African Fancy Gumdrop Coral Croucher

Chris Adams · May 16, 2016

Anyone had experience with these?
African Fancy Gumdrop Coral Croucher

Caught my eye on DD as they have had couple bonded pairs last month or so.

So tempted.

Would be going into 30gl mixed reef mostly sps with 2 clowns.
High flow

Chris Adams · May 16, 2016

found this thread. Answered some of my questions. Cool but a pass. Seems they are a bit reclusive. Also not really into them possibly laying eggs on my Acros

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/fancy-gumdrop-coral-croucher.153108/

Lionfish Lair · May 16, 2016

Oh yes, yes I have. I've had two..... lemme show you the extent of my interaction....

DD has them all the time as a bycatch of SPS, if you will. Their environment is naturally an SPS one. They are called coral crouchers because they crouch in corals, literally. Flow won't bother them, because they won't be out in it. Their reason for hiding isn't that they are nervous and will eventually warm up and be outgoing. They hide because that's that's what they are built to do. You'll have to be super careful with tank maintenance, as you won't be able to blindly grab a rock and move it, they could be hidden there.

Chris Adams · May 16, 2016

Very cool

Lionfish Lair · May 16, 2016

very cool for about for about 4 seconds, three times a week. I don't recommend them, to be honest. Not unless someone REALLY wanted one, but you discovered that in that other thread.

The first one we bought was labelled a gumdrop Goby, so we didn't even realize it was a venomous velvetfish.

Chris Adams · May 16, 2016

the search will continue for something cool and paired, until then the clowns keep their mansion to themselves

Daniel@R2R · May 17, 2016

@Squishie89 knows about these

michellejy · May 17, 2016

Chris Adams said:
the search will continue for something cool and paired, until then the clowns keep their mansion to themselves

DD has a lot of goby pair/pistol shrimp lately. If my yasha goby pair is an indication, I would plan on seeing them less than the gumdrops though :/

michellejy · May 17, 2016

To clarify, I know others are more outgoing. I was specifically referring to Yasha gobies in a tank with no aggressive tankmates :/

Squishie89 · May 17, 2016

What I say in that other thread is still my consensus on them. I still have mine and he seriously is my favorite fish (hence him being in my icon).

These fish are definitely not for most people, they hide a ton, sometimes will go on escapades to find new hidey holes where you can't find them and they then don't eat for almost a week (after these adventures my little dude usually goes back to tried and true areas where he gets fed), they are venomous, they do not come out and hang out or swim in the current (not horrible swimmers, but nor are they great swimmers), they usually require spot feeding. Cheers for super run on sentence.

The video Lionfish Lair shared is a VERY good example of what having these guys is like.

But they are ridiculously adorable and always grumpy looking, I can't imagine my tank without him.