Purple firefish going on 3rd week of hiding.

[DragonForce]

I have a really pretty purple firefire in my reef that only hides all day. He/she eats during feeding time but hides in the corner behind a rock the rest of the time. The firefish is housed in a 37g mixed reef with 2 true percula clownfish. Do you think he needs a friend? is my reef too small for more than 1? will they get along? or should I just wait it out and the little guy will eventually come out? Thank you for looking!

 

[melosu58]

How about the clowns. Are they picking on the firefish? As long as he is eating, that is good news.

 

[DragonForce]

It looks like the male swims over near where the firefish is hiding every once in a while so I think that would be a yes.

 

[loyalrogue]

The purple firefish (Nemateleotris decora) do not buddy-up well with other purple firefish in the way that regular, red (Nemateleotris magnifica) firefish do.

Yes, they do hide a lot, and that's only natural behavior for them.
The red firefish also like to hide, but not near as much as the purple ones do.

Also, both species are bigtime jumpers.
If they get startled, they go carpet-surfing real quick.
It's highly recommended to keep a cover (or eggcrate) over their tank.

I've got a cover over 80-90% of my tank and just this weekend one of mine managed to find an uncovered spot big enough to hit dry land.
The wife noticed him barely in time, and I got him back in the water and breathing again.
He was still in "critical condition" after half a day, and I haven't seen him since yesterday afternoon.
Hopefully he's hiding in the rock piles recovering still.

*crosses fingers*

 

[melosu58]

It looks like the male swims over near where the firefish is hiding every once in a while so I think that would be a yes.

I believe this is the problem. You might have to take him back to the LFS if the clowns dont quit hounding him.

 

[DragonForce]

Bleh, I won't be able to catch this guy thats for sure. Maybe I need to add another fish to keep the clowns at bay in their host frogspawn more. They seemed like nicer fish when my 6line was around

 

[Ksnell]

I was just facing a similar problem in my 20 gallon. We had a red firefish that got along with our percula really well, but one day she decided to find the only small opening in the covering of our tank and hop out. Saddened, we decided to get another one, and found a really good looking big guy from the LFS. When he got in the tank, he was great, swam around, explored, etc. Then the percula turned into a bully, and the firefish went into hiding. The firefish was so afraid of the perc that I had to target feed it in a little corner the firefish had made its own (right by its dart hole). We recently added a green chromis to our tank, (this is about a month after buying the firefish), and low and behold, the firefish came out. Now all the fish swim together, and seems like they all like to pick on each other. Except for our green clown, he just hides under our mushrooms and watches everyone act silly. I don't know if the chromis made a difference, but Dr. F &S catalog says that they help bring shy fish out of hiding...