File Fish

[Saurabhdxb]

Hi there,

i am starting to see apitasia in my tank, just one for now, but want it to be under control from now, i m planning to get a file fish, my doubt, is it reef safe? i hv zoas, hammers, tourches, toadstol and few leather corals, will these corals be safe n not harmed by the file fish? in addition i hv two cleaner shrimps in the tank. Will it be the right move to get the File fish?

 

[DeniseAndy]

If the fish likes to pick at little anemones, think of what else looks likes little anemones. I would never risk one with my clams, but I would think zoas and some lps would not be all that safe. Now, this is when its natural food source is used up. It you have a constant supply of aiptasia, you could be okay.

 

[GeoSquid]

I got a filefish for bad Aip outbreak. The fish did great on the Aips but once they were gone......it ate all of my coral. I got rid of the filefish after that and all the Aips came back with a vengeance. So, I ended up with a lot of Aips and no coral.

 

[jerrod]

I have a File fish and it does a great job on Aptasia however they are known to nip at fleshy corals. I have seen mine take nips out of Acans, hammers, and my torch. For some reason he leaves the Duncan alone. I ended up going the Berghia Nudibranch route and that is working so far and exiled my filefish to the overflow and then sump to eat aptasia there. As soon as that was done I gave him to a friend.

 

[taricha]

I had one that seemed to reduce my zoas, aiptasia, and ball anemones (hitchhiker) in roughly equal amounts until all disappeared.
Individual fish preferences can vary.

 

[jd371]

I have mixed 75g with a clam, zoas, sps, lps and nems and the only thing my filefish went after was a gorgonian and some acans. Gorgonian didn't make it and I moved the acans to another tank. I can't say for sure he's eating any aptasia because I've never seen him eat any but I don't have aptasia out in the open on top of rocks and only see them in the crevices that are out of reach.