[HELP!] My peppermint attacked my clownfish!

[easy_henry]

G'day everyone,

 

First timer here, hope I've posted on the right section. I was rather stressed with what I saw today. I have a tank with 2 clownfish, 1 peppermint shrimp, a couple of anemones and live rocks.

 

The peppermint was added 2 weeks ago and at the beginning he was just hiding behind rocks. He started picking up confident in a few days and started coming out whenever I feed my anemones cubes of fresh prawns. In fact, if I put my hand in the tank the peppermint will climb onto my hand!

 

One of the clown started getting very curious with the peppermint and is always "looking" at him.

 

 

I spend a lot of time looking at my tank after work during dinner and today I found my clown's fins are damaged!

 

 

While I was taking photo of my clown as a record and I saw this...

 

(Photos were all taken today)

 

YES! The peppermint jumped onto the fish and started attacking it!!!! I've isolated the peppermint now and am thinking of returning the shrimp back to the shop. I have never heard from anywhere that peppermint shrimps attacks fish! (or did I just didn't do enough research?)

 

Does anyone known/heard/experienced anything about this (would really like to know why!)? Should I pickup a different shrimp or should I just forget about getting shrimps? What should I do about my clown?

 

Any help or comments are greatly appreciated. Thanks everyone in advance.

 

henry

[revaltion131]

I'm not sure I'd blame the shrimp for the clown's fin loss. Some damage from natural aggression between clowns seems more likely to me. Peppermint shrimp have been known to act as cleaners and it's possible that's what it was doing. They're also known for attacking corals if they get hungry, but not fish. I certainly can't be sure as to what he was doing without seeing the behavior for myself. In my experience, they are completely harmless towards fish.

 

Before you completely get rid of the shrimp, watch the clowns and see if there's any aggression, mainly fin-nipping, between them. The type of damage done to the fins also looks like what angels and tangs do to themselves on the rocks when they're careless about where they swim. The thing is, clowns are usually out in the water column and wouldn't tear themselves on the rocks.

[Weetabix7]

And did you notice that the OP has an actual pic of the Shrimp on the Clown?

 

I say just get rid of the Shrimp, and no, I've never heard of this before either.

It does sound very much like a cleaning behaviour though, just never heard of it with Peps.

[BustytheSnowMaam]

Ok, duh guys, peppermint shrimps ARE cleaner shrimps! He's cleaning the clown. Not hurting it. When cleaner shrimps clean, they do spin the fish around like he shows in the picture.

[opy01]

Ok, duh guys, peppermint shrimps ARE cleaner shrimps! He's cleaning the clown. Not hurting it. When cleaner shrimps clean, they do spin the fish around like he shows in the picture.

 

+1

 

Haven't any of you seen Finding Nemo? lol The other clown probably did that.

[easy_henry]

Thanks everyone.

 

Just to feed a little more info. The 2 clowns have stopped attacking each other long ago. I have notice this clown being aggressive to the pepp before thou. It likes to chase the pepp back to its "home", but the live rocks are located is in such a way that no matter where the pepp hides, the clown can get close and "observe" it. Also if I feed brine shrimps in the tank, the pepp would come out and the clown would try grab food of him.

 

This fin damage only happen with in the last 20 hours (Since going to bed til home from work). My worry is that even if the pepp are only cleaning the fish. What about the fins? Is there any ways of stopping these fins from getting damage? There are damage on every fin sections!

 

On the other hand, is it possible that the pepp is stressed from the clown's aggression/close observation toward it? Or pepp not getting enough food? (I'm just paranoid...)

[revaltion131]

And did you notice that the OP has an actual pic of the Shrimp on the Clown?

 

I did. What I meant was that I would have needed to see it in live action to make up my mind about it.

 

If there is something wrong health-wise with the clown, which could cause some fin damage, it makes sense that the pep my try to clean it, especially with the clown hovering around it. If a fish wants to be cleaned by whatever cleaner animal it may be eyeing, it will often hover around that animal and/or show its sides to the cleaner in question.

