New Clownfish

I have a new tank set up Dec 6th. I only had a 6 line wrasse and some cleaner crew until yesterday, it is a 29g nano cube done with cured live rock and Nutri seawater. tested water and all levels are great, ph is 8.2 and amonia and nitrate are at top of colour chart.
This morning my new clownfish that had been at the lfs for over a week and looked great there, were on the bottom of the tank, one almost over on his side. Do they sleep that way? I know the Wrasse was bothering them when I put them in, could he have worried them into a stress?
I am new and worried for them. Is it normal for them to go to the bottom at night. Could I have too much oxygen in the tank, my water level was low and some bubbles were getting into the tank. I forgot to top up water when I dripped the fish in.(added a skunk shrimp with them and he is fine)
Thanks,
Ed

 

eddy, when you say top of the scale do you mean 0?
to much oxygen - that cant happen, to little can, but I dont think thats the issue.

clown fish do adopt some strange positions when at rest so hopefully thats all this is

but I am worried because you have a tank thats only 22 days old, that has already got 3 fish, a shrimp and a CUC in it and maybe its that the new fish are suffering from new tank syndrome which is a popular term to describe fish being poisoned by their own wastes in a tank that has yet to cycle adequately

your levels might be right, but thats simply because the required peaks have not yet been reached, rather than they have occured and its over

if the fish show clouding of the eyes that a sure sign of ammonia poisoning

to put it into perspective my 75 was 3 months old before I added my 3rd fish.

1st week after set up with base rock - 2 x YTB damsels where added
1 month - part CUC was added
2 month - balance of CUC was added
3 Month - banana wrasse was added

you cant build you stock up to slowly, Ed, but you can do it to fast

Steve

 

Good post Steve. adding fish to a tank should be done very slowly especially when its new. going slowly will help minimize the risk of something bad happening and will give you more time to react without overwhelming the system. You need to give the tank time to build up the bacteria it needs before going all out. Since you already have all the livestock in there you are going to have to keep up with the params and may have to do more frequent WC's until everything stabalizes out.

 

OK thanks Guys!!
They are doing good now, so I will keep an eye on the prams as you said.

 

are they doing ok?

 

They are doing great now!!! Swimming around and eating. I think it was just so early and I didn't realize how they sleep. I feel pretty silly now about it. But thanks for the good advice about everything else.
My Prams are right on target as well.

 

Eddy,

You are not alone as far as the "sleep scare" with new clowns...I got my clown pair home, got them all settled in, enjoyed the evening watching them etc etc...

Woke up early the next morning (still pretty dark out) come down to see the fish and just about had a coronary when all i see is both of them sort of slowly flopping on the surface on their sides. Trust me, I panicked a bit too and could not figure out what I had done to cause this. Granted i was NOT a member of 3reef at the time (unfortunate for me) - but I started googling like mad only to read about the goofy sleeping habits of clownfish.

Needless to say, they straightened right up once I had the lights on and drapes opened and went about their business (i am willing to bet they were also laughing at me for being such a spaz). I wound up suggesting to my LFS that they might want to try to remember to warn "clown newbies" about this little phenomenon.

As far as feeling silly - I did too - how fortunate you had the support of 3reef to go to when this happened. I am glad all is well for you and the clowns.