Is there a goby guru in the house?

[zmazza]

I heard Mel was really experienced with taking care of gobies....

I got my 30 gal set up last night. I'm waiting for the temp to stabalize and then I'm going to put the salt in tonight. I inadvertantly used the first 3 hours of water with my new RO unit. I've got a TDS of about 18-19 or so. It's producing 0 TDS though out of the RO now... Is that going to be a bad thing?

I plan on taking some live rock out of my 29 gallon and hooking the canister filter back up to it and moving one of the maxijet 1200's to my 30 gal.

All in all it's not going to have a huge amount of live rock, but shoudl have enough. Probably 45 lbs in each.

This all goes back to my question though... Can a 30 gallon safely hold more than one species of goby? Can they live peacefully with blennies? I thought about doing a goby dominated reef, but I'm not sure if it's possible.

I'm trying to get this 30 gallon started in the right direction towards a reef tank and turn my 29 gallon back into a FOWLR...

I don't think my corals are doing so well in that tank. That was my "newbie" tank if you will. Feel free to comment anytime, ct_vol, lol!

Let me know what you guys think.

Thanks.

[EvilMel]

Yeah...tons of gobies can live in harmony.

You gotta watch out which kinds you get...but if you pick the right ones you'd be golden. Man I love goby dominated reefs!! They so totally rock and everyone has heard how low of a bioload you'll have while still maintaining a decent number of fish. Yah gobies!

If you want to keep other gobies/small fish I would suggest NOT getting one of the watchman gobies that gets huge. Those things can even eat a pistol shrimp when they get bigger.

Good combinations are all of these mixed together:
red head
neon
green banded aka limestripe
clown (though not yellow clown if you want to keep sps)
either yasha hashe or high fin red banded watchman gobies with a Randalls shrimp (stays small so would be fine in your tank)...never without the shrimp though
Trimma would probably be ok (no personal experience with them though)

I would stick with no more than one neon (maybe two in that sized tank) but you can get several of the green banded or red head without difficulty and maybe 2 clown gobies.


NEVER EVER EVER EVER get a catalina goby unless your tank temp is below 72deg all the time.

I'm also not a big fan of any of the sleeper gobies for longer term surviorship because I think they pretty much always exhaust their food supply.

[zmazza]

Sounds awesome. I like the hi fin red banded.. Never heard of the lime stripe or the yasha hashe. Sound's pretty cool though.

I guess that's what happened to my yellow watchman / pistol shrimp pair, haha! So much for a $25 dollar half inch candy stripe pistol shrimp. I haven't seen him in a year.

I LOVE the yellow watchman though. He's been my first goby.

That sounds really cool. I'll check out the limestripe. I like the neon's too.

Where do you think the best place to purchase gobies would be? Online? From other reefers?

Local?

[zmazza]

Wow! The yasha hashe looks really cool. I wouldn't mind having one of those and maybe a hi fin red banded goby.

If you wanted strictly gobies and maybe a very small fish or two, what would you add?

What about just gobies?

I plan on making this tank xenia, mushrooms and zoanthids. Maybe mushrooms, not entirely sure yet. Want something easy, you know?

[zmazza]

That's an expensive little goby the yasha is.

60-70 dollars.

Maybe I'll stick with the hi fin red banded, haha!

How much are the lime stripes? I'm having a hard time finding them.

[Runner]

Originally posted by zmazza
I got my 30 gal set up last night. I'm waiting for the temp to stabalize and then I'm going to put the salt in tonight. I inadvertantly used the first 3 hours of water with my new RO unit. I've got a TDS of about 18-19 or so. It's producing 0 TDS though out of the RO now... Is that going to be a bad thing?

A TDS of 18 or 19 is not bad. I wouldn't worry about it -- especially since you are using better water now. When you buy RO water at the stores around here, you get probably ~10 TDS.

When I first started this hobby, I ran dechlorinated tap water (150 TDS) for several months and had my cyano mostly under control. A switch to the LFS 10 TDS supply cleared it up totally in about 3 months.

[zmazza]

TDS out of the RO now is 0 TDS. It comes out of the tap at 110 or so. After a few water changes that 18-19 TDS should go down drastically.

[Sk8r]

The yellow watchman gets along pretty well with the highfins, also with blennies and dartfish, all pretty much on same scale, some posturing, no nipping.

[zmazza]

Hmm sounds good. I've got a firefish and a yellow watchman and they are by far my favorites. Very interesting fish. The YWG has to take the cake with personality, though.

I had thought about a lawnmower blenny, but wasn't sure what else I could keep with them. Definitely going to be mostly gobies though... maybe one blenny... not completely sure what kind of bioload they have, though.

[EvilMel]

If it were me, and you plan to introduce another pistol shrimp, I would certainly keep it to only one watchman goby. I am sure they get along better when there isn't a shrimp to compete for, but I just wouldn't risk it.

In that case I'd pick EITHER the yellow watchman, high fin red banded, or yasha hashe goby...not more than one.

In general you want to limit the mixing of fish that inhabit the same space in a reef tank, ya know? If there are only a certain number of holes that would be good to perch out from under, then there will be negative interactions...hench...only one watchman.

