Lost my first fish to...?

[atlweb]

I lost one YWG a year ago to jumping, so I was more mad at myself for not having a top. But now, I lost my yellow clown goby to reasons unknown.

I heard either my vortech or pump make really loud noises for about 10 seconds late last night and when I turned on the lights, I had no idea what happened, and the noise stopped. I began looking for my goby but couldn't find him. This morning I woke up and hermits / a brittle star were fighting over the top yellow part of his dead body.

I am super bummed. I'm still am not entirely sure if the two are related... but everything else in the tank is doing well so I don't know what else could have killed him. He was only in for 2 days so I wonder if I got a bad shipment. I did a 20% water change, so hopefully that will take care of any nitrates from him dying.

 

[brianjfinn]

It's possible he got caught in the power head, but much more likely that he died from other causes. Clown gobies generally do not fare well unless they're in an established system with tons of sps. They're found in the wild living among sps, and I'm not sure if they use the coral more for food or for housing, but I have seen them nip at corals many times.