how the heck does a fish just disappear??

[Nina51]

fed the tank last night an hour before lights out. everybody, including my yellow fin flasher wrasse ate like pigs, as usual. i always look my fish over right before lights out. no torn fins, no signs of disease. an hour after i fed, the wrasse was nowhere to be seen.

this morning, everybody front and center...except this wrasse. i have looked everywhere. overflow box, sump, not stuck to a power head, used a flashlight to look all through the rocks where i can see. not behind the tank. not on the floor anywhere. my dogs weren't even awake so i know they didn't find it. no sign of him. it's like he went **poof**! :confused:

[santanzchild]

some shrimp and crabs had a late night snack with a heavy sleeper...

Or he just feels like sleeping in today!

[Nina51]

i don't have any shrimps or crabs in my tank, just snails and not a whole lot of those.

he's never done this before so i'm not holding out a lot of hope.

[rocsec1]

They can hide very well when they want too. I've had fish disappear for a week and he show back up. Do you have a sock. I've pulled a few fish out of there before. In fact I've pulled one out of the sock twice

[Washout]

Likely still sleeping in the sand. Mine doesn't come out sometimes until my lights are at their brightest.

[thegrun]

+1, they sleep in the sand. I could have jumped, or died and eaten by the crabs.

[Nina51]

he's out. i put a few pieces of formula 2 (his favorite) in the tank and he came right out and ate. obviously, since i didn't see him last night, he went out. i dunno if he had a date with a hot wrasse or what but apparently, whatever he did last night wore him out and he slept late. maybe he's hung over.

he is grounded now for scaring me half to death.

oh and, i don't have any crabs in my cuc.

[philosophile]

Bristleworms will also take out a fish over night if it died. Glad your fish came out of hiding! But the short lesson here is that if your fish dies in your tank, it will simply just disappear in short order, because of your very effective clean up crew.

[d2mini]

Nina, I don't think I have EVER found a dead fish in my sw tanks. They always just magically disappear.

[gone fishin]

disappeared hmmm. My first thought would be aliens :worried:

Some of my wrasses can be pretty good at hiding no matter how close I look for them. I'm sure they will pop up when they are ready.

[Nina51]

Nina, I don't think I have EVER found a dead fish in my sw tanks. They always just magically disappear.

interesting. would that be the case if i only have snails and no crabs? i do have urchins and brittlestars.

disappeared hmmm. My first thought would be aliens :worried:

the danes eat aliens as soon as they land so that wasn't even a consideration. ;)

[Sk8r]

Had a yellow watchman disappear for 3 months. Hole on reverse side of rockwork.
A firefish disappear for a year. He's living in the sump.