Which Anthias?

After reading about the Anthias I am very confused. Some say a certain species is peaceful so I search it and I learn that it's aggressive to some fish so people recommend another anthias. I search that supposedly more peaceful anthias and still there are posts that it's also agressive, followed by another recommendation for a "peaceful" anthias that again turns out not so peaceful in peoples threads. So which anthias species is the peaceful one? I want 2 or 3 max but I need some that are peaceful as I have a bangaii cardinal and firefish that get spooked easily. Thanks for any help.

 

My 2 cents; No Anthias. One of the species that for 90% of the reef keeping hobbyist population is better left to the ocean.

 

Ok point taken. I'm trying to create a colorful assortment of peaceful reef fish and unfortunately the Anthias one of the nicest looking to me. It's there any other colorful, fluorescent reef fish that anyone can recommend?

 

What size tank? I'm not saying you should necessarily try anthias on a whole, but be 100% sure you have exactly what they need in terms of feeding routine, light choice, mesh top, species choice (Ie. No purple queen anthias), etc.

 

Definitely NOT purple queens. For the very Very VERY experienced and prepared professional aquarist.

I would not recommend any of them if you have less than a 75 Gallon tank. Reason for this is that they do better in harems of 3 or more. Each species is a tad different, but in harems, their aggression is usually directed against the others of it's own species.

 

The tank is 125g 6ft with a canopy although it wouldn't stop the fish from jumping onto my leds or cross braces which i heard happens. Lighting is bright and i would need an auto feeder since I'm hardly home.

This is also what I've heard but then i also read all of them turning male and killing each other off or even staying female and the females picking on each other which just adds to the confusion.

 

Off the top of my head, I can't think of a saltwater fish that isn't aggressive to some others (depending on tank size and landscaping). The peaceful label is relative to other saltwater fish.

Blue reef chromis are usually pretty decent, and cheap so if you have to get rid of them you aren't losing hundreds.

 

Generally, the trouble with many anthias species is that they'll be fine for a while, and once settled, they begin to pick each other off until one is left, which is why we have a single P. flavoguttaus with half a tail that will never grow back (it resides with our OSFF with no problems). The nice thing is that they generally keep their squabbles among themselves.

The two species we've had the best success with are O. borbonius (blotched anthias) and P. squamapinnis (lyretail anthias). The blotchies were simply amazing fish that we had for several years, as were the lyretails (IIRC, we the last one was over 8 years in our care).

Get them on the small side, and get all females, as the dominant fish of each group will become a male.

 

I love the blotched anthias but they are pricey. If you want a nice peaceful free swimming pink fish look at flasher wrasse.

 

Which flasher wrasse, the carpenters or McCoskers flasher wrasse?