I thought Royal Grammas were PEACEFUL!!!

Well my QT tank is hosting another batch of fish for my DT.

I have a firefish, Randalls goby, royal gramma, and a tail spot blenny.

In my 20g QT tank I have a couple peices of PVC and a little dish with some sand and small rock forming a cave on it.

Everyones fine except for the gramma being REALLY territorial. Its doing its open mouth and poking at the tail spot and my randalls.

All the sites say this fish is peaceful... wth! I dont want this gramma causing all this stress on the other fish.

Think it will be alright for 4 weeks or should I return it?

 

they are not peaceful from what i have read

and you really shouldent have that many gobies/blennies in 1 small qt tank there too close geneticly

 

The goby and the blenny are getting along fine, sometimes they hang out together. I was told as long as they don't look alike it's fine.

Anyways, would a mirror taped near the grammas home be a good idea?

 

Are you 100% sure it's a royal gramma? There is a bi color dottyback that looks exactly the same and is very agressive. Although I also have a royal gramma and if a fish tries to get into the grammas cave it will open it's mouth and poke at the fish to get it to leave but it's mostly all show. But either then that it swims with my purple firefish and doesn't bug anyone else.

 

like a distraction tactic?
i mean you could try it
grammas seem to just be moody and blennies gobies and mandarins are all geneticly similar
if they look like each other its almost 100% of a fight
its more of less of 33% of a fight if there geneticly similar which these guys are

 

I'm pretty sure it's a gramma. Has the black dot and the color change is incremental and not like a stripe.

Yeah, it protects its cave but I saw it once go across the tank to the tail spot and do it for no reason. Also, it tends to happen with the lights off. With the lights on, everyone interacts fine.

 

Hhmm yeah that's odd. My gramma is also pretty small though so i don't think it wants to pick on the big fish.

 

Grammas are very territorial and will defend their staked out territory with the aggression you have seen. Smaller tanks magnify their aggression. I suggest getting a second QT tank for the gramma.

 

Since we're on the topic of royal grammas, would a coral banded shrimp pick on a royal gramma? I wake up today and my grammas fin is missing. First the firefish has missing flesh and scratch marks and now this, it's getting on my nerves now. My stocking list is yellow tang, blue tang, purple fire fish, bangaii cardinal, flame angel, spotted watchman goby, royal gramma, coral banded shrimp, cleaner shrimp, ocellaris clown fish.

 

Royal grammas are not aggressive - but are territorial. the wide open mouth thing is just a warning and only used to stake out the territory. Once he is put in the DT everything will be fine. they don't chase (main reason of stress)

how big is your tank?

all crabs can be an issue. Be sure that it is not fin rot