Two Lyretail Anthias Questions

[radiata]

1) I put 8 smallish female Lyretails in my 180 a few months back. They're well fed and have gotten larger. As expected, one transitioned into a male. What I didn't expect was to have a second one transition into a male. How common is this? I thought the original male would ride herd on all the rest and prevent a second transition from happening. Is there ever any expected ratio of males to females? The only thing especially unusual about the tank is that it has a real lot of rockwork, and therefore lots of boltholes.

2) Anyone have any preferred T5 lamp color (and brand) for showing off Lyretails' coloration? I'm heavily on the blue side, and I don't think it does justice to anthias colors.

Thank you for any thoughts...

 

[Doctorgori]

personal opinion but I like ATI purple plus for orange
Yes, that happened to me once. you won’t have 2 males in 6ft, unfortunately
just MHO

 

[nereefpat]

2) Anyone have any preferred T5 lamp color (and brand) for showing off Lyretails' coloration? I'm heavily on the blue side, and I don't think it does justice to anthias colors.

Throw a Coral+ bulb in the mix.

 

[radiata]

personal opinion but I like ATI purple plus for orange
Yes, that happened to me once. you won’t have 2 males in 6ft, unfortunately
just MHO

Throw a Coral+ bulb in the mix.

Hmmm, maybe I can teach them about 6' Covid Social Distancing... I haven't actually seen a lot of aggression (yet), but the newer one is spending his time in the left-most quarter of the tank.

I wonder if they can be distracted from their natural mutual animosity with the addition of 4 more (smallish) females. Any ideas?

Thank you both for the T5 suggestions. So far I've found I had a slightly used Geismann Fiji Purple bulb in my used equipment collection and installed it. The coloration is indeed looking better. I'll try the ATI next. Too bad I haven't seen any T5s discounted for Black Friday.

 

[Haydn]

Sorry I can't help with the lights but with the anthias-

I have kept lyretails in larger groups and have on a number of occasions had more than one 'male'. The first one that transitioned is probably the dominant breeding male and the second one although it has male colours isn't quite as vibrant and will tend to hang around at the edges of the group. Although he may try to court the females they will have nothing to do with him. Should the breeding male disappear, this 'male-in-waiting' (as my wife calls them ) will quickly assume the full male role.

Your full male will dominate and dive bomb him but usually it's just threat and no damage is done.

As an example I had 18 lyretailed anthias and I ended up with two full breeding males and 4-5 males-in-waiting the rest females. They lived as a stable community, with only a few dominance spats, and I never saw any damage on the fish.

 

[radiata]

Sorry I can't help with the lights but with the anthias-

I have kept lyretails in larger groups and have on a number of occasions had more than one 'male'. The first one that transitioned is probably the dominant breeding male and the second one although it has male colours isn't quite as vibrant and will tend to hang around at the edges of the group. Although he may try to court the females they will have nothing to do with him. Should the breeding male disappear, this 'male-in-waiting' (as my wife calls them ) will quickly assume the full male role.

Your full male will dominate and dive bomb him but usually it's just threat and no damage is done.

As an example I had 18 lyretailed anthias and I ended up with two full breeding males and 4-5 males-in-waiting the rest females. They lived as a stable community, with only a few dominance spats, and I never saw any damage on the fish.

Thank you for this reply. Now I'm less concerned about the two males than I was. The first male doesn't seem to be bothering the new one any more than he bothers his females. And, the new male isn't venturing very far into the tank from his end.

What size tank did you keep the 18 lyretails in? And, what kind of other fish, if any, did you keep with them?

Thanks again...

 

[Haydn]

Thank you for this reply. Now I'm less concerned about the two males than I was. The first male doesn't seem to be bothering the new one any more than he bothers his females. And, the new male isn't venturing very far into the tank from his end.

What size tank did you keep the 18 lyretails in? And, what kind of other fish, if any, did you keep with them?

Thanks again...

2000ltrs 2mx 1mx 1m. Just general stuff- tangs, angelfish

 

[Saltyanimals]

I wish my pair would change. Coming on two years now and I have a large female and a smaller female. No color change, no dorsal fin change.. just two ladies. ..I think. I'm considering adding a true transitioned male to the pair... wonder what would happen there.

 

[radiata]

Six Months On...

All eight of my Lyretails are still alive and well. The second male has expanded his territory to half on the tank, and has picked up a second female follower. The two males do a lot of bobbing and weaving when close to each other, but no damage yet.

 

[Saltyanimals]

Six Months On...

All eight of my Lyretails are still alive and well. The second male has expanded his territory to half on the tank, and has picked up a second female follower. The two males do a lot of bobbing and weaving when close to each other, but no damage yet.

