Your Experiences with a Flame Hawk??

[goofieones]

Again I have been gathering information for this fish, and it just amazes me how one source of information will say peaceful, reef safe, and another source will state aggressive, eats inverts. So the best bet I figured was to gather experiences from people who have had these fish. I really was wondering if this fish would bother smaller fish, like clowns, grammas, gobies, firefish. Thanks for the info.

 

[kappadoku]

Smaller fish? Dont think so. I had one for 2 days, becasue I was garunteed it had been in with shrimp all its life, and had never been a problem. It didnt pick on other fishs, but DID eat a cleaner shrimp and a peppermint overnight. I think shrimp is their natural food in the wild, and its hard to break a fish of 10,000 years of genetic instincts.
BE CAREFULL!

 

[guppie]

I have had mine in a 125 fo with a small six line and grammas for 1 month and he has not bothered them at all. I have been told that not to put any shrimp with them. hope this helps. Good luck

 

[shel]

I have a Flame Hawk in my 125. He is a very cool fish to have. I do not have any cleaner shrimp with him, but I do have a Maroon clown, 2 Tangs, 6 chromis, 1 blue Damsel, 1 Dragon Wrass, and a manderine goby. The manderine is about the same size. It does not bother any of them. I even have snails, hermit crabs, and a sally light foot crab, and emerald crab. He just looks at them. When I introduced the damsel, he was being a little pissy towards the damsel. They hit each a few times, then all was good. It is cool because he sits right in front of you and stares at you. He acts like he always has to be the center of attention. He is like, don't worry I am right here. If I did not have one already I would buying one. I even wanted to add another, but found out they do like to be in pairs.
I have lr with mushrooms and polyops, and I think some spounges. It does not mess with it. I do feed ghost shrimp 1 every other week. He is a very good at catching them.
My thoughts only, I hope they help.
Shel

 

[deblin2]

I have a flame hawk with all of the fish you named plus a manderine. He gets along very nicely with all of them. I have a very peaceful tank. They are very interesting fish. You will love it.

 

[pufferlover]

I have and have had many hhawks over the years Longnose, spotted, falco and arc eyed. The flames is one of the milder ones and they all share the way of sitting on something waiting for food to go by, and yet they will dart up to the top to get their fair share if needed. Yes hawks will eat shrimp (Had a spotted eat a 20 dollar flame shrimp within the first 2 days of the shrimps arrival). They say the Longnose is a great reef fish but it also will eat shrimps. I think you will enjoy yours I do mine.
[ May 04, 2001: Message edited by: Pufferlover ]

 

[fishysam]

Make sure you have a top on your tank, mine jumped out a week ago. It sucks when a $45 fish that mostly sits around on rocks is able to jump so high.

 

[justlooking]

I just saw a flame hawk for 40$ I might buy. How would it be with a firefish,dottyback,jawfish,algae blenny,coral catfish. Will it eat my hermit crabs? I always wanted a hawk fish, figured this was the smallest, least aggresive type just need more info......

 

[goofieones]

I got one, it was on sale for like $19.95. Wow this is an old post, anyways it should work fine with those fish. And yes it will probably eat smaller hermits. I have never seen mine try to attack anything else, except for small blue legged hermits. He is kinda a sissy when it comes to the other shrimp.

 

[justlooking]

How about the arc eye? The store labeled it a flame but it looks like it could be an arc eye, and online it says the arc eye is more aggresive!

 

[pufferlover]

A arc eye is more on the brownish tone with a couple of gold lines below the eye. And yes they tend to be aggressive whereas the flames are more passive. Never met a hawk that would refuse a good shrimp dinner tho.

 

[bailey99]

Do they ever eat your snails or hermits?
Shaun

 

[dugan]

Bailey, mine ate my shrimp but never touched any of the snails or hermits.
Dunno if it was just dumb luck or if Flame Hawks just have more of an appetite for shrimp cocktail than crab legs and escargot.
Katie

 

[guppie]

I had mine in a 125 with bigger fish and no problems , just moved him into a smaller tank with a six line a royal grammas and he has not bothered them. Good Luck

 

[seafish]

well i would never put a hawk fish with anything but a sark because mine beat on every fish i had it didnt at first but after about 3 months it did mine is pretty big though

 

[justlooking]

what kind of hawk was it?

 

[webnstuff]

I can say first hand, I used to have a flame hawk...while small he was fine in a 55 reef, after several months he began eating shrimp at nite... soon after he began openly attacking reef crabs. geez was he hard to catch and remove.....overall he is a cool fish though!!

 

[goofieones]

Okay, three days ago I posted that my flame hawk doesn't bothered anything in the tank except for small blue legged hermits, but yesterday my yellow watchman goby was out, (which I don't know why he usually hides, until feeding time.) Anyways the goby was swimming near the hawk and he beat the heck out of it. I am pissed, my poor goby's top fin is almost gone..... I don't know if the goby is going to live. He is now in hidding agian and I can't find him. That little SOB, I guess he will have to find a new home. Funny thing is, he doesn't pick on the 6 line wrasse, which always swims in his area. He probably can't catch it. And here I thought I had a nice peaceful tank....

 

[dasnake03]

Flame Hawks are one of my favorite fish,they are hardy,colorful, and have the best personality a fish can have. I have one in my 90gallon reef, he has never really caused a problem. As for inverts,my cleaner shrimp did dissapear but there was no way the hawk did it,the shrimp was huge, he has never gone after any snails either. Hawks will bother other small bottom dwelling fish though. Go for the flame hawk!

 

[tlarsen]

Sounds like a great fish. Can it be put in a 150 gallon tank with a scotter blenney?