[bri74]

hey guys I woke up this morning and went to turn on tank lights like always and didnt see the lion right away usually he is right at the glass. I found him floating upside down behind my spray bar which is almost at the surface of the water he moved right away for food but keeps going right back there to the same spot. I checked all parameters that I have tests for and all seems ok the water temp is a little high not sure how it changed but its around 80- 81. I turned down heater and opened the hood hopefully to cool things down a wee bit any help would be great thanks. I just gave it another look and the trigger is up there too right above a power head

[e_baer]

hmmm....im not sure about the trigger, but i know lionfish are known to hang upside down under rockwork a lot, especially the antennata lionfish. what species do you have? what do you feed it?

[bri74]

ive heard that too but its the first time ive really seen him do it. I feed him mysis, scallops and last week some rosy reds. he is a black volitan

[e_baer]

well, im reading up on it now.
Black Volitan Lionfish
how long have you had it?

[bri74]

had it 5 weeks

[e_baer]

as long as it is eating i think it is doing OK.

[Salt-lick]

Any noticable bumps growths or anything of the sort? Maybe your flow is too high?

I looked up your fish and saw asome other people say this as well..

An upside-down lionfish is no big deal...they spend a huge portion of their lives hanging inverted or sideways.
Now if this fish is NOT eating, and showing stress colors(ie, very lightly colored or super dark coloration) then i would worry.
Taking it out and attemtping to reacclimate it will do little for you right now
What else about the tank can you tell us?


If you are truly worried about it call your LFS maybe they can do a water test to make sure yours are accurate.. and let them know maybe you can get a refund if he doesnt make it ?

[rlcline76]

And how is the trigger behaving? Out of curiousity...

[rlcline76]

Now that I have had my coffee, the reason I asked the above question is because I was under the impression that triggerfish and lions need a much bigger aquarium.

[bri74]

ok ive had my coffee too now and the trigger seems to be doing ok he just hangs out under his own ledge I do realize they are gonna need a bigger tank soon but the fish are still pretty small lion is about 5 inches and the trigger is less than that. The trigger sometimes goes up and sits atop of my power head which is almost at the surface but he pretty much goes everywhere.

[jgo1973]

Well I havn't had my coffee yet, but I have had my black volitan for about almost a year now and he hangs upside down all the time. I have found that when my tank temp rises my lion, humma and dogface puffer all tend to "chill" right next to the powerhead. As long as he's eating and not "gasping" for air, he's probly good. They are just very lazy. FYI mine is about 5x bigget than when I got him in September.

[jgo1973]

I mean Bigger...he's not a "bigget"

[TreeHugger74]

how long have you had the trigger, is he newly introduced?

[bri74]

Ok jgo he is eating and my temp did rise a bit I turned heater down. Dont know how the temp rose but anyways. He looks better today he has always been lazy but never hangs upside down so i guess its pretty common i wont worry about it for now and everything else seems ok in there. Is there a better test kit I can be using other than the API one?

[bri74]

Ya treehugger I put him in there about a week ago also the longspine urchin is new last week too

[bri74]

the snowflake eel is new also