Missing clown - would trigger be to blame?

[OceanLuv]

This is very puzzling to me. I have a blue chin trigger in my tank who has been a model citizen - he leaves all the corals alone and I have never seen him bully any of my other fish. I have had him about 9-10 months and he is about 3.5 inches long. the tank is small for him though, only 4 feet wide, so we are upgrading to a 6 foot tank because he needs more room.

This morning one of my clowns didn't come out for feeding and I didn't see him in his usual spot (up at the surface in front of the powerhead!). My LFS thinks that my trigger will eventually eat the clowns, but I don't believe him.

The reason I mentioned tank size, was because I was wondering if he got frusterated and took it out on my little clown??

[tray262]

Do you have a lid on your tank ? I had a clown take a leap a few months ago. might want to look around your tank. Also I think it would be possiable for the trigger to take him out.

[OceanLuv]

I have a lid, but there are a couple of inches open in the back. I have a canopy that is also open in the back ... he could have jumped out the back I guess, I didn't check behind the tank! Poor little guy

[tray262]

to jumping I've lost, A clown, a hippo tang (little guy), six line wrasse, my poor guys, I now have a lid.

[kevinpo]

Very unlikely that the trigger ate the clownfish. I have a pair with a clownfish for over 5 years. I also have sold 25 or so with no reports of them eating tankmates. An established one will sometimes go after a new fish at the moment it is dropped into the tank because it thinks you are feeding it something. It stops as soon as it realizes the mistake but there could be damage to the new fish especially if it is small (like a dartfish). Normally if you release the new fish with a net submerged into the tank all the resident fish will hide in response to seeing the net

HTH,
Kevin