Leopard Wrasse

Just curious about experiences with them. Currently I have one in my display and he's not been seen since added. Its been about 4 days now and was told it could be two weeks before he acclimates.

He is under the sandbed somewhere - they are notoriously bad shippers (stressed out to the extreme in the bag since they have no sand to hide in while shipping), which is part of why they take so long to acclimate.

Did you get him from the LFS or online? How long was he in the store if so?

4 days is a long time to hide - he may be coming out when you don't see him and hiding the minute you enter the room - but I'd be worry about whether he has had enough to eat.

this might seem crazy but i have found the have jet lag it has always taken mine up to a week to get use to the day night time here, if you look under your tank up at the glass you might be able to see it in the sand, they do bury every night, and i have never had a problem with mine not shipping well, might have just been lucky

hmmmmm....very interesting behavior from this wrasse eh? .....so chef - have you looked in the sand? please keep us posted on this....

He is a nice fat one and I saw him eat at the LFS. They had him in a medicated QT for about two weeks. I looked under the tank and didn't see him, but I also have some sand stars dug in which couldn't be seen either. I did read about the change in night vs day and I'm going to look at night again for him. I had some salinity issues about 2 years ago and lost some new fish which included a Leopard that was in the tank for several months. There's still a Tamarind Wrasse in the system which has thrived for the past two years.

Originally Posted by fishchef

Just curious about experiences with them. Currently I have one in my display and he's not been seen since added. Its been about 4 days now and was told it could be two weeks before he acclimates.

I would not worry to much yet , when I got mine it had about the same behavior. Mine is still kicken and has changed from female to male .

Thanks, seems like its just a waiting game now. Roll the dice.

If you see him/her please post some pics.

Originally Posted by fishchef

Thanks, seems like its just a waiting game now. Roll the dice.

also a possibility that i jumped i have had one do that before, just check around the tank

I have mesh over the tank and I saw it head for the bottom. That side of the tank was covered at the time. They're ususally not jumpers or considered ones. Leopards fear response is to dig in. Some do jump, but usually not this species. We'll hope that's not the case. There's always exceptions.

Any sighting fishchef ?

Ahhh...jerky! I've been in this hobby since '91 and you'd think that I'd be used to fish deaths, but each one gets harder to accept. How it jumped out of the tank with 1/4 inch nylon mesh baffles me. It must of been during the brief moment I had the top off. All I was told for months was that Leopards do not jump...wrooong. Told my wife I'm swearing off fish and sticking with corals. My Purple Tang was the last fish I added about a year ago, but temptation got the best of me. Sorry, no picture.

I've had good luck with mine but I think theres a little bit of jumper in all of them if they get scared enough.

Seems like all the fish I look at these days are jumpers or can be. Thought I had approached the problem. Most of the fish in my tank are 1+ years old and I even got one that I've had for 15 years. Thought I'd do some wrasses since I have my quota on Tangs. It just saddens me when stuff like this happens and I was warned.

My wrasses have been on good behavior but I did have a mated pair of flame wrasses jump and kinda made me sick so I swore off wrasses for several years. Most of my fish are 7+ years old as well.