Clown Injuring Itself on Torch Coral

[Lognor]

I added a Torch coral several weeks ago.  As soon as it started opening up and extending, both of my Picasso clowns start trying to make it their home.  It was a decent sized frag with three heads when i got it, but it was still a frag and much too small to handle just the smaller clown, let alone both.  As it got bigger and extended more, they really started hanging out around it full time.  Since it wasn't big enough to swim through, they would swim under and around it, trying to hide.  Then they started pushing out the sand around it, trying to burrow lower under it.  It's on a basic frag plug so of course the thing starts leaning and moving around because these two idiots are like two full grown cats fighting over the same kids shoebox.  After a week or two of straightening it regularly I decided to make it more stable.  I removed the plug stem and glued the base to a piece of ceramic tile that gave it a much wider base.  The torch is doing really well now with the new stability. 

 

What i've noticed the past week or so, is that both clowns have scrapes/discolorations all over.  No bleeding, nothing looks severe, but they definitely have minor injuries.  Watching their behavior I can only surmise that the rubbing, nudging, and swimming through the torch they are doing is actually causing abrasions from the skeleton and frag plug.  I don't think it is burn marks from getting stung because it doesn't really match the type of injury others have described with sting/burn marks.  In the included picture you can see spots in the white areas that are slightly darker.  Those colorations weren't there before they started messing with the torch. 

 

They're too dumb to stop doing it, so should I be doing something different to help the situation?  Anyone else experience this?  How did it turn out in the long run?

 

[A Little Blue]

12 minutes ago, Lognor said:

I added a Torch coral several weeks ago.  As soon as it started opening up and extending, both of my Picasso clowns start trying to make it their home.  It was a decent sized frag with three heads when i got it, but it was still a frag and much too small to handle just the smaller clown, let alone both.  As it got bigger and extended more, they really started hanging out around it full time.  Since it wasn't big enough to swim through, they would swim under and around it, trying to hide.  Then they started pushing out the sand around it, trying to burrow lower under it.  It's on a basic frag plug so of course the thing starts leaning and moving around because these two idiots are like two full grown cats fighting over the same kids shoebox.  After a week or two of straightening it regularly I decided to make it more stable.  I removed the plug stem and glued the base to a piece of ceramic tile that gave it a much wider base.  The torch is doing really well now with the new stability. 

 

What i've noticed the past week or so, is that both clowns have scrapes/discolorations all over.  No bleeding, nothing looks severe, but they definitely have minor injuries.  Watching their behavior I can only surmise that the rubbing, nudging, and swimming through the torch they are doing is actually causing abrasions from the skeleton and frag plug.  I don't think it is burn marks from getting stung because it doesn't really match the type of injury others have described with sting/burn marks.  In the included picture you can see spots in the white areas that are slightly darker.  Those colorations weren't there before they started messing with the torch. 

 

They're too dumb to stop doing it, so should I be doing something different to help the situation?  Anyone else experience this?  How did it turn out in the long run?

 

No, there is nothing you should do but let it go. They will stop. My smaller, male Clown used to hide in and around Euphillias all the time. Until the injuries weren’t worth the fun he had at the time. 

[WV Reefer]

My clown gets black spots from his Paly obsession.

 

Love hurts. 

 

[toddrparr]

Kind of looks like he is enjoying it...

[Clown79]

My clowns have hosted a frogspawn for almost 3yrs.

 

They get black spots from it which is common.

 

My female sucks on the frogspawn and at first the sting caused the clowns mouth to stay open for a few days, this no longer happens.

 

Clowns need time for them to become immune to the sting of the torch. Same thing happens with anemones

[Lognor]

2 minutes ago, Clown79 said:

My clowns have hosted a frogspawn for almost 3yrs.

 

They get black spots from it which is common.

 

My female sucks on the frogspawn and at first the sting caused the clowns mouth to stay open for a few days, this no longer happens.

 

Clowns need time for them to become immune to the sting of the torch. Same thing happens with anemones

I was hoping / figuring that it was going to be a normal part of the process.  I'm a bit hyper cautious to things in this tank because I'm still so new at it all.  

 

Thanks to those that took the time to read and especially those providing feedback.  Much appreciated.