 

What are your water parameters? IME, high nitrites, even just 1 ppm, can cause fin decay. It may have been something else in conjunction with high nitrites (which were around 4 ppm in my case) but the nitrite reading was the key indicator when I had the problem with a fish in quarantine. Anyway, I still think a lot of it looks like it was just torn, but the first part of the dorsal does look like it could possibly have been erosion. Without being able to pinpoint a cause for sure, and maybe it was indeed the shrimp that did it, I would add a garlic or other vitamin supplement to the food source for the clowns. If it's not water quality and it's not illness, the fins should grow back just fine on their own.

 

If you want to be sure the shrimp is getting enough food, you can always target feed it at the same time you feed the other fish. However, mine does just fine on its own without being target fed.

[easy_henry]

...What are your water parameters? ...

 

Just did a water check and all are good:

Ammonia 0 ppm

Nitrite 0 ppm

Nitrate 0 ppm

pH 8.2

SG 1.023

[revaltion131]

Yeah, most likely not a problem, then. I just wanted to make sure, but you would probably have seen issues with the other clown as well. Like I said, give it some kind of supplement in the food and it should heal up shortly.

[MikeTR]

My clowns attack my peppermint shrimp if it decides to wander out of its general area. After watching the shrimp eat a dead snail and how hard it had to work to actually get any meat.. i doubt the shrimp is the problem.

[easy_henry]

A little update with today...

 

Got home and checked my clown with the same amount damage on fins. So I released the pepp back in the tank. The pepp and clown were again back to their usual self; observed and followed each other. Within minutes I saw the shrimp jumping onto the clown again. I thought I might give them some time to "bond" or clean so I made and ate dinner.

 

After dinner I checked my clown again and found more damage to her fins + a few scales out of place! Then I saw the pepp pulling the clown's tail and split a little more. And like most things in life, I sat in front of them video recording them for 2 hours and had no success in capturing the event. I've captured a lot of their behaviors and a few close to jumping shots.

 

Here's a quick 30s clip of

.

 

I have now isolated the pepp again... I really don't want my clown's fins to keep getting damaged...

 

Once again, thanks everyone!

[stevey87]

There are 3 other shrimp species that look similar to Peppermint Shrimp. Some of them eat soft corals and such. First you should make sure the shrimp you have is what you think it is.

 

http://fish.suite101.com/article.cfm/peppe...hrimp_imposters

[revaltion131]

Well, I'd definitly take it back seeing that it sounds like it's more than just a cleaning behavior. Sorry to hear it turned out to be the culprit after all.

[lakshwadeep]

Some thoughts (which others have also mentioned):

 

A clown will not deliberately allow a shrimp to get on its body if it feels threatened and receives no benefit. The clown seems to be going directly to the shrimp, and I would think it knows better than to allow healthy skin/scales/fins to be nipped. Your video clip is clear, but it doesn't show what happens when the shrimp actually gets on the clown. That hyperactive motion is what my peppermints used to do when I put my hand in my tank, and I could feel them picking at my skin.

 

Since you have the peppermint isolated, I suggest observing how the two clowns interact. I think the dominant clown (which is the female) is more suspicious than the shrimp.

[easy_henry]

There are 3 other shrimp species that look similar to Peppermint Shrimp. Some of them eat soft corals and such. First you should make sure the shrimp you have is what you think it is...[/url]

I've done research in the past and I do think mine is the right one... The dude from the aquarium also said they are correct. Here's a photo I just of him yesterday.

 

... Sorry to hear it turned out to be the culprit after all.

That's OK, thanks for your help anyway I might try and exchange for a different one to see if the same thing occur.

 

...That hyperactive motion is what my peppermints used to do when I put my hand in my tank, and I could feel them picking at my skin.

 

Since you have the peppermint isolated, I suggest observing how the two clowns interact. I think the dominant clown (which is the female) is more suspicious than the shrimp.

My pepp does that same thing when I put my hand in the tank. This clown is the dominant one out of the two. I think the pepp also want to get onto the other (smaller) clown, but this other clown is to scared to swim close to the pepp. As for the video, I've tried my best... I really wanted to capture it for you guys to see but things never happen when you want them to...

 

I have a new theory. The pepp lives behind the rock where the dominant clown's anemone is. Perhaps both of them are both trying to protect their territory. At least that's how I'm trying to make myself feel better...