This would be absolutely amazing then. Having a pair that regularly spawns is the dream.

I've not been able to find any footage of tilefish pairing behavior, but it does remind me of how clownfish pair up in some aspects.

I still can't tell who'd be the female in this case, but it looks like the smaller one usually nips and nudges the larger one, is generally more outgoing, and patrols around the cave regularly, while the large one mostly stays put.

 

[i cant think]

This would be absolutely amazing then. Having a pair that regularly spawns is the dream.

I've not been able to find any footage of tilefish pairing behavior, but it does remind me of how clownfish pair up in some aspects.

I still can't tell who'd be the female in this case, but it looks like the smaller one usually nips and nudges the larger one, is generally more outgoing, and patrols around the cave regularly, while the large one mostly stays put.

There’s definitely times where this hobby comes in clutch for the scientific side of the reality. What scientists may often overlook because they’re not necessarily easy to observe naturally or don’t really spike scientific interest due to either being of a least concern status or not ‘EDGE’ species’ we know very little about. It’s why I love this hobby, we find out so much more than what is actually out there.


Hopefully we see at least more pairing behaviour if not spawning behaviour from these two! Just to show everyone the even more unusual side to tilefish, and help us understand more about these fish.

 

[christinna77]

These two are cracking me up today. They're so comfortable just chilling on the sand all day long.

 

[christinna77]

I made a compilation of my two purple tilefish jumping attempts. I think it really puts into perspective how common it is for them to jump out. The last clip where one of them squeezes through an egg crate hole also shows that egg crate isn't enough as a lid lol.

 

[christinna77]

@i cant think Do you have any thoughts on whether this could be still part of their pairing behavior, or whether I might have two males or two females instead?

I'm not sure whether you've been following my thread, but I've had to separate them twice now. The smaller one wouldn't stop picking at the larger one's head, which already had a secondary bacterial infection caused by flukes. He was mostly healed, so I removed the divider, but then I noticed the wound was getting worse again. I went through hours of footage and finally found more proof:



A few things:

1. Why does he just let the smaller one pick on him? Shouldn't he swim away or defend himself? He does absolutely nothing.
2. If the larger tilefish pulls through (still to be determined, he was on his death bed twice now), would it be reasonable to still put them together in my display tank? The tank is larger and has a lot more hiding spots, so I'm thinking it might work, but I'm not to sure... I suppose I could put in both of them together at the same time, or I could put in the larger one first and then the smaller one a few weeks later.

 

[i cant think]

@i cant think Do you have any thoughts on whether this could be still part of their pairing behavior, or whether I might have two males or two females instead?

I'm not sure whether you've been following my thread, but I've had to separate them twice now. The smaller one wouldn't stop picking at the larger one's head, which already had a secondary bacterial infection caused by flukes. He was mostly healed, so I removed the divider, but then I noticed the wound was getting worse again. I went through hours of footage and finally found more proof:



A few things:

1. Why does he just let the smaller one pick on him? Shouldn't he swim away or defend himself? He does absolutely nothing.
2. If the larger tilefish pulls through (still to be determined, he was on his death bed twice now), would it be reasonable to still put them together in my display tank? The tank is larger and has a lot more hiding spots, so I'm thinking it might work, but I'm not to sure... I suppose I could put in both of them together at the same time, or I could put in the larger one first and then the smaller one a few weeks later.

That looks more like bullying, as for why it’s the smaller one, I’ll use the wrasse example as it could be something along these lines (minus the protandrous hermaphroditism);
In wrasse, when the Terminal Phase Male is too old, the younger Transitional Males battle each other to assert dominance over the others, however in tanks we find when ‘pairs’ are kept, as the male gets too old to hold its own, the female usually starts the transition and bullies the male into hiding and eventually can cause death (unless separated quick enough). I have had males of the same species cohabitate, and it’s not easy but is do-able in a large enough system as long as you’re ready to pull them out if it goes wrong.

I would place them both into the display if the larger pulls through as there will not only be more areas for them to get away from, but also due to you having an already established tilefish, it could be evened out in aggression, where rather than a 1v1, it’s a 2v1 or 3v3.

 

[christinna77]

That looks more like bullying, as for why it’s the smaller one, I’ll use the wrasse example as it could be something along these lines (minus the protandrous hermaphroditism);
In wrasse, when the Terminal Phase Male is too old, the younger Transitional Males battle each other to assert dominance over the others, however in tanks we find when ‘pairs’ are kept, as the male gets too old to hold its own, the female usually starts the transition and bullies the male into hiding and eventually can cause death (unless separated quick enough). I have had males of the same species cohabitate, and it’s not easy but is do-able in a large enough system as long as you’re ready to pull them out if it goes wrong.

I would place them both into the display if the larger pulls through as there will not only be more areas for them to get away from, but also due to you having an already established tilefish, it could be evened out in aggression, where rather than a 1v1, it’s a 2v1 or 3v3.

That's a really interesting example. Thank you for taking the time to answer! The only difference is that tilefish don't change sex, so based on what we've seen, could we assume they're the same sex?

And that's good advice, thank you. I plan to rearrange the rockwork just a bit before putting them in. That should hopefully help with my existing tilefish too, although he's been very tolerant of other fish venturing into the same cave where he's at.

I'm still confused about why the larger one didn't seem to defend himself, though. Does this happen with wrasses too, where the older one just lets the younger one keep attacking him until he's seriously injured? I'm quite certain he's still got some growing to do and isn't too old, but perhaps the smaller tilefish could sense he was already weak from the flukes...