Shrinking Yellow Clown Goby

[Liz]

Hi all,

Wondered if any one had any advice for treating a shrinking yellow clown goby? He is sharing my large leather coral with my two clown fish who treat him as their pet. I have a green one who is very happy and normal.

I'm convinced he is getting longer and thinner each week. He eats (all be it very small amounts and is quite choosy) but he is getting thinner. He spends most of this time in the coral but at feeding times he swims about in the open picking at bits of food for a while. He seems quite active just worryingly thin. I feed a huge variety of frozen and dried foods as well as phytoplankton and marine snow. Just wondering whether any one has any advice. I'm worried he will waste away.

I've dosed the tank with a general pasasite and bacterial meds a few weeks ago as a result of an out break of whitespot. He was thin before this outbreak but I would have thought if he had a parasite this would have eliminated it. No other fish have these symptoms.

I've even tried garlic guard to increase his appetite but to no real avail.

Tank parameters are all normal and stable and the tank has been set up for 3 yrs but dismantled and moved a year ago.

Please help.
Thanks
Liz

 

[steve-s]

How large is the tank?

Contrary to popular belief, these small gobies do very poorly in small tanks. They need a large supply of live planktonic foods to thrive. Larger systems are usually the best in keeping them healthy. You could try blender mush, sometimes the micron size of the food plays a serious role. Be sure it is vitamin fortified as well.

Cheers
Steve

 

[Liz]

Hi Steve. Sorry i sould have said. My tank is 100 gallons. I also forgot to add I have been adding a vitamin supplement along with the garlic guard (but not on an everyday basis).

He seems very interested in the food just doesn't seem to be eating enough to sustain his weight. He gets just as excited at the addition of food as everyone else. Just seems really odd that my green goby is happy when the yellow one isn't.

I think he started loosing weight from his trip over the wier. He decided to investigate the other side of the divide to see if the grass was greener on the other side. I had to dismantel the filtration system to get at him (little bu**er). He wasn't injured in the process as far as i am aware though he may be psycologically scarred.
He's such a lovely little fish I don't want to loose him.

I'll keep trying with the vitamins and garlic guard and try blended mush too. Do you recommend any particular foods for yellow clown gobies. Perhaps i just haven't found his chocolate yet.

Thanks
Liz

 

[steve-s]

Green clown gobies are often much easier to keep than their yellow cousins. The Citron (Gobiodon citrinis) being easier than the yellow clown (Gobiodon okinawae). The green and Citrus do not seem to be as picky an eater as the all yellow clown goby. I find more commonly it's the micron size of the foods fed than the type. I like you have seen they do quite aggressively get into at feeding time but quickly lose interest.

What I would suggest is reducing your food sizes with a blender. Mysis and brine these days tend to be too large and meaty which they cannot consume. More often than not they end up eating the smaller "husks" and not the nutritious meaty bits. Hikari branded frozen meat products seem to be the smallest so you might try that. You can also try some Cyclop-eeze products. Overall I don't think it's food type but rather food size.

I find they do best in a tank with a heavy & thriving population of live mysid shrimp especially.

Cheers
Steve