Planning ahead - stocking 125

[justanotherfishhead]

Make yourself fully aware of the Scott's Fairy as his colors will eventually change w/o the presence of a female. Mine has already lost some color over the coarse of 3 months. Still nice coloration, but not the same.

Do you think that's true of other wrasses too? What about the females, do they lose colors if its the only wrasse? How do you tell male vs female when you're buying them?

 

[Bifferwine]

Those are in the "fish-only" category, which I shouldn't even consider if I have corals right?

It depends on the fish. Most non-reef safe wrasses won't eat corals, but they will eat all your inverts.

 

[BL1]

No not necessarily, a lot of the wrasses in the fish only category are there because they are "reef safe with caution". They typically can go in a reef but will go after certain things like shrimp, feather dusters, crabs, and snails. The grey head wrasse is one of those in that category.

 

[justanotherfishhead]

I think I'll steer clear of those, since I really like having a few shrimp in my tank.

Anything I should be aware of if I can find a Red Head Salon Fairy Wrasse?

Saltwater Aquarium Fish for Marine Reef Aquariums: Red Head Solon Fairy Wrasse

 

[BL1]

Do you think that's true of other wrasses too? What about the females, do they lose colors if its the only wrasse? How do you tell male vs female when you're buying them?

It's true of a lot of wrasses, dominant or super male will be the most brightly, vibrantly colored in the group. They will lose their colors if not in a group of three or more since there's no breeding competition for them. Next would be the sub-male which is just smaller with similar colors to the dominant just not as bright. And then you have the female which will be even duller or in many cases a completely different color or pattern. The females won't lose their color of they're the only one but, a lot of times they will change to a male over time if left by themselves.

A lot of times te only way to know M v. F is to look up pics of other peoples wrasses or ask, the people at the LFS should know which it is from the shipping invoice. Some good examples you can look up for the differences are Golden Rhomboidalis and Lineatus Fairy Wrasses.