Copperband butterfly thread

Robert Staie · Nov 15, 2015

No I have not had any of my CBB eat any coral, but I have been asked that question when I tell people I have one in my tank.

omykiss001 · Nov 15, 2015

My copperband in the tank. They are actually pretty good at holding their own. My powder brown tang is sort of the tank dick. The yellow tang mostly ignored him. I was able to distract the powder brown by taping a mirror on the tank, he spent an hour changing his image and after that seemed to forget the CCB was the new guy in the tank. We'll see how it goes on a new day.

cameronh · Nov 17, 2015

Saltwaterfishy said:
Update: my copperband is still doing fine eating frozen food more agressively now hopefully he stays healthy!!

How's that Kenya tree doing man?

Saltwaterfishy · Nov 17, 2015

cameronh said:
How's that Kenya tree doing man?

Great thanks to Ur help. Seem like him and the leather are already growing. But no polyps on the leather and coming out. What does this mean.

coralbeauties · Nov 17, 2015

I lost mine today. Got it wholesale last wed and it hasnt eaten a bite. It tried to feed it pretty much everything. live worms, live brine, frozen brine, frozen mysis, krill, arctic pods. I ordered a small one. wondering if a larger sized fish would have worked out better?
Jeff

flamehawk1613 · Nov 17, 2015

when I first got mine I fed him small earthworms and he loved them , since then he started eating all kinds of food to included claims, squid , shrimp, ect. the only thing that I feed that he is not interested in is nori. I love how they hunt and its cool how they can swim upside down

Saltwaterfishy · Nov 21, 2015

Still going good 2 weeks. But my cb only seems to have interest in brine. And only eats a couple mysis. Will brine keep him healthy for a while

Jlentz · Nov 22, 2015

dbl said:
Maybe a stupid question, but assuming a CCB would find and eradicate an aiptasia infestation, after that, are they proned to start enjoying other corals types? Have any CCB owners experienced this?

Mine picked at my wellso, acans, clam, and plate coral. I think it killed my lettuce nudi and sea hare. I've seen it going at my snails and I think it's been taking them out. It took out my coco worm around day2. It got all the aiptasia in the DT in about 3 weeks.

I'm trying to get it out but it's pretty elusive.

It's a beautiful fish but it's causing too many problems for me.

dbl · Nov 22, 2015

Jlentz said:
Mine picked at my wellso, acans, clam, and plate coral. I think it killed my lettuce nudi and sea hare. I've seen it going at my snails and I think it's been taking them out. It took out my coco worm around day2. It got all the aiptasia in the DT in about 3 weeks.

I'm trying to get it out but it's pretty elusive.

It's a beautiful fish but it's causing too many problems for me.

Yikes...that's what I was afraid of, but at least he got your aiptasia first! I guess it depends on the species because you hear both sides of this story. Thanks for sharing.

cameronh · Mar 28, 2016

Saltwaterfishy said:
Great thanks to Ur help. Seem like him and the leather are already growing. But no polyps on the leather and coming out. What does this mean.

You still around man? You haven't been on in months

skiwez · Mar 28, 2016

Not the greatest photo but my pair have been together almost 2 years now

Humblefish · Mar 28, 2016

@skiwez How did you go about pairing them up? Beautiful fish, BTW!

skiwez · Mar 28, 2016

To be perfectly honest I think it was pure luck. I'll relate all that I think is relevant but which part was more important than the other I could not tell you. I'll leave that part up to you @Humblefish
When I bought the fish they were actually still acclimating in the Styrofoam boxes from the wholesaler. I walked into the shop and they had 4 or 5 boxes open because it was their delivery day. Both of these were in one box and were the most active fish in there. I don't normally buy fish from my LFS without at least seeing them eat, but the store already had a couple of others in the display and were active and picking at live rock but someone else bought them as I watching them. So I took the two in the box and brought them home to finish acclimating at home. I have a QT/hospital tank set-up, its a 40 gallon breeder. By the end of the day they were eating frozen mysis. One was about 3.5 inches the other 3 inches. kept in the breeder for about a week feeding frozen mysis. After that they went into the display. They were/are the largest fish in the tank, its a 72 x 27 x 27. They now eat Larry's Fish & Reef Frenzy along with mysis and maybe aptasia. The only tang i have in the tank is a blue hippo which is not more than 3 or 4 inches. The other fish are fairy wrasses and anthias a couple of flasher wrasses oh and the filefish what you can also see in the picture.

I think I lucked out in that the fish must not have been in holding tanks with the wholesaler for very long because they had full bellies when I bought them. Upon receiving them I fed them alot and often so they never had to outcompete each other for food. Now they are the most aggressive eaters in the tank. When I feed mysis I thaw but leave the circulation pumps on but shutdown my overflow. the moving food seems to illicit a feeding response from alot of the fish. Also when I feed Larry's i used to defrost and dump into the power head but that caused a huge mess. What I do now is cut a piece about 1.5 inch square and clip it to the algae clip in the picture above. The two Copperbands come in first and get their fill of the bits and pieces they like. They spit out what they don't want which slowly releases the rest which allows the other fish to swoop in. It's alot cleaner now and everyone still get their fill.

If you have any questions please ask, I'll do my best to answer.

Humblefish · Mar 28, 2016

@skiwez Thanks for the info! I've been considering a "butterfly garden" as my next tank, so I might have to roll the dice on two CBBs and see if they pair up.

skiwez · Mar 28, 2016

That would be awesome, will be keeping an eye out for your butterfly garden.

Also not sure if it's related to their success but i really enjoy watching the cleaner wrasse groom the copperbands. When they are ready to be groomed, they hang out by the rock there and the cleaner will pick stuff off of them. They will even allow him to poke around inside of their gills really pretty amazing. Sometimes the cleaner gets alittle overzealous with its cleaning and the copperbands turn on him. Nothing ever happens but the wrasse understands that they are done with him for a while.

Rob's Reef · Mar 28, 2016

One of my favorite fish! Unfortunately I haven't had any luck with them... once I get them to eat I put them in my DT, problem is my Desjardin sailfin (spelling?) chases anything I put in the tank around and stresses them out. Within a couple days I find them sucked to one of my MP 40's... :/

ReefFrenzy · Apr 1, 2016

I'm really glad to hear about your success with our foods and the feeding clip method. We have many folks sharing videos that LRS foods have helped get their Copperbands eating. The clip method as you discovered works great. Thank you for trying LRS foods!