Another plug for Green-banded Gobies...

[c est ma]

And an update...my gbgs, which started breeding in mid-November, continue to produce a brood a week. They are just so cool!

 

I remember when I first came to N-R, it was considered borderline to have even one fish in a 5.5g, let alone two. So I was uneasy about introducing the second goby, but as far as I can tell the pair is thriving. They are so small they make even a 5.5g look large:

 

(See female goby on top of rock outcrop, middle left, bottom:)

 

Here's a bad shot of the female, which I post to show her ventral "suction cup," and especially the gravid area of her belly:

 

And another, also showing the gravid area well:

 

Here she is tonight, looking plump with eggs:

 

 

The male has moved his egg-guarding site all around the bottom of the tank. Currently it's on the right side beneath a rock covered with GSP. When he first moved to this location I was lucky enough to catch him in the construction stage. For what seemed like hours he would disappear under the rock, then reappear with a mouthful of substrate, spit it out, and disappear again. In this shot you can see his pile of rubble on the bottom right. The entrance to his nest is just above the tube worm tubes to the bottom left of the gsp rock (note the encroaching Nassarius, stage right):

 

 

The male darts out to take on his oblivious rival:

 

 

He probably thinks he's chasing the snail away:

 

 

Victorious, he retreats to his nest:

 

 

 

My previous gbg threads, some of which have baby pics, for anyone who's curious and missed them:

 

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...=6&t=102634

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...=6&t=105663

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?...=6&t=107163

 

--Diane

[epicfish]

You fish look great!

 

...and your rics too! Wow....where'd you get them all?

[the_anti_honda]

This thread kicks serious ass!!!

 

I think this is one fish I have never kept and I need to get!

[c est ma]

Thanks, epic and anti!

 

Epic, thanks for the comments on the rics. I've got more about them in this thread--

 

http://www.nano-reef.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=110792

 

--including where they came from (basically, several local lfs's). They are definitely my favorite coral-like creature.

 

--Diane

[Withers]

I think its amazing that you've gotten a pair of fish to breed in a 5.5 gallon tank. That is simply awe inspiring. I mean just to set up an environment that is healthy enough and suitable for fish to breed is difficult, but to do it in such a small tank is simply unheard of.

[Livingonline]

Our pics are great!!! I looked at your Rics thread and they are simply gorgeous!!!

[kismetsh]

AWESOME!!!!

 

How did you sex them? Or did you just buy 2 and hope for the best?

[c est ma]

I think its amazing that you've gotten a pair of fish to breed in a 5.5 gallon tank. That is simply awe inspiring. I mean just to set up an environment that is healthy enough and suitable for fish to breed is difficult, but to do it in such a small tank is simply unheard of.

 

Gee, thanks, Jason, but I can't take much credit--it's not as if I set out to build a breeding tank in the first place. The fish are just so programmed to go through their breeding behavior. It's really a privilege to witness.

 

Of course, it does always make one think that the tank conditions are OK when the fish seem happy...(and makes it easier to live with the flatworms & algae... )

 

As I think I mentioned earlier, being a nano-reefer actually might lead to better breeding luck--since smaller tanks can only hold so many fish. I know if I had a much bigger tank I'd have added more, and the little gobies might have been stressed or harrassed or I simply might not have gone with two fish of the same species. (Altho the breeder on Reef Central does have his gbg's breeding in a community tank...)

 

(Of course, the downside is that I keep posting on the same critters over & over...sigh.)

 

--Diane

[c est ma]

Roxie--Thanks!

 

Kismetsh,

 

Basically, the latter--I got two fish and hoped for the best...Actually, I got the first, which turned out to be male, a few months (Edit: it was actually 1 year!) before the second. I was only going to have one fish, and the first gbg was delightful--quite curious and "personable" whenever I was around the tank.

 

I kept thinking how much happier he'd be with a mate, however...though I also kept reading about how two gobies of the same sex would fight, and I had no idea how I'd remove one if it came to that...And I was also worried about 2 fish in a 5.5g in the first place.

 

Finally I decided to try introducing a second fish. They immediately reacted to each other, with a lot of displaying and side by side (head-to-tail) quivering. At that time I thought I probably had 2 of the same sex. But nothing looked too vicious, so I decided to give it some time...

 

Within days I was sure it was a pair, and the first fish was less often in evidence...It eventually turned out that the first was a male (who was busy constructing and guarding nests) and the second (much bigger) fish was a female. I subsequently learned that gbgs and many other gobies have facultative sex development, and that the chances of ending up with a pair are therefore pretty good...

 

Interestingly, I'd heard before that male gbg's have noticeably elongated first dorsal spines. When I first put my fish together, I could see no difference in their dorsal fins...It was only after a few clutches that the male's first spine really did grow and it is now very obviously different from the female's. (There's a pic of this in one of the previous threads...)

 

--Diane

[kismetsh]

Thanks for the info!

[Nyxis]

How small are these fish? The pic with the nassarius makes the snail look like a monster compared to your fish.

