Sand Sifting Madness!!!!!!

I have never been able to keep this fish long term myself. I also found it impossible to keep this fish with "sand dwelling" corals like open brains and fungia. The fish constantly dumped sand on these corals regardless of where they sat in the tank.

 

This has not been my experience at all. My Diamond Gobies are sitting on the sand and it goes through their gills and back on the sandbed. They don't fly over corals and drop bombs.

I still have tons of bugs crawling all over my rocks and my sand and corals look great.

My only drawback has been having to put more food in the tank and making sure they get some. But all seems well. I've had these for a few months now. Previously I had one for quite a while in another tank before it jumped out. They are jumpers.

 

Well that just goes to show you how the same species of fish can have different personalities between them. I have tangs that eat LPS corals. You never know.

However my comments are specifically targeted towards the strigata species. Everything I have experienced with them, and read about them in published articles says the behavior I stated is the rule, not the exception. As always ymmv.

 

Ok we have to add this to the acronym/glossary I am pushing soon. What does it mean?

 

LOL, Your Mileage May Vary.

 

Ahhh..

 

I agree with justphish. If you have corals and invertebrates, it is very important to have an established and varied deep sand bed with many different living organisms in it. The more diverse and the greater the amount of living organisms we have, living in our sand bed the better, for our reef inhabitants.
If you purchase a sand sifting goby(sleeper, shrimp) then what you are doing is going against that rule, by wiping out beneficial microfauna etc. from your gravel bed.
Not to mention what they do as far as debris on your corals(ie. plate).

 

Well, after coming home to my hammer and sun corals getting buried alive, and reading the article JP showed me, and just looking at my tank, he's coming out. Tomorrow morning. God this is gonna SUCK! But like I said, that's what I get. I preach that you should research an animal before an impulse buy. Then what did I go and do? An impulse buy. And it's costing me already.............. :-[

 

OK he's outta there. I only had to tear down about half the tank, so it wasn't as bad as it could have been. I did it early so the tank would have a couple hours to settle down before the lights came on full blown. So hopefully it will be a normal day for the corals and stuff. For anyone who buys on impulse like this, let this be a lesson! I know I will NEVER do it again.

 

I feel your pain. I had to tear down all of the rockwork in my 90 gallon to catch a type of wrasse that, unbeknown to me, develops a taste for sps coral polyps when it reaches maturity. It was a 4 line wrasse in case anyone is wondering