Worth keeping diamond goby

[Sean Duggan]

Hi everyone I have a Red Sea reefer Xl 625 with a diamond goby in it. I really love the fish, he has a great personality, does his "job" and is very entertaining. Last week he buried two acan frags and a milli frag that fell of the rock. He also constantly builds up sand around his den. I got annoyed and wanted to get rid of him, but after trying I'm having second thoughts. Im afraid I would have to tear apart my tank completely to get it, something I don't want to do. Should I just leave him be and make sure corals are more secure. I do like the fish, should I just level out the sand he moves once or twice a week, and use a turkey baster to blow off anything he covers?

 

[ScottB]

Yeah it is a tough trade. If you want to keep anything on the sandbed alive, he will have to go.

Otherwise, you can mount everything to rock say 2 inches above the sand line and just keep an eye out. I've done that before, mounting a large duncan colony to a standalone chunk of rock and everything else to base rock.

 

[Sean Duggan]

Yeah I do have 3 trashy and 2 lobos on my sand bed wedged up against rocks and he's never buried them other than a rare few specks here and there. He only buries where is den is and he only moves shells and frags he can grab. I will admit I was lazy with the two new acan frags and just through them in the sand bed instead of properly mounting them. IM going to do a little re arranging of my tank but I think Im going to keep him for now.

 

[New&no clue]

I have the same issue with mine. Even things that are on rocks are still not safe. Good luck with him

 

[CindyKz]

I love mine. He's got a ton of personality and keeps the sand bed sort of clean (it's a 180gal, big job for a little fish).

I have a couple chalices on the sand. Anything he sprays sand onto, I just blow off with a turkey baster during normal maintenance. I decided that level sand is something I don't need in my life and to be honest, the hills and holes lend character.

 

[Sean Duggan]

I love mine. He's got a ton of personality and keeps the sand bed sort of clean (it's a 180gal, big job for a little fish).

I have a couple chalices on the sand. Anything he sprays sand onto, I just blow off with a turkey baster during normal maintenance. I decided that level sand is something I don't need in my life and to be honest, the hills and holes lend character.

Yeah I’m going to keep him for a little while I think. Tanks 5’ long and he does a great job of keeping sand clean. Only thing he really gets sand on is lobos trachy and acans. And all of them seem to get it off themselves pretty good. I just level the sand off so I don’t see bare glass on the bottom and it also keeps him occupied for a day redoing it all. He does have the best personality in the tank.

 

[Terri Caton]

I had a huge one in the tank I just rescued but he jumped and committed suicide on day 2 before I could get a top (rimless). Found him one morning 1/2 way across a large room behind a couch! Total bummer as he was beautiful.

 

[SuncrestReef]

Yes, they can be a pain if they bury corals, but my sand has never been so clean even if i vacuumed it. I just decided to move corals up onto the rocks so he doesn't bury them, and leave a few random rocks and shells for his amusement.

 

[Jesterrace]

You will either have to move the corals out of the sandbed or get rid of it and switch to conch snails. After going through a couple of DWGs I gave up on them and switched to conch and although I miss some of the personality quirks, I don't miss the daily sand storms and excavation projects. Here are my conch snails in action:

 

[S2G]

Have you thought about an eggcrate cage in the sand bed ? Like an underground fence

 

[Sean Duggan]

Just a little update. I did end up getting rid of him. I had a blonde Naso tang suddenly start attacking everything. So I’m good friends with the owner of my LFS and he came over today to get the blonde Naso and grabbed the goby while he was at it. Will miss the little guy, but he’s in good hands and the corals will thank me