Aquarium Serial killers!

[Oregon Grown Reef]

My snails disappear at an alarming rate in my 40 breeder despite there being plenty of microfauna for them to eat. I believe the Molly Miller Blenny developed a taste for them.

 

[whybenormal]

This is Natasha. She is my husband's clown. My husband refers to her as наташа, его маленькая убийца.... his little killer. I refer to her as the Russian assassin clown....

She is pictured here with her partner in crime, Boris.

Together they will attack and kill anything that dares to enter their tank. My hands.... tools.... the turkey baster I try to feed them with.... other fish within an hour, cleaner shrimp, peppermint shrimp, they kill everything. They even killed a decent sized tang after they had been separated in an acclimation box for what I thought was long enough.

My husband is quite pleased with his attack clown. He says she saved him lots of money because as long as we have her I won't buy any more fish.

.........I thwarted his plans by buying a second tank just for them.

Your husband sounds just like mine! He says his next fish choice is a lion fish. Then he thinks I’ll quit coming home with more fish.

 

[Nathan Peel]

A long time ago when I was little, my family had a saltwater aquarium.
It was this 55-gallon hexagon tank with a clownfish and an anemone I believe. I don't remember all of the details, as I was under 10 years old and wasn't interested in the hobby.
I think there might have been a cleaner shrimp and some other damsels. There's also a possibility that there was a small blue tang in there. I hope not, but it's a possibility. As you'll learn by the end of this comment, my family (mostly my dad), didn't really know much about fish. I want to note that none of this was done to be purposefuly cruel.
So, we lived in San Diego, which has lots of nice beaches. Many of the beaches do not allow collection of wild life. but there are a few that do.
One day we went to this cliff with tide pools that allowed collection. We brought nets and buckets, hoping to catch fish and crabs for our aquarium. There were tons of different species of fish and iverts. We got lots of snails and crabs pretty easily. However, I wanted to catch a fish.
There were these tiny little gray fish that were fast, but not as fast as some as the other fish. While they were small, about an inch, they were bigger than some of the other fish. I used a net to catch a few. I might have had help directing it into the net, but I know I caught at least two. I'm not sure what happened to the second one. Part of me wants to say we let it go, or maybe it got out some how.
Anway, we brought this fish home, dumped it into our aquarium and watched it get along with the clownfish and other fish.
A while later, the fish grew huge. It killed everything in the tank. It quickly became the sole inahbitant. As far as I can remember, it full on ate the other fish, but I could be wrong. We kept the fish for a little while.
My family and I frequented the Scripps/Birch aquariums in La Jolla. We noticed that in their huge aquarium, they had similar fish as the one we had. They were massive.
We learned that the fish we added to our little 55 gallon aquarium was an Opaleye fish aka a Rudderfish. These fish can grow to 26 inches.
Obviously, we could not keep it. We wanted to have clownfish again, so we decided to get rid of it.
An interesting thing that we noticed is that most of the other Opaleye fish at the Scripps aquarium only has one spot on each side, while ours had two.
My dad contacted the aquarium and asked if we could donate it. They agreed and we brought the fish to the aquarium. We asked if there was a reason it had two spots, and they said it was quite rare.
I know we named the fish, but I can't remember what it was. I feel like it was about a foot long when we donated it.
This isn't so much a story of a fish turning into a rampat killer, but a story of foolish people. To the say the least, my dad learned a lesson.
I think we shut the tank down after that. It wouldn't be until many years later that I would get into the reef aquarium hobby with my own tank.

 

[i cant think]

Neon dottyback for me.

Once it hit 4", homie decided CUC were food. It didn't just eat them. It played with them.

Also, in case anyone is thinking about a Checkerboard Wrasse, check here first.

Actually… That’s not a Halichoeres hortulanus. This is instead a MUCH worse species with aggression, it’s known as a “Pudding Wife Wrasse”, the actual species of this is Halichoeres radiatus. It appears yours is also a transitional male, males of this species are certainly some of the worst with aggression.

 

[i cant think]

I’ll let you guys think about which of these two commits more crimes.
A) Halichoeres chloropterus - Green “Coris” Wrasse
B) Halichoeres iridis - Radiant Wrasse


Well, here’s your answer. It’s actually my Iridis. This may be a surprise to some of you who know wrasses as you may know Chloropterus is supposedly much more aggressive than iridis. I believe when my iridis first transitioned, he killed my second 2 inch Lysmata amboinensis. And when he was a female, he managed to kill a 1 inch Stenopus hispidus. Many snails and crabs have fallen victim to the iridis as well. The chloropterus however, only ever started to eat the cuc when they were dead.

