can cleaner shrimp detect sick fish?

[Vince S.]

i purchased a new dwarf angel and my cleaner shrimp has been constantly chasing it, trying to get on his body. the dwarf angel doesn't seem to like it very much.. gets frightened and runs away. the cleaner shrimp has never done this to any other fish. does this mean there's some parasites that cleaner shrimp detecs on the dwarf angel?

[Aragorn]

Hmmm,
Not sure whether they have "insight" toward a sick fish. I do know that my Cleaner Shrimp have a definite affinity toward certain fish though. Maybe because your angel is a new addition they want to give it personalized attention. Not sure if this helps though. Sorry.

[Vince S.]

maybe. my cleaner shrimp certaintly has a weird personality. too friendly towards everything including my hand. i hope the angel doesn't get too annoyed and attack the shrimp in defense.

[snoopdog]

I would be inclined to say that there is probably "something" on it's skin. My cleaner never gets on a ish unless it has something and parks next to the cleaner fish. He is kind of like a service station, fish swim up to him and park and he will give them a thorough looking over. I have never seen mine do this unless there was something on the fish in question. Sick or not this is probably a good thing that should end within days.