[c est ma]

Well, they are pretty small...and my male is especially small, even for a gbg, I think. I tried to get a pic of one of them tonight by a ruler, but neither would cooperate. I did find this shot back in the "archives" that shows the male sitting on a 1" diameter Porites plug I used to have:

 

 

(The flatworm by his tail isn't that big comparatively...it was just on the front glass... )

 

Here's a shot of him shortly after I got him:

 

 

The female might be about 1.25" or so.

 

I got the male in October 2005 so I've had him for almost a year and a half, now. Which is contrary to info I read on RC which says they only live about a year, usually...(and who knows how old he was when I got him?).

 

--Diane

[epicfish]

I actually might have to get a pair for my 10 gallon!

[Spliffstar]

cool fish, never seen one before.. how big do they get? amazing tank by the way.

[c est ma]

cool fish, never seen one before.. how big do they get? amazing tank by the way.

 

Thank you very much!

 

Well, your question sent me off on a little research binge, which led to its own tangents...Because I started off with the LiveAquaria entry, which I already knew lists these fish as maximum 2", and which I strongly doubted (unless they have a particularly large subspecies or something...).

 

One problem is the nomenclature--you will find gbg's most often under these two names:

 

Gobiosoma multifasciatum

Elacatinus multifasciatus

 

(I think the last is the most recent, altho lots of the literature is still using the first. There are even other variations around...but the species always starts with "multifasciat--." This is one case where the common name is handier than the scientific! I guess that shows how much is currently being studied and learned about gobies.)

 

At:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gobiosoma_multifasciatum

 

they state that gbg's can reach 3.5cm (~1 3/8" ), which seems far more accurate to me.

 

I also found this interesting tidbit there:

 

Gobiodon sp. start life as females, and are bi-directional protogynous hermaphrodites, meaning that when paired up, if necessary, one changes sex to form a breeding pair. In the case of two females forming a pair, the larger of the two becomes male, and in the case of two males, the smaller changes sex to become female.

 

And they even had a link to the scientific paper this info came from:

 

http://www.springerlink.com/content/k2n23j45634265p8/

 

I also found these interesting links. The first has some nice pics, and leads to some further pages on breeding these guys:

 

http://lisap46.tripod.com/id139.html

 

This one is a bit briefer breeding story (it also states that they reach "about 1 inch" in length):

 

http://www.rcthawaii.com/research/5.htm

 

Compare to the LiveAquaria blurb, which I think has some misinformation about length (and I wouldn't call any marking on these fish "brown!"):

 

http://www.liveaquaria.com/product/prod_Di...cfm?pCatId=1144

 

Other commercial sites seem to have just copied the LA info:

 

http://www.vividaquariums.com/10Expand.asp...uctCode=01-2736

 

Maybe I sound too anal, but the difference between a 1" and a 2" fish is important for nano-reefers!

 

--Diane

[epicfish]

Wow, great research you did. I have this topic on my notify list since those gobies...wow. I've started to look for them in the LFS around this area. I hope to get a nice pair for my 10 gallon!

[c est ma]

Wow, great research you did. I have this topic on my notify list since those gobies...wow. I've started to look for them in the LFS around this area. I hope to get a nice pair for my 10 gallon!

 

I'm glad it was useful to you! Good luck, I hope you're successful! And I hope you can tell from the pics that the red & green colors on these fish just glow--they're really "neon."

 

--Diane

[jimmy595]

hmm my LFS has these, would they like a 10g???

[epicfish]

They're in a 5.5g, so I assume they'd like a 10g.

[c est ma]

Ditto!

 

I found an earlier pic of the tank, before everything was so grown in, and even in this one the goby makes the tank look much bigger than it actually is (IMO, anyway):

 

 

(That was taken in Jan. '06.)

 

--Diane

[Zzak]

Ditto!

 

I found an earlier pic of the tank, before everything was so grown in, and even in this one the goby makes the tank look much bigger than it actually is (IMO, anyway):

 

 

(That was taken in Jan. '06.)

 

--Diane

 

What temp do you keep your tank at? I thought these were cold water fish like catalinas.

[kismetsh]

I think you have converted me into a GBG fan! I think I will add a pair to the stocking list for my 20!

[travisurfer]

very nice tank c est ma. the gobies are still just awesome

[c est ma]

What temp do you keep your tank at? I thought these were cold water fish like catalinas.

 

 

Well, in all my reading about them, I have not run across that info. But your post made me curious, and I looked a few places...I did find this:

 

"Since this is a more sub-tropical species temperatures should be no warmer than 80º F." (from: http://www.rcthawaii.com/research/5.htm )

 

To answer your question, I keep my tank at 80º. Sometimes in the summer it gets up to 82º. (If it gets any higher I turn off the hood...) It would seem that my fish are doing well, so I would not think they need colder water...

 

But thanks for bringing that up. I'd like this set of threads to have as much info about gbg's as possible. (I wonder again if there are different gbg populations represented in the pet trade?)

 

BTW, in looking back through my notebooks, it turns out I had the male goby for a year before I added the second one! (Apparently, he didn't actually become male until then...)

 

--Diane

[epicfish]

Went to 4 LFS today! NONE had them! Booo....the search will continue!