Female anthias in corner

Been MIA from this forum for a while because been battling hair algae and finally have a handle on things. Rocks are almost all clean having to come to a strict feeding schedule for my trio of anthias made it work more. Anyways, yesterday when u was doing a water change and moving a few rocks around i noticed one of my anthias had disappeared. kmowing that it has happened before, I looked in the overflow and their it was. Now after everything calmed down and what not I noticed that now of the females is on the right side of the tank constantly. the male doesn't seem to really to bother her nor the other female. The male just seems more concerned (if fish are capable of that) and just hanging around her and is trying to get her to follow him. I'm not entirely to sure which anthias was in the overflow either so I'm worried it was the male and the one female is transitioning into male. No aggression as far as I can see so I'm not to entirely worried. Could it be just stress and the male trying to put his dominance in check again?

in the picture I posted you can see the female on the right and on the left you can kinda make out the male in the cave hanginger close by. she doesnt really move from that spot except to catch the food that comes floating by.

 

What kind of time frame are we talking about the fish spending in the overflow? I'd suspect that a day or two wouldn't be enough for a sexual change. Could certainly be wrong but hopefully someone with more experience with Anthias will chime in.

 

could most certainly be stress, from the overflow trip/moving rock work......in fact why are you moving your rock work around?...I too doubt a couple of days was enough to trigger a sex change, furthermore if im not mistaken anthias stay female when they are alone and become dominant males only once another specimen is present

 

only a day I assume but, it doesn't hurt to reassure that it doesn't happen in that time frame. What I'm worried about is that it was the male back their and not a female. I'm still unsure of which one it is but, I'm only assuming it's the female because how she's acting.

 

I had to move a few rocks due to a galaxia growing rampid on some rocks. it was originally only grow on one but, it caught on to a pice that held up a few others so I had to move it in order to segregate the galaxia. anyways, like I said in the above post. I'm still not sure which an this was in the back. Can only assume it was the female. I'm just hoping it wasn't the male and that one day without him was enough to trigger the sex change.

 

I wouldn't worry to much right now. Typical behavior for a stressed fish. After a few days it should resume it's normal behavior.

 

I agree. let it be for a while and just keep an eye on it.

 

OK so update. She's still in the same spot and hasn't moved out much except a few inches from the front of the cave she sits. She's really pale pink and yellow. She doesn't have a bowed stomach so she's eating right. I've thought about maybe moving a few rocks and perhaps it'll "reset" something. I know salt water fish are generally smarter then fresh (cichilds) so not sure if it'll work. thoughts?

 

I wouldnt touch anything unless you witness active violent aggression from tank mates, you're likely to stress her out all over again if you start moving things around.

that being said 15 days is starting to be a long time.... remind us what tank mates and how many anthias are in your system? my 2 cents

 

All of the tank mates are pretty docile. Swissguard basslet pair, ruby red scooter, pink streak wrasse, starry blenny and a yasha goby pistol shrimp. The anthias are a trio and have been fine for 6 month's prior to this. The only aggression that I have seen was between the starry blenny and the scooter when I first got the starry. Other then that except the occasional basslets chasing the wrasse out of their cave theirs not much. in the picture below you can make them out and the one female kinda just in the corner. This has been the most out she's been in a while so I caught it while I could. It's like she's really spooked of something but, no one is being aggressive towards her.