Lyretail Anthias Quarantine

[Zhain]

I have 3 smaller size female lyretail anthias in a 10 gallon quarantine tank. The tank has a PVC tube for hiding. All 3 fish eat very well and appear to be very healthy. I am treating them with Cupramine to be on the safe side before adding them to my display tank. My normal process is to observe and treat new fish for 7 weeks before they are added to the display.

My concern with these 3 fish is that the dominant female is so mean. She is always after the other two. They hide from her constantly, but she often hunts the others down to keep up the chase. It's painful to watch. She does let them eat so I don't think starvation will be an issue.

Should I give these fish a couple more weeks in quarantine and add them to the display tank early, or should I relax and accept this as typical behavior for the species as they establish their pecking order?

They started quarantine on 1/3 and the cupramine treatment reached full dosage on 1/14. My normal process has the last day of quarantine as 2/21.

I have a 40 gallon tank that I was going to start using to quarantine tangs after the anthias were added to the DT, but maybe I should transfer the antias to that tank now.

What would you do?

[Tripod1404]

If you can get dividers, you can divide the tank into 3

[SAT]

if you can get dividers, you can divide the tank into 3

+1

[Jdub968]

More than likely if you were to remove the aggressive one then one of the other two would then become dominant and aggressive. If your DT is large enough maybe all three can find there own territory

[LobsterOfJustice]

I would move them to the 40, and add more structure for hiding (like pvc fittings) and breaking up the open water visually (like plastic freshwater plants).

If you separate them, you are going to have trouble reintroducing them back together later. You may end up with multiple males that way.


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