Blue tang from Petco with ich and Herbtana product killed invertebrates

[ariellemermaid]

Fish stores keep their fish in small tanks temporarily... they are not permanent homes... Also most stores will sell you whatever you ask for, they are not in the business to lose business so their advice may be a little "loose".

This is true, however I would challenge the idea (stated elsewhere above) that sales are the driving factor for poor advice especially at Petco. I have yet to find a minimum wage high schooler at petco that’s ever even owned a tank. So I think it’s a bit cynical to chalk it up to sales. It’s mostly just a lack of any knowledge and experience; for someone who’s never owned a tank or had a 5G betta tank, 30g probably does sound huge. For the latter to be true they’d have to at least pay commissions which they don’t, otherwise, why would they even care about sales? It’s less “work” to just talk someone out of a fish than chasing and bagging one up. Drawing on my own retail experience here.

Also, forgot to mention to OP; make sure you’re checking pH while doing hypo! At full salinity it’s not something you really need to care that much about, but in hypo it can get really low! Here’s the full Humblefish hypo article for reference.

 

[ariellemermaid]

Also websites like Live Aquaria or Blue Zoo are a little more accurate in depicting tank size then random websites though I would always take everything with a grain of salt.

I would even be careful about this (as you said with a grain of salt). They generally post accurate factual info, but they don’t say things like “this is the number one fish people say they regret buying on Reef2reef.” I always check here for threads on something I’m considering buying because there’s just important real-world considerations they leave out. This open forum is a wealth of info from different perspectives!

 

[Tamberav]

I called all LFS in the area and pitched the info I got from one against the others. The concensus seems to be that the 2" tang is ok starting off in a 30 gallon, that hyposalinty at 1.009 but not below 1.008 or above 1.010, temperature should be bumped to exactly 80 degrees and they also recommended a cleaner wrasse. They also advised that tangs are just extremely ich prone and that removing the tang to a QT would stress it to the point of almost killing it and copper would set into the LR and kill any invertebrates we put in there in the future. Continuing research , doing water changes to gradually lower salinity and playing the waiting game now.

lol a cleaner wrasse. They can not get to ich as ich is buried under the skin and the white spot you see is just the bodies reaction.

Furthermore cleaner wrasse actually have poor survival rates in captivity so they are asking you to potentially have another problem or death at the cost of your wallet.

Here is an actual reliable source: https://www.thewrasseguy.com/all-about-reef-safe-wrasses

I hesitate to even include this genus, as I reservations against even buying them, let alone keeping them or recommending them for a reef tank. These are the “cleaner” wrasses, as in the wild they remove dead scales/tissue from other reef fish, but primarily feed off of the slime coat of others. My reservations against buying/keeping this genus are due to the following reason: they usually cannot be sustained long term in a closed system as a diet of prepared foods does not offer them the range of nutrition they require. In a small system, they can also harasses other tank mates for cleanings to the point of problematic levels. There are some success stories about keeping a cleaner wrasse long term, but for each success there are hundreds of failures. You are probably better off skipping them. Category 1 in terms of reef-safeness, provided they actually belong to the genus above. There are some wrasses sold as "cleaners" which are not as adults.

 

[Tamberav]

I would even be careful about this (as you said with a grain of salt). They generally post accurate factual info, but they don’t say things like “this is the number one fish people say they regret buying on Reef2reef.” I always check here for threads on something I’m considering buying because there’s just important real-world considerations they leave out. This open forum is a wealth of info from different perspectives!

Yes hence the grain of salt but my comment was mostly about tank size. For example
A hippo tang they recommend 180g. This is a fairly good recommendation.

 

[Tired]

OP, that fish is going to get a foot long. For an idea of what that will look like, get a dinner plate from your kitchen and hold it next to your tank, and see if that looks like an appropriately-sized fish. Any source that says you can put a tang in a 30gal permanently is a very bad source. Even if tangs stayed small (which they don't), they're a very active fish that needs more space than a 30gal can provide.

You could see if anyone in your area wants it, maybe put up a "free: sick tang" ad in the sale area on this forum. If someone already had a quarantine tank set up and wanted a blue tang, that wouldn't be a bad deal.