Fish compatibility

[loonz]

Hi, can a basslet (royal gramma or blackcap) be kept safely with firefishes , yellow-head jawfish in a 65g, without them tearing each other to bits? Thanks for any input.

[Brooke]

The gramma might act aggressively towards the firefish. If you attempt it, make sure the gramma is in the tank last!

Brooke

I have 10 fire fish and 4 royal grammas, a coral beauty and a bird wrasse with a few neon gobies in my 40 gallon reef. they all do great. The only fighting is occasionaly between the fire fish males as they are a species dominance by the male. Be aware they are great jumpers too, I have 9 now....****......LOL

[Doug1]

I would caution against more than one Gramma species in such a small tank, ordinarily they don't toletate conspecifics well, though if small and lots of cave structures they might be OK. Firefish usually harem as Dave mentioned, the males fight amongst them selves. This is frequent with Serranidae, Pseudochromis, anthias etc.
With Pomacentrids, i.e. clowns and damsels the females are noticably larger and courtships can be brutal. With most of the dwarf angels(Centropyge) they start off female and one will turn male if they become a breeding pair

[Alice]

Wow Dave, that's a lotta fish in a 40 gallon tank

[hooked]

I had a firefish and royal gramma in a 38g. I added the firefish first and after about a month put the royal in. They did good together with an occasional attack by the royal. It only happened about once a week that I could ever tell. All and all I think they got along pretty good. HTH