Thalasstronaut
Active Member
So I added a Link’s Goby to my tank after seeing him at an LFS. I had done my research and decided if I ever saw a robust looking specimen, I’d give it a shot, and this guy was fat and even had some iridescence to him. Awesome.
He’s maybe 2 inches or so, I’ve had him a while. My kids asked the other day how big he would get and I said he was probably close to full grown. I did a quick Google image search to verify. And discovered that I don’t have a Link’s Goby.
Not that they are especially similar looking, but the light bulb clicked on as soon as I saw a picture of an actual Link’s Goby. What I have is, correct me if I’m wrong here, a Sleeper Banded Goby, aka Sphinx or Dragon or Bullet goby.
Which, while really cool, is not really what I intended to get. I had considered them at one point, but I know they get big and move a lot of sand.
Now. I run a 90 gallon tank with an RUGF, the plates run from the back of my tank and stop about 6 inches short of one side and the whole front. I have dolomite gravel over the plates and a special grade sand perimeter, with a small transition area. No corals yet but it will be a very simple soft tank.
I’m not terribly worried about the plates getting clogged by displaced sand, I have a pretty good gravel layer, and this is a short term (say about 2 or 3 years) tank before I put in a larger one.
My biggest issue is how compatible a relatively small sand area is with an SBG. He does indeed sift sand and is constantly picking at the gravel and rocks. I have a good amount of copepods and I feed live baby brine and black worms throughout the week. (Two days of worms, three days with BB) plus reef frenzy and fish frenzy in the rotation. He seems to eat just about everything, so I’m cautiously optimistic he won’t starve for lack of critters in the sand. The other concern is that I do keep a mandarin and a dragon pipefish in the same tank, and if this goby is going to further stress the pod population, I might have to make some changes.
The system itself is over a year old, but the substrate was changed when I moved tanks about a month ago. So I can’t imagine there’s all that much going on in there. Is this a case where I should preempt a possible problem and rehome him? I haven’t been back to the PetCo where I got him since I made the purchase but I am 100% certain the tag said Link’s Goby, and he was only $20, while SBGs usually go for about double that. Not that that really matters, I guess.
So in this situation, what would everyone do?
And a full tank shot to visualize the amount of sand:
He’s maybe 2 inches or so, I’ve had him a while. My kids asked the other day how big he would get and I said he was probably close to full grown. I did a quick Google image search to verify. And discovered that I don’t have a Link’s Goby.
Not that they are especially similar looking, but the light bulb clicked on as soon as I saw a picture of an actual Link’s Goby. What I have is, correct me if I’m wrong here, a Sleeper Banded Goby, aka Sphinx or Dragon or Bullet goby.
Which, while really cool, is not really what I intended to get. I had considered them at one point, but I know they get big and move a lot of sand.
Now. I run a 90 gallon tank with an RUGF, the plates run from the back of my tank and stop about 6 inches short of one side and the whole front. I have dolomite gravel over the plates and a special grade sand perimeter, with a small transition area. No corals yet but it will be a very simple soft tank.
I’m not terribly worried about the plates getting clogged by displaced sand, I have a pretty good gravel layer, and this is a short term (say about 2 or 3 years) tank before I put in a larger one.
My biggest issue is how compatible a relatively small sand area is with an SBG. He does indeed sift sand and is constantly picking at the gravel and rocks. I have a good amount of copepods and I feed live baby brine and black worms throughout the week. (Two days of worms, three days with BB) plus reef frenzy and fish frenzy in the rotation. He seems to eat just about everything, so I’m cautiously optimistic he won’t starve for lack of critters in the sand. The other concern is that I do keep a mandarin and a dragon pipefish in the same tank, and if this goby is going to further stress the pod population, I might have to make some changes.
The system itself is over a year old, but the substrate was changed when I moved tanks about a month ago. So I can’t imagine there’s all that much going on in there. Is this a case where I should preempt a possible problem and rehome him? I haven’t been back to the PetCo where I got him since I made the purchase but I am 100% certain the tag said Link’s Goby, and he was only $20, while SBGs usually go for about double that. Not that that really matters, I guess.
So in this situation, what would everyone do?
And a full tank shot to visualize the amount of sand:
