Clownfish displaying mating behaviour toward other fish?

[eaglepin]

I've got a bit of a weird one for everyone. Between my clownfish and I, one of the two of us is not so bright...

 

I have a 36 gallon tank with:

• 1 blue spot jawfish
• 1 tank bred picasso clown
• 1 banggai cardinal
• 1 small rbta

The clownfish was added last to the tank, 2 weeks ago, from a previous tank in which she (assuming female as it is >2 years old) was the only fish. In the new tank, my clown seems to be very interested in the jawfish. The clown hovers around the exits to the jaw's den. When the jaw appears, the clown shimmies and shakes the way clowns do when pairing/mating.

 

The jaw doesn't know what to make of it, nor do I! Haha. Any ideas? Is this actually aggression from the clown? Is the clown trying to tell the jaw to get out of the way so it can have the nem? I'll try to get some pictures up but haven't done so before...haha

Another picture

...and another pic.

[Mariaface]

Is she shimmying, or does it looks like a tiny seizure? Between clowns, the female will dart at the male and the male will jitter (and look like he's cowering in fear). Then there's the shimmying movement that is actually meant to push water towards a threat, so it'll back off?

[eaglepin]

To be honest, I think I've seen both behaviours.

 

I've definitely seen the seizure-like twitching. I've also seen the clown sort of kick-up sand and shoot along the sand bed swimming away from the jawfish. That might be trying to shoot water at a threat like you describe?

[Mariaface]

I demand a video of dumb clownfish behavior!

 

No, but seriously. The seizure-twitching is plain old submission behavior, so maybe your clown keeps challenging the fish, sees it's out of its depth and forfeits, then comes back later when its ego has healed?

 

Or maybe it's got really bad eyesight and once in a while thinks it sees a suitable mate!

 

I kind of want to see what others have to say...

[eaglepin]

Haha, I'll see if I can capture it on film! They tend to change their behaviour when watched, so I setup a webcam to capture the pics above

[eaglepin]

Here's a couple of videos. I wasn't able to capture the seizure/twitch, but got the clown swimming fully sideways...which is normally a precursor for twitching.

 

https://youtu.be/bEWTwWMQUnE

https://youtu.be/m8qzLumH3o4

https://youtu.be/2lB2fxn49iU

[clownfitch]

She wants the jawfish to move away from her nem. Showing aggression.

[magikarp]

When I had an Occy with a Yellow Clown Goby sometimes i'd see the Clown do the seizure-twitching to the Goby (which was less than half it's size)

 

Normally it would happen if I was feeding. Occasionally my Yellow Clown Goby would attack or chase the clownfish away. Pretty game for such a small fish. After he got beat up by a Goby half it's size it would do the submissive dance to it.

 

 

 

Clownfish are just weird