Also, it's doubtful that unless your yellow watchman is about 6 inches long that it could have eaten your shrimp. I meant stay clear of the watchman gobies that get a few inches long.

OH and blennies are fine but I'd pretty much stick to one of those as well. Many blennies occupy the same habitats and are not at all shy about fighting for holes. You might be ok with an algae blenny and something like either a bicolor or midas blenny (not both).

[zmazza]

Hmm... so maybe a lime stripe and a lawnmower blenny?

That would be a good amount for a small reef tank, right? Maybe bi-weekly 10% water changes?

My watchman MIGHT be 3 inches long. Perhaps the pistol shrimp just disappeared. Who knows.

Thanks for all the help Mel. Your opinions and recommendations are greatly appreciated.

[ct_vol]

Zac~ You can see my yasha/randall's - goby/shrimp pair tomorrow... As far as where to get them at... I think theres a few people wanting to do a live goods order... Just nobody wants to organize it... I would, but I'm not buying any more fish untill after the wedding... Well, not a lot of them at least... lol

Heres my randall's goby and tiger pistol... In case if you haven't seen the pic...

[zmazza]

That's awesome. I'd love to have something like that, but they aren't cheap, lol. Almost 100 dollars for the pair... that would be hard to get my wife to agree too, lol.

I may go with a hi fin red banded and a randals shrimp...

that is a pretty pair though.

[EvilMel]

This is a completely incorrect pairing BUT...here's my old pair...RIP shrimpy.

[zmazza]

That's cool Mel. I love the YWG.

Maybe I had a Randall's shrimp. The aquarium called him a candy stripe pistol shrimp..

He was $25 dollars or so.... perhaps that's what he was.

What are you guys using for substrate? I planned on using some extra pool filter sand, but I'm not entirely sure.

[cee]

You can get a randall's goby for about $25 online and a pistol shrimp for $18. They will pair naturally provided they can find one another. Randall's shrimp pair with the most # of gobies. I'm surprised your tiger paired with the randall's goby, Randy.

Dave

[EvilMel]

Yeah...totally don't buy a pair together...just buy them separately, like Dave says!

Dave, from what I have read, Randall's shrimp in the ocean will pair with high fin red banded gobies and yasha hashe gobies. Those are the only two natural pairings I have heard about. As you can see from my picture though, they are prone to other pairings, but it just doesn't seem to be as tight of a fit (sort of). My YWG would often leave my shrimp for extended periods. When I had two high fin red banded gobies (mated) paired with the same shrimp, they never ever left him. Each one would perch out of a different burrow in their home.

Dave, have you heard of other natural pairings?

[zmazza]

My YWG paired with one of my clownfish once...


Rode him like a horse. Was the strangest thing....

[cee]

From Scott Michael:

Only three of the Stonogobiops spp. show-up in aquarium stores with any degree of regularity, and one of these is commonly seen. Two of these species are very similar in color, with alternating white and dark brown to black bands on the body and a yellow head. The three other members of the genus that are not (or rarely) encountered in the marine aquarium trade are: the Dracula shrimpgoby (Stonogobiops dracula) from the Maldives, Medon's shrimpgoby (Stonogobiops medon) from the Marquesas Islands, and the fivebanded shrimpgoby (S. pentafasciata) that was recently described from Japan.

Unlike the other shrimpgobies, which spend most of their time resting on the substrate, most of the highfin shrimpgobies scull in the water column from 1 to 36 cm (0.4 to 14 in.) over their burrow entrance. Most of these fishes also associate with Randall's shrimp (Alpheus randalli).

That's 6, plus the Tangaroa Goby (Ctenogobiops tangaroai) also pairs in the wild, I believe.

Dave

[zmazza]

Hmm... makes me want to get a hi-fin red banded and a randall's goby... what do you think Mel? Good pair of fish for a reef? Fun to watch? What do you think, cee?

How hard is it to manage a group order? You just have to make sure you have everything delivered, right? I'd be up to that. I might just take a personal day and get it taken care of. What do you guys think? I'll definitely put in a fish order....

[cee]

That's the pairing that I have and it's quite fun to watch. The purple firefish even shares the burrow with the goby/shrimp. If you do decide to do a group order, I may also be interested depending on where and fish availability.

Dave

[zmazza]

Liveaquaria.com? Cutting those shipping costs down would be awesome. They are pretty high for just a fish or two...

I'd love to get a hi-fin red banded though... Randall's shrimp shouldn't be too much.

Maybe we can find some more people who are interested, but I wouldn't mind spearheading it. If we could receive the items on a Wednesday, I could drive them up to Knoxville and we could split everything up.

[cee]

The Randall's shrimp is kinda hard to get these days from liveaquaria and isn't presently listed. p e t s o l u t i o n s has them (a variant, Alpheus yaldwyni) frequently. That's the problem I had, ordering from one vendor who had both items in stock at the same time is a matter of timing.

Dave

[Hurley12]

saltwaterfish.com has both right now i just ordered them with some MTRC people just FYI

[ct_vol]

Originally posted by Hurley12
saltwaterfish.com has both right now i just ordered them with some MTRC people just FYI

Yeah, I came close to ordering from there to get that pair for the Aquapod... But Ashley put the knicks on it... I ordered some more coral instead... Not from SWF...