Whats wrong with Clownfish?

[mmaglione]

All i have a clownfish, standard orange and white thats been around for a year now. I rescently added a black false perculous clown and they have fought for a few days now. The thing is , is that the orange clown has always been fine. Now today after changing my water column from high nitrates, low ph and ick... im noticing that the clown is holding his mouth open constantly like a dog would if he was panting. The clowns breathing seems normal however his mouth is hanging open. Im concerned because this did not happen before. What are some thoughts as to what it could be ? just stress? Is this a symptom for something? doesnt seem to be normal behavior for this particular clown. The black clown seems fine, just stressed from getting picked on. I have a 55G tank.

 

[six2sevenproductions]

What are your levels? Sounds like that fish is not gettting enough oxygen. Try getting that PH up.

 

[iDream]

They might just be establishing dominance, are the clowns about the same size?

 

[mmaglione]

Clwons

Yeah both clowns are the same size. levels are fine except low ph at 7.8, low salinity at 1.20 and high nitrates at 80. I did a 60% water change as i had ich as well and now that the nitrates are lower, ph is balanced and salinity is closer to 1.23, the clown seemed to have stopped the behavior, i'll continue to monitor him, thanks all.

 

[PrettyFishies]

If you have Ich in the tank you need to get fish out and into a quarantine tank for treatment. If you leave the fish in the tank with Ich, the parasites will just reproduce and come back tenfold.