6-line aggression question

[fishoholic]

I know 6-lines can be very aggressive but I was wondering are they able to bite fair sized holes in the side of another fish's body?

Basically a few weeks ago my cleaner wrasse jumped out and I thought I'd add another cleaner wrasse to the tank. My old cleaner wrasse was always cleaning my king angel and about a week and a half after the old one had been gone from the tank my king angel stopped eating. Thought if I added another cleaner wrasse maybe it would help the king get back on track. Seemed to help as my king angel started eating pellets (only pellets) the day after I added the new cleaner wrasse and the cleaner wrasse had been cleaning him.

Unfortunately my 6-line does not like the new cleaner wrasse and was chasing him/attacking him all over the tank, when he wasn't cleaning the king angel. I also noticed my niger trigger didn't seem to like the new cleaner wrasse much either. However the niger just sort of chased him away if he got to close to him whereas the 6-line would relentlessly chase him around the whole tank.

Didn't see the new cleaner wrasse all day yesterday and I thought maybe he was dead and the 6-line killed him. However I looked over at the tank a little while ago and there the cleaner wrasse was swimming around the top of the tank. I went over to look at him and he very badly beat up he has two chucks/holes in the side of his body his top and bottom fins are all nipped up and he has a hole though his tail I was easily able to catch him and I moved him over to my 80g refugium area tank were I hope I will be able to save him but he's in really bad shape so I'm not sure if I can.

So after talking to Doug I planned on making a bottle trap and seeing if I could catch the 6-line. However we started to wonder if the 6-line could of done all the damage or if it was the niger trigger who bit the chucks out of the side of his body. I would hate to remove the 6-line and add the cleaner wrasse back only to have niger trigger beat him up. But I didn't see the trigger really bothering the cleaner wrasse, I only saw the 6-line attacking him.

So I would like to know has anyone else had a 6-line bit holes/take chucks out of another fish's body before? I did notice the 6-line continuously chase/pick on the cleaner wrasse so maybe he bit him in the same spot a few times? FYI when I saw this happening I did try to break them up but at the time they were a lot faster then I was with a net. Then the cleaner went MIA and I assumed the worse. Glad he's alive still and I really hope he'll make it.

[Delphinus]

My sixline wrasse chewed all the fins off from a mandarin I had. Found the poor little thing as a completely immobile lump: no pectoral fins, no dorsal fin, no caudal fin - all removed.

So I don't know about bite chunks out of the body for sure as mine was mostly after fins of his "enemies" but it wouldn't surprise me very much.

[fishoholic]

Ya there's a lot of damage done, wouldn't surprise me either if the 6-line did all of it.

Just checked on the cleaner wrasse and he's laying on his side on the bottom of the 80g tank breathing heavy and not moving, unfortunately at this point it's looking like he's not going to make it

[The Grizz]

I think my 6 line took out my McCosker Flasher as well but has no gone after my canary, cleaner or checkerboard. They are all a little bigger then him.

[Myka]

Doug says "nems is evil", but what he really means is "6-lines is evil". I wouldn't be surprised if the 6-line did it. That's one fish that I don't understand why people buy it. There are lots of other wrasses that do all the great pest eating like 6-lines do, but are much more peaceful. If you can catch the 6-line, try a Melanurus instead?

[fishoholic]

Grizz the cleaner wrasse was twice the size of the 6-line, but that didn't seem to bother him.

Myka I know 6-lines can be evil but I've always really liked the looks of them and I have always kept them without issues in the past. I thought because it was in a 230g tank, that that was why the 6-line never picked on anyone in the past, but maybe it was more because he was usually the last wrasse added to the tank. I never saw him pick on the last cleaner (however he was added before the 6-line) so I didn't think it would be a problem, obviously I was wrong.

Unfortunately I just checked on the cleaner and I found him dead, not to surprising considering the amount of injuries he had, but sucks knowing one of my other fish was the cause of his death

[Delphinus]

Originally Posted by Myka

Doug says "nems is evil", but what he really means is "6-lines is evil".

+1

'nems are just dumb. Dumb dumb dumb but not truly evil. They're far too dumb to be evil. Sixlines on the other hand are way smarter than one might think and yeah ... just evil once they realize what they can get away with.

Sorry about the cleaner. That really does suck, I feel for you.