Blue/green chromis: success?

Sipec · Jun 4, 2020

What has your experience with blue/green chromis been? I've heard of and seen people not have great success with them, as a person thinking of getting some what should I know?

F i s h y · Jun 4, 2020

Lots of discussion and varying opinions. Here is a recent thread.

You want a group of Green Chromis

People are constantly posting about 'Green chromis' being both easy and impossible to keep as a group, and I keep banging on about which species are they. A couple of years ago I felt I had the choice of C. viridis or C. Atripectoralis'. Today it has become even more complicated -This is a...

www.reef2reef.com

Do a search for chromis and the results will provide reading for a whole day. Myself, i think I may stay away from them...

boacvh · Jun 4, 2020

I got 4 green and 2 blue. Now there is 1 green left and 1 blue left. They killed the others of the same color but the blue and green don't bother each other. I've seen threads of people that keep many successfully. Just be aware it's highly probable you end up with just 1.

Phycodurus · Jun 4, 2020

no luck here IME: a group of 10 blue reef chromis widdled its way down to three individuals. This was in a 180G tank.

another attempt at a group of 6 green chromis (Chromis viridis) shrank to just one. this happened whilst still in quarantine. ("There can only be one!" ;Hilarious)

i have read anecdotally that frequently feedings throughout the day help curb their internal group aggression. i plan to try this on my next attempt. (right now, i only feed once a day; twice on weekends when i'm home).

i also have the idea to mix small numbers (3-4 individuals) of five or six species and see what happens.

Sipec · Jun 5, 2020

Would you guys think it better to try an odd or even sized group, or do you think it wouldn't matter?

Sleeping Giant · Jun 5, 2020

I have 2, they fight here and there, but mostly just hang out with each other

xtremeyolks · Jun 5, 2020

I started with 8, then about 3 weeks later I was down to 4. They kept killing the smallest one of the group. The 4 have been happy and healthy for 4 months together now.

ca1ore · Jun 5, 2020

I've never really understood the appeal. OK, they are cheap, but so are other damsels. They are drab, prone to picking each other off and carry uronema. No thanks. Group of yellow tail damsel are a better choice IMO.

Sipec · Jun 5, 2020

ca1ore said:
I've never really understood the appeal. OK, they are cheap, but so are other damsels. They are drab, prone to picking each other off and carry uronema. No thanks. Group of yellow tail damsel are a better choice IMO.

Well, in a perfect world they're a nice cheap schooling fish

ca1ore · Jun 5, 2020

They don't school …. at least not in a home aquarium.

Phycodurus · Jun 5, 2020

Joey Bekius said:
Would you guys think it better to try an odd or even sized group, or do you think it wouldn't matter?

above 3 fish, i personally don't think it makes any difference.

even if just 2, i see them either tolerating each other or one eventually taking out the other.

i wonder what the survivability of 20+ would be, or a certain number where finally the littlest guy doesn't get picked off because no one fish can zero in on him.

Sleeping Giant · Jun 5, 2020

I really don't think they school, but people keep trying

Cameron Martinez · Jun 25, 2020

I had 4 two in each tank. In the larger tank another fish did one in not the other Chromis. In the smaller tank the two are doing fine. Both tanks they hung out together most of the time no fighting at all.

Cameron Martinez · Jun 25, 2020

Not sure if this would be the best place to ask but...
We have had this Chromis for about 5 years now. After about the first year every once in awhile he puts on his Skeletor face like Halloween and keeps it on for awhile.
I have three more and they do not do this and have never seen this with any other fish.
First time I saw him like this I thought he got caught in a fan or another fish ate his face off.
I have attached a video of him. He has his costume on till about a minute into the video. Then he dips behind some mushrooms and when he comes back up he is just about back to normal.
Has any one had one of these guys do this? Or any ideas why?
He seems healthy but it freaky as all hell.
thanks for any feed back at all or if anyone can suggest where I can post this for answers.

Sierra_Bravo · Jun 25, 2020

Ashamed to say it, but I killed a bunch of chromis (black axil and blue-green) to try to get just five in my 120. I tried multiple approaches. In the end, I have one blue-green and one black axil that made it through and have been with me for three years now. A waste of effort, money, and fish, in my opinion.

If you have to have a "shoaling" fish, try threadfin cardinals or masked gobies. You can get masked gobies at KP aquatics for $10 each.

Sierra_Bravo · Jun 25, 2020

Cameron Martinez said:
Not sure if this would be the best place to ask but...
We have had this Chromis for about 5 years now. After about the first year every once in awhile he puts on his Skeletor face like Halloween and keeps it on for awhile.
I have three more and they do not do this and have never seen this with any other fish.
First time I saw him like this I thought he got caught in a fan or another fish ate his face off.
I have attached a video of him. He has his costume on till about a minute into the video. Then he dips behind some mushrooms and when he comes back up he is just about back to normal.
Has any one had one of these guys do this? Or any ideas why?
He seems healthy but it freaky as all hell.
thanks for any feed back at all or if anyone can suggest where I can post this for answers.

Whoa - I have never seen that before. . . maybe call a Priest?

Ef4life · Jun 25, 2020

All 6 of mine have been great. They swim together all day long. I’ve had them all over a year now.

Imo - they are active fish constantly swimming in the open all day long, so they need a lot of food, fish that are hungry are going to fight over the available food. I feed 3-4x a day, 2-3 small meals of pellets on an auto feeder, then a large meal of frozen foods. They also need to each have their own little hole preferably multiple holes to sleep in/ retreat when scared or stressed.

Cameron Martinez · Jun 25, 2020

Sierra_Bravo said:
Whoa - I have never seen that before. . . maybe call a Priest?

Did the video work for you? I had someone else say they couldn’t view it.

Mastiffsrule · Jun 25, 2020

Evening

I gave up on the green chromis after my last batch in my 180. They went from 5 or 6 down to 2, now 1 for the last year.

I set up a 90 at Christmas with basic damsels and love them. Only problem I ran into was the neon ones I got did the same as the chromis. The striped and azure are great.