Why's my clown being so aggressive

[Qh2214]

So my black clown fish is being extremely aggressive towards my blue damsel and somewhat aggressive towards my normal clown. Any reason to this? Also been trying to bite me as I've been stuck my hand in the tank to move some of my coral.. This is a relatively new behavior just started happening in the last week or week and a half. The black is larger then my orange clown should I try to rehome my black one and if worst case that did have to happen how do I know what to get for my next clown bigger or smaller then my normal orange?

 

[KJ]

This is normal ,it looks like the black one will turn into a female, mine done this before,

 

[jsker]

Clown fish can be that way. It is best to buy them in Pairs.

 

[KoleTang]

Normal clownfish behavior. The black and white is becoming the dominant fish. The small one will learn its place once it realizes it cannot win.

 

[ngvu1]

They are more aggressive when they are paired up and host something like nem. They are even more aggressive when they lay eggs

 

[California Reef Co.]

This is normal behavior. The larger clownfish is establishing its dominance.

Hard to tell from the photo but are they getting enough food? The second picture shows the black clown as being a little on the skinny side.

But yes assuming everyones getting enough food/swimming space, this is normal behavior. One of our clownfish was very nice even to her male counterpart for the longest time. One day when my hand was near her anemone she just started biting me. Quite hard too!

 

[john.m.cole3]

I added a mocha clown 3 months after one of the 2 percula (paired) jumped ship and turned into fish jerky. The percula chased the mocha all over the tank for about 6 weeks. I recently had to re-arrange some rocks, and now the mocha and perc are buddies.

 

[Qh2214]

Ok I was just curious because I've had the orange since the beginning of the tank so about 1 year 3 months, had a baby black at the same time then it just mysteriously died got the black one probably about 2 months later so its been there about a year. I figured it would have already sexed by now. I wish I would of gotten them at the same time! The orange one hosts in my torch and the black one is drawn more to my nem. IF they do lay eggs I'm really going to try and get them all out and try to raise the clown and maybe make a deal to my LFS. The black clown is definitely the most dominant fish in my tank. I usually feed my fish about 2-3x a week I've only got 4 fish. I feed them a homemade fish food that I get from a local reefer that they seem to love. He says since his food is all organic when the fish poop the corals will eat it and will help them grow. Which my birds nest is starting to grow you can see in one of the pictures!

 

[Qh2214]

Do any of you have any experience in your clowns laying eggs? I'm going to try and see if I can find any maybe she laid eggs and thats why she is being so aggressive all of a sudden. I am interested in keeping the babies and trying to raise them is there anything special that clowns need to breed or is it just luck of the draw?

 

[russell13]

Some fish are jerks

 

[TideReefer]

From my experience, if your clown is more aggressive than the damsel, let it be. I've had blue velvet damsels kill clowns in my tanks!

 

[Qh2214]

oh wow I had no idea! Thanks for the heads up!