Stocking - are these new fish additions a good idea?

[jeremyg]

I have a 170 Gallon Fish-Only tank (60"L x 20"W x 30"H). No live rock, but have several caves and artificial plant decorations that the fish use to hide in, and a deep sandbed.

Are these butterflyfish ok to add, or is my tank too agressive?

1. Dot Dash Butterflyfish
2. Pearlscale Butterflyfish

I also plan to add some or all of these wrasse (after getting advice from the wrasse lovers thread):

• Dusky Margined Wrasse
• Melanurus Wrasse
• Harlequin Tusk

And these are the fish I have currently:

• Queen Angel
• King Angel
• Emperor Angel (Juvenile)
• Blue Hippo Tang (x2)
• Powder Brown Tang
• Clownfish (x3)
• Coral Beauty
• Lemonpeel Angel
• Picasso Triggerfish
• Oxina Cardinalfish
• Flame Hawkfish
• Diamond Goby

Here's a pic from a few months ago for reference. I since added 2 caves so there are now 4 separate caves, although the diamond goby claimed one and filled it top to bottom with sand.

 

[KrisReef]

Beautiful assemblage of fishes thus far. I think the fish might appreciate more resting cover and places to sleep in when the lights go off. The picture above doesn’t have enough hiding spaces for the fish that you currently have,( imo). Long term health of the fish would be improved with more cover so that each fish has its own “room” to sleep in so that they don’t have to sleep with anyone else at night, imo. My tanks have a similar problem and the fish are okay for now but as they grow older and larger the stress of sleeping with a buddy might require rehoming some of them to allow everyone to get a good nights sleep which is hugely important for their health.

I had 5 Anthias that I added 3 more rescue Anthias to the school (the new ones were very thin and failing to thrive at the lfs). Two of them have vanished in the weeks since they were added and I presume that they were eaten by the larger fish (H tusk or a largest vlamingi tang?) who are not eager to share their tank with more fishes. Besides, they taste great, but the lack of living space and resting space encourages competition to the death ime.

I think you should look at your tank and realize that it is very crowded in comparison with a wild reef that provides a good amount of bunks for the fish to rest in. We can’t have everything in our tank without stressing the occupants who will fight to get the space they want.
If you do add more fins you should also consider adding more cover for everyone to set up their own apartment where they can retreat to when the stress of living in “the big city” in overcrowded neighborhoods starts to manifest itself in violent behaviors towards the neighbors.

Not what we want to see or hear but what your fish would tell you if they could talk, imo. So put more curbside tents and hotel rooms in the tank before you add more occupants and it might work out in the long term.

Is another tank an option for you? A second tank or a huge tank would probably make you and your fish family more comfortable.