Yasha Goby Care & Info | The Prettiest Shrimp Goby?

Mirror mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest goby of them all? We don’t pick favorites, but we think you’ll agree the yasha goby is pretty high up there. And its looks aren’t even the best part — the fascinating shrimp symbiosis is.

Find out everything you need to know about yasha gobies and how to care for them in your home reef below.

Yasha goby description & natural habitat

Description

Talk about tiny! The yasha goby is proof that good things come in small — and colorful — packages. A relative newcomer, this species was first described in 2001. It quickly became an aquarium favorite thanks to its diminutive stature (no more than 2″!), beautiful red tiger stripes on a cream-colored body, and dramatic dorsal fin. The latter isn’t just for decoration or to seduce potential mates, but allows the goby to communicate with its shrimp roommate.

Shrimp roommate? Yes! There’s a reason these fish are also called shrimp gobies, and it’s not because they’re particularly crustacean-like. Stonogobiops (and various other gobies, like the popular yellow watchman) maintain symbiotic relationships with pistol shrimp of the family Alphidae.

Yasha gobies live in burrows, which they share with a single species of Alpheus shrimp: the candy cane-striped A. randalli. You can read more about this symbiosis in the goby and pistol shrimp explainer, but the basic gist is that the two work together as a well-oiled security system. The fish acts as the motion detector, the blind shrimp as the sentry gun!

Did you know? In Japan, where this goby was named, “yasha” refers to a traditional female demon figure with long upper canines. The species’ bulging eyes and huge mouth make it look more like a frog than a demon; the name is actually a reference to its particularly large prevomerine (located in the roof of the mouth) teeth.

Natural habitat

Yasha gobies were first discovered around Okinawa and its surrounding islands in southern Japan. They’ve since been spotted throughout the Western Indo-Pacific, where they seem to prefer the deeper outer reef slopes between ~50–130 ft.

Like other gobies, yashas are benthic fish (better known as bottom dwellers). As we’ve seen, they inhabit burrows in loose substrates along with their shrimp roommate(s).

Yasha goby aquarium

Aquarium set-up

Although some sources quote tank sizes as small as five gallons for a yasha goby, we personally prefer to go for a minimum of at least ten to fifteen. This way we can keep our fish with their shrimp friends. The pair needs a pretty thick layer of substrate for their elaborate burrow, after all, which eats up a lot of water volume.

To help your goby and crustacean counterpart feel construct their home to their liking, you can cover the bottom of the tank in a mixture of fine sand (for easy burrowing) and coarser coral gravel (for structural integrity). Some sources recommend 1.5″ of depth, but we think up to 4″ would be great for a luxury underwater mansion.

One thing to keep in mind is that all the tunneling these duos do can undermine the structural integrity of your reefscape. Plenty of live rock to burrow under will be greatly appreciated, but it might be worth considering gluing everything to the tank bottom — you wouldn’t be the first aquarist to find their entire reef on the floor because a rock pillar fell over.

Tip: Most fish are jump risks, but yasha gobies have a particular reputation for being “carpet surfers”. They’re skittish and can wiggle out of unimaginably tiny crevices, so you’d do well to close up everything even vaguely resembling a gap between tank and hood before you bring your goby home.

Yasha goby compatibility

Shrimp compatibility

You don’t have to keep your yasha goby with a pistol shrimp. We think it kind of defeats the purpose of keeping shrimp gobies in the first place, however, and without its bodyguard present the poor fish is likely to stay shut in its burrow the majority of the time.

Other tankmates

These little gobies make excellent additions to peaceful reef systems. Although they’re at risk of being harassed or eaten by aggressive or overly boisterous tankmates, they’ll get along well with other mellow numbers. Blennies, firefish, small wrasses, cardinals, clownfish, and other classic small reef species will work well.

It’s also possible to keep multiple goby species together, though we’d avoid other shrimp gobies or sand-sifting species unless you can offer them a lot of space. Coral dwellers like the yellow clown goby (which are even smaller than yashas!) will work well in most systems.

Are yasha gobies reef safe?

Yes. Gobies, especially tiny species like yashas, show no interest in corals and other sessile invertebrates. They might damage a reef scape is by using its components as building supplies. Very small frags are best kept off the substrate so they don’t end up dragged into a tunnel by the shrimp.

Yashas also leave motile invertebrates alone. So does their favorite pistol shrimp, the relatively small A. randalli; bigger gunslingers can have a taste for small critters like sexy shrimp, so be careful with those.

Yasha goby diet

Yasha gobies may be tiny, but they’re still carnivores: they mostly feed on small zooplankton and tiny crustaceans, though they’ll also take algae and general detritus. They’re not possessive of their meals and may actually share whatever they bring back to the burrow with their shrimp roommate.

As long as meals are placed near its burrow, your captive yasha goby should take any type of reef food without issue. You can offer mysis, small pellets, chopped seafood, and the occasional plant-based option, preferably divided between 2–3 meals daily.

Tip: Wild-caught yasha gobies, like many other reef fish, are notorious for arriving skinny and too skittish or weak to eat. It’s worth finding a tank-bred specimen to prevent disappointment!

Breeding yasha gobies

Breeding reef fish at home is almost always a highly complicated project. Still, with yasha gobies, we know it technically can be done. These shrimp gobies were first successfully reared in captivity in 2016, which was a huge boon for the aquarium industry because they’re so cryptic in the wild — demand was way higher than the few fish that could be caught and distributed. Captive-bred yashas are now reasonably common in the hobby.

Roger Williams University, whose aquaculturists first managed this feat, have kindly shared some information about their breeding set-up. If you want to try spawning your gobies at home, this is probably your best place to start.

Conclusion

Yasha gobies may not have been around in the reef hobby for very long yet, but they’ve captured aquarists’ hearts. Between their beautiful pattern, suitability for small tanks, peaceful, reef-safe nature, fascinating shrimp symbiosis and ease of feeding, there really is a lot to like about these tiny bottom dwellers!