via The Biota Group
Biota Palau is excited to introduce a new species to both the aquarium trade and to aquaculture—an adorable sand-sifter type goby called the Buan Goby, Amblygobius buanensis. It is closely related to the more well-known “Sleeper Banded Goby” aka “Dragon” or “Bullet” goby, A. phalaena, but half the size. The species is named for Buan Island in the southern Philippines. The species is found in the Western Pacific (southern Philippines, Java, and Palau) and is sometimes called the Buan Silt Goby in the literature.
Buan’s Goby is peaceful, reef safe, and gets along great with other peaceful reef fish. Avoid keeping it with aggressive species or animals that are large enough to eat small fish. Like other gobies, these can easily jump out of an aquarium when chased or frightened, so a tight-fitting lid is required. They do exhibit sand-sifting behaviors but don’t require sand for survival.
This type of goby doesn’t usually do well in captivity when wild-caught, but our captive-bred gobies feed on just about any fish foods offered. We recommend Easy Reefs DKI pellets and Masstick, small pellet foods like TDO C1 and C2, frozen PE Calanus, and Hikari Mysis.
These gobies do well singly in a smaller tank of 10-plus gallons. Pairs may do well in large aquariums when added at the same time, but note that this species can be aggressive toward conspecifics and is not sexually dimorphic.
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References
Fishbase – https://www.fishbase.de/summary/Amblygobius-buanensis.html
Eschmeyer’s Catalog of Fishes (California Academy of Sciences) – https://researcharchive.calacademy.org/research/ichthyology/catalog/fishcatmain.asp
