[zhenya]

I think either group will work fine in the 55g tank.Personally I like #2.

One other note.., I would forgo the sand sifting starfish. It will starve rapidly in this size tank. On the other hand the smaller Holothurian will do fine in the 55g tank with the fine sand bed. Tiger tail or the yellow cukes are my favorite.
And if you plan on adding 10 Mex. Turbo snails you are definately sentensing at least half of them to slow starvation. They grow pretty large, too( I have one that is at least 2" across). I would think if you add two-three of these snails in the beginning it will be plenty to maintain amount of rock that you have. Personally I would add two and two-three other grazing snails for diversity. Make sure that they have plenty of food ( be it on the glass or the rocks) to eat before you add any to the ones you already have.

Good luck, Garrett!

[Samper]

Do you plan on having corals down the road?

[Minh Nguyen]

What kind of light are you going to have? If you don't have much light, there will not be much algae growth and the need for grazer is limited.
If you let us know a full list of equipments, we can advise better.

[Garrett]

Sorry for the delay,

As for corals i don't plan on having them in this tank maybe when i get more experience down the road and a bigger tank. As for my Equipment i have:

55 gal. All glass Tank
CPR Overflow 600 gph
CPR Bakpak 2 Skimmer
~10 gal. sump w/ Mag 9.5 Return (Contoled by a ball valve)
50-60 lbs. of Live rock
30 lb. of Argamax sand
20 lb. of Agra-Alive (the small size) oolight or something like that i don't know the certian name.
As for lighting i know i dont have the means to even attempt at keeping corals i belive they are just florecent. One give of a white light and another gives of a blue light. I'm not by my tank this weekend to give the exact names of what they are.

My tank has been running for about 3 weeks now with nothing in it. Levels are good and i've even noticed more coraline algae growth since i started the tank. Maybe i should just start out with 10 Nassiarius snails and go from there. Sorry for the lengthy read..

Thanks

[Minh Nguyen]

I would get 3 Royal Gramma (Gramma loreto), 2 Ocellaris clowns and a Flame angel. The secrete about keeping group of RG is that you need to keep one male and two females. The dominant RG will turn to become a male and the other will stay females. If you put two males together, they will fight to the death of one. RG will change sex relatively quickly if they stay by them self. You need to get three of the smallest RG in the tank. They will not fight. Keeping them in a group, they will spawn and also will be out of the rock work most of the time.
Another thing about RG is that there is a very similar fish, the Brazilian Gramma (Gramma brasiliensis) that are very aggressive and difficult, if not impossible, to keep in group.
If you are going to keep Royal Gramma, make sure you correctly ID the fish. Brazilian Gramma is much more common than Royal gramma in the US. This is the reason why RG have an undeserved reputation of being nasty and aggressive. They tend to be shy and peaceful. I keep a breeding group of Royal gramma, and never seen them bite any other fish.

Here is a picture of the Brazilian gramma

Here is a picture of the Royal Gramma

Good luck with your tank.

[Minh Nguyen]

If you have not seen it already, the different between the two species is that BG are larger, have larger mouth, lack the black stripe across the eye, and less colorful.

[Garrett]

Ming,

I like that idea... but how would i go about introducing all of those fish would i go by the hardiness or how much they eat....do i introduce them all at once (meaning the RG). Are you supposed to introduce pairs at the same time? (meaning the Clowns).

[Minh Nguyen]

If you decide to keep 2 Ocellaris, 3 RG and a Flame angel then two things that are important:
Add 3 RG at the same time if you can, otherwise add only smallest RG that you know are females. I would not add any RG that stay by them self for more than about 1 week.
Add the Flame angel last.
In a 55 g, you can add two or three small fish at a time without problem.
For Ocellaris, you can add one or two at a time and there will be no problem as long as you don't add a mature female in a tank that have a female in it.

[Garrett]

After careful consideration i have decided to go with the list of

2 False Percula's
Six Line Wrasse
Bicolor Angel

My question is what should i introduce first and what order thereafter?

Thanks

[Garrett]

Ok on a whim i went with what Minh suggested and got 3 small royal gamma's. I acclimated them and then put them into the tank and they started fighting. The would lock heads and roll. Is this normal when i put them in at first? Will this settle once they get there rolls in order?

[Minh Nguyen]

Lock head and roll seem serious. Were they all in the same tank at the LFS?
Two male RG will fight to the death of one

[lightcycler]

Originally Posted by Garrett

Ok on a whim i went with what Minh suggested and got 3 small royal gamma's. I acclimated them and then put them into the tank and they started fighting. The would lock heads and roll. Is this normal when i put them in at first? Will this settle once they get there rolls in order?

Any update on this? Curious how it turned out?

[Garrett]

Sorry didn't know someone had commented on this...

Well i did go for the 3 royal gammas. Got them from the lfs brought them home did the appropriate accl. etc...and put them in the tank. They swam around for a few and then went after each other like an ultimate fighting championship. Thinking i would find one dead in the morning i woke up and everyone was ok. Don't know if they just needed to find who's the boss or what, but for now they are fine together. They nip at each other sometimes but nothing like in the beginning and nothing i don't think is any conern. For a little bit 2 stuck together and the other went to the other side of the tank which i thought was interesting. I haven't put anthing in the tank i have been fighting a skimmer problem and didn't want to overload anything. Even though i don't know what would happen i know i want 2 osc. clowns, but i'm not sure how they (gammas) would react to them. Debating on taking two back to another lfs and then getting the two clowns nothing set in stone.

Any thoughts?

[Garrett]

BTW, stuck together meaning they paried themselves not literally "stuck" sounded funny when i read it after i posted it.

[lightcycler]

Interesting. I have a 75 gal FOWLR I'm starting up. 2 months old still thinking about what fish. I also want a pair of false percs. 1 or 2 grammas......and a coral beauty angel.

I have read so much conflicting info on Royal Grammas I really don't know....I think its a roll of the dice on what critters you get. Some are naughty some are nice I also think its a roll of the dice how they do with the clowns.

My plan is to start with the clowns and then add either one or two grammas.......not going to try 3. Will find a pair in a tank together already. Maybe you can keep the 2 that stuck together and return the one that went off alone.

Well there are a lot of people on this board that know a heck of a lot more than me ......but this is the cool part ......learn on the fly

[Garrett]

Yeah i definatly is a roll of the dice for sure...I will probably take out 2 of the gammas i think it will be for the better in the end. Definatly a learning experience also debating on a bi-color, flame, or coral beauty as for my angel choice. I have had a coral beauty before and really liked it, but i do like the bi-color also. taking my time that's for sure.

Only time will tell....

[lightcycler]

Good luck. I have a 2 month old 75 gal. Plan on the first fish around Jan or Feb. I found out 6 years ago how to kill fish so now I'm learning how to keep them alive. Round 2 with a 5 year lull

[Minh Nguyen]

The one Royal Gramma is the male. He will build a nest and went over to try to entice of the female, swim around her in a dance then dart off then come back, to come into his den and laid eggs. He will guard the eggs until they hatch. A group of Royal Gramma is beautiful and fascinating to watch. Garrett, I would leave the three together for a few months. You will not regret keep them in group. You do need to feed them a diverse and color food to help them retain their pigmentation. The good thing is that RG will eat just about anything and are very easy to keep in good shape for breeding. RG will flare their mouth at other fish sometime but they are very docile and never actually bite any other fish. They are great community fish.

[Garrett]

What type of color food do you mean? I feed them formula two and cyclopeeze as well as some brine shrimp on occasion.

[Minh Nguyen]

cyclopeeze flakes are great. I also make my own frozen food and put everything in it.