When to rehome a fish?

[Reef Jedi]

What is your deciding factor on when to rehome a fish?

I have a blue hippo who has become a huge bully, not allowing other fish to swim in any of the open spaces. I haven’t decided to rehome him yet however I wanted to see what your drawing line is?

Let’s have a discussion on rehoming fish.

 

[exnisstech]

For me its when aggression makes the tank unpleasant to sit back and relax watching the fish. I can't stand to watch fish aggression all day.
Is this is the reefer 500 in your tank thread? If so I'll be that guy and say the tank is too small for a large hippo and could be the cause of some of the aggression. I moved out of my 72x24x24" 180g because my tangs looked cramped, one of which was a 5yo hippo. I moved into a 84x30x24" tank and TBH I wish I had gone larger but didn't have room. It's hard to imagine how large the little quarter sized hippos being sold can get in a couple of years. My hippos have always been docile but neither were the largest tang in the tank.

 

[Reef Jedi]

For me its when aggression makes the tank unpleasant to sit back and relax watching the fish. I can't stand to watch fish aggression all day.
Is this is the reefer 500 in your tank thread? If so I'll be that guy and say the tank is too small for a large hippo and could be the cause of some of the aggression. I moved out of my 72x24x24" 180g because my tangs looked cramped, one of which was a 5yo hippo. I moved into a 84x30x24" tank and TBH I wish I had gone larger but didn't have room. It's hard to imagine how large the little quarter sized hippos being sold can get in a couple of years. My hippos have always been docile but neither were the largest tang in the tank.

Yes it is, of course he started as the size of a dime and now he’s the largest fish 2 years later. I had plans on upgrading to a 5ft tank but then we moved back in Feb and I spent my upgrade cash on buying interest points down since this market is so “great”. So I currently re arranged the rock scape to provide more negative space for swimming and re structure the territories. I was hoping that would buy a little more time so I could decide on rehoming or upgrading. In this new house i easily have space to go larger.

 

[exnisstech]

I get the mortgage game fortunately I'm no longer in the game. I refinanced 3 times the first 2 years of taking out the loan due to dropping rates. Hopefully you'll get to play that part of the game but I'm not very optimistic these days.
My current hippo is a tweener and between the size of my damsels and larger tangs and is probably why he's so mellow. For months he hung around with the chromis or damsels and now just kind of swims around alone. He will defend his place in the rocks but other than that is peaceful.

 

[KrisReef]

What is your deciding factor on when to rehome a fish?

I have a blue hippo who has become a huge bully, not allowing other fish to swim in any of the open spaces. I haven’t decided to rehome him yet however I wanted to see what your drawing line is?

Let’s have a discussion on rehoming fish.

I try not to get fish that grow into this problem, but when it happens it’s a crapshoot to predict what will happen to the other fishes if/ when you remove the apex predator and the subs start competing for the empty top spot.

Sometimes it is best to remove some of the subs to ease tensions, I try to make whatever adjustments all at once.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

I had to rehome a few because of declining tank quality. So it was either leave the fish in the tank as I reset it, or give them up and they have a better chance of surviving

 

[ReefRepublic]

What is your deciding factor on when to rehome a fish?

I have a blue hippo who has become a huge bully, not allowing other fish to swim in any of the open spaces. I haven’t decided to rehome him yet however I wanted to see what your drawing line is?

Let’s have a discussion on rehoming fish.

I had to rehome a blue hippo before for that same exact reason, my deciding factor was the other fish were getting really stressed about the whole situation

 

[BryanM]

What is your deciding factor on when to rehome a fish?

I have a blue hippo who has become a huge bully, not allowing other fish to swim in any of the open spaces. I haven’t decided to rehome him yet however I wanted to see what your drawing line is?

Let’s have a discussion on rehoming fish.

I rehome when they get problematic.

Long term you probably know, but your reefer 500 isn't big enough for that fish... Dunno how big he is today, but if he's technically outgrown the tank, this is probably the reason he has a mean streak now, he's just stressed.

Either way I'd rehome him for the reasons @exnisstech stated. Its just not fun to watch aggression all day.