That's great that you're able to have 2 males in a 180. I've upgraded since to a 180 (6') myself and ended up having a velvet wipeout at the start of the year. All new live stock and started with 4 new lyretails. One was clearly the smaller/weaker on and lasted about a month. Left with 3, I see 2 that are likely male given the dorsal fin and overall behavior. What I'm waiting for is for them to decide which one gets to be the male, but glad to see that maybe they both can be in the size of the tank. Now I feel like I need to add 2-3 more females. ...just don't want to go through another QT round. =)

 

[radiata]

That's great that you're able to have 2 males in a 180. I've upgraded since to a 180 (6') myself and ended up having a velvet wipeout at the start of the year. All new live stock and started with 4 new lyretails. One was clearly the smaller/weaker on and lasted about a month. Left with 3, I see 2 that are likely male given the dorsal fin and overall behavior. What I'm waiting for is for them to decide which one gets to be the male, but glad to see that maybe they both can be in the size of the tank. Now I feel like I need to add 2-3 more females. ...just don't want to go through another QT round. =)

I'd like to pat myself on the back and tell you what great anthias husbandry skills I have, but there are really just two reasons for my success with them so far.

The first is the Avast feeder: https://www.avastmarine.com/products/autofeeder.
I feed a wide assorted mix of 1mm and 2mm pellets every daylight hour. This feeding is in addition to one frozen meaty food feeding daily. These frozen foods include PE Mysis, Rod's Pacific Plankton, Omega or spirulina enriched brine shrimp, and many others.

I also credit the large volume of live rock in my 180. More rock = more bolt holes. More bolt holes = more escape routes for chased fish. I have no idea how many pounds of live rock I have. You can't see any of the back of the tank from the front. Twenty-odd years ago, before the 180, I started buying used live rock from people bailing out of the hobby and who advertised in the pre-internet Want Ad Press. This was in preparation for a large tank. I just stowed the rock in saltwater in plastic garbage pails. When I put my dream tank together, I built a grid out of half-inch PVC pipe four inches off of the back wall and made my own hangers to attach live rock to it. I completely covered the grid with rock, and I ran some chutes behind the grid so fish could get from one end of the tank to the other unobstructed. (DO NOT use zip ties for hangers - they'll get brittle after 8 or 10 years and will facilitate your fragging endeavors when they break and drop rocks on your corals!) Since the original build, I've added more rock in front of my wall with cantilevered shelf rock platforms and shelf rock structures above the sand be to keep the sand bed as large as I could.

Hope this all makes sense...

 

[Saltyanimals]

That makes sense. Plenty of food does seem to reduce aggression due to competition for food. Ie tangs. Anthias eat more frequently so I’m sure they love your hourly schedule.
I unfortunately can’t do the same as I prefer a minimum rock scape for sps which are filling in. These will eventually serve as the hiding places however I can’t overfeed without affecting nutrients which would affect the sps. Every tank is different, but glad to see your success.
If I assume that I do have two males now that means the 3rd is the only female for the tank. I wonder if that would make the lonely male more aggressive to get the female. I’m looking to add a few more females once I get a handle of a tank stability issue. Good luck.

 

[radiata]

That makes sense. Plenty of food does seem to reduce aggression due to competition for food. Ie tangs. Anthias eat more frequently so I’m sure they love your hourly schedule.
I unfortunately can’t do the same as I prefer a minimum rock scape for sps which are filling in. These will eventually serve as the hiding places however I can’t overfeed without affecting nutrients which would affect the sps. Every tank is different, but glad to see your success.
If I assume that I do have two males now that means the 3rd is the only female for the tank. I wonder if that would make the lonely male more aggressive to get the female. I’m looking to add a few more females once I get a handle of a tank stability issue. Good luck.

I agree that my feeding regimen should result in high nutrients, but I don't think it has. My nitrates tend to run between 5 and 8 (NYOS test kit), and my phosphates beteen.03 and .04 (Hanna LR). I currently automatically change 5G of water a day, utilize some pretty heavy algae filtration and automatically dose LaCl.

 

[radiata]

Lyretail Follow-up...

Six or seven weeks ago my original male developed pop-eye on his right side. At a physical disadvantage, he retreated to the right 1/6th of the tank, but kept eating and defending his dwindling territory. He died about three weeks ago (based on my skimmer output). I think the death was due to an advancing pop-eye infection, and not anything the other male was doing.

And then, a week ago, another of my remaining six females started to change into a male. He's been aggressive with the females that were under the control of the original male. But he is still smaller than the second male, and not too much direct confrontation is occurring between him and the 2nd male.

Seems to me that we're missing some pieces in the Anthias female to male conversion event...