While killing a little time after visiting family, I decided to stop by Fish Gallery’s new location to see what they had in stock. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my usual camera equipment with me, so I had to rely on the trusty old iPhone for a little video making. I will apologize in advance for the shakiness of the video since the camera phone isn’t the best setup for aquarium videography. I wandered around the store not really expecting to see anything that unusual, but Fish Gallery had several unexpected fish that caught my eye. For starters, they had an extremely large Freckled Hawkfish (Paracirrhites forsteri). In fact, it’s the largest I have ever seen. These fish are usually only a few inches long when imported, but this one was at least 9-10″. At first sight, I even thought it was a grouper. The fish wasn’t ordered that way, but apparently showed up in one of the numerous orders Fish Gallery received a short time back.
Moving on to the next setup, I stumbled upon a gorgeous pair of ORA Spotcinctus Clownfish, which have been at Fish Gallery for a few months now. The two fish didn’t show any signs of actual pairing activity, but appeared to tolerate each other’s presence as their fins were intact and neither showed signs of aggression. After wiping up the drool, we found an interesting but small leaf scorpionfish (Taenianotus sp.) sitting on some rocks in one of the other display aquariums. I was hoping the fish would hope around the rocks, but it sat in the same place doing what it does best, mimicking a leaf swaying back and forth in the water current.
Wrapping up my day, I saw the tiniest little nano aquarium that had to be less than one gallon of total water volume. Surprisingly, the tiny aquarium was packed full of corals and even had a tiny purple striped dottyback (Pseudochromis diadema) and a fire shrimp (Lysmata debelius). Fish Gallery had two more gorgeous tiny tanks sitting by the cash register, but I was unable to shoot those as I was in the middle of a coral purchase.