 

[AlexandraDreadlocksPanda]

I have something in my tank that enjoys Zoas... I had paid a large amount of money for a zoa garden rock. 5 polyps per frag plug and around 12 plugs all glued to a single rock. I paid $200. After the first week, day by day, the polyps disappeared. I have no idea if my CBB ate them day by day, or if I have dorman zoa eating nudis, or if super hidden pistol shrimp went after them in the night. I've caught no one in the act of eating them. I soaked one group in coral RX to see if there's anything that fell off as the polyps were dying. The only thing that fell off was a small brittle starfish. Maybe the micro brittle / serpent starfish had an appetite for zoas? I don't know. Are there zoa eating amphipods or copepods? I find it hard to believe when I can grow acropora successfully and some LPS that the water wouldn't be right for Zoas?

If you’ve got a Tiger Cowry in there they can have a voracious appetite for Zoa’s….

 

[i cant think]

I have something in my tank that enjoys Zoas... I had paid a large amount of money for a zoa garden rock. 5 polyps per frag plug and around 12 plugs all glued to a single rock. I paid $200. After the first week, day by day, the polyps disappeared. I have no idea if my CBB ate them day by day, or if I have dorman zoa eating nudis, or if super hidden pistol shrimp went after them in the night. I've caught no one in the act of eating them. I soaked one group in coral RX to see if there's anything that fell off as the polyps were dying. The only thing that fell off was a small brittle starfish. Maybe the micro brittle / serpent starfish had an appetite for zoas? I don't know. Are there zoa eating amphipods or copepods? I find it hard to believe when I can grow acropora successfully and some LPS that the water wouldn't be right for Zoas?

An idea of all your stock including inverts may help us to give you ideas on what may be taking out your Zoas.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Actually… That’s not a Halichoeres hortulanus. This is instead a MUCH worse species with aggression, it’s known as a “Pudding Wife Wrasse”, the actual species of this is Halichoeres radiatus. It appears yours is also a transitional male, males of this species are certainly some of the worst with aggression.

Yes! This is why I hang up around with people smarter than I. Pudding wife is correct and it's in one of the many male transitional phases.

There is a checkerboard in there as well I believe.

 

[nim6us]

100% hermit crabs! I had one the size of a golf ball that just murdered snails for sport. Turbos, nassarius, conches, it didn’t matter. He didn’t even want their shells he just killed them for the thrills. He’s also the reason I don’t keep hermit crabs anymore.

 

[b0bburg3r]

Emerald crab snuck into my 6 lines sleeping spot and cut him in half. Woke up in the morning with it carrying one of the half’s. Sad day.

 

[velvetelvis]

Emerald crab

I don't trust any crab!

 

[velvetelvis]

Sargassum fish. Incredibly boring except for the cumulative 45 seconds that it consumed all its tank mates. Never again

Many many years ago, my father caught a sargassum fish and foolishly decided to put it in our FOWLR (this was the late '70s when "corals" meant bleached coral skeletons--no one kept reef tanks). It ate everything in the tank, and bit my father in a final burst of spite as he released it.

 

[smacrophylia]

Emerald crab

Emerald crab took out my $300 trachy and one head off my torch before I realized what the issue was

 

[StatelineReefer]

I don't trust any crab!

If it's got claws, it breaks laws!

 

[wolfen281]

If it's got claws, it breaks laws!

I smell a t-shirt with this slogan.

 

[Cichlid Dad]

Emerald crab took out my $300 trachy and one head off my torch before I realized what the issue was

It seems like you can't win for loosing

 

[rcrutherford44]

Back in 2016 when my daughter was 1st diagnosed with epilepsy, we let her pick out a snowflake eel. Was really cool to watch swim around the tank at night. Until it wasn't once he got bigger a few years later.... Ended up having several fish "disappear" and he wrecked the tank burrowing under the rocks. We "donated" him back to our LFS

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

Have a client who, for many years, had a dinner plate-sized green carpet anemone that stationed itself up near the top of an overflow.

I don’t know how many fish that thing took out over the years…definitely a lot.

But the most memorable was that it ate a pair of pretty good sized Sargassum triggers. Both of them met their demise at different times by trying to pick mysis shrimp off the anemone’s tentacles. Client saw both of them, because she and her kids would always watch the fish when they fed them.

The phone calls I received as they were being consumed sounded like 911 calls.

 

[ZOZOSHARKS]

Unfortunately, my sharks didn't understand the cleaner wrasses were just trying to help them.

What type of sharks?

 

[ZOZOSHARKS]

Hi Aspect what type of sharks do you have?