lost my first fish

bolar70 · Jan 5, 2022

Hello, I'm kind of new to the marine tank hobby. I have a 75 gal tank that's about 5 months old. I lost a young Heniochus butterfly yesterday. He was eating and swimming fine until the day it wasn't. Unfortunately, he was dead in the morning. When I came home this afternoon, I noticed my Pearlscale Butterfly fish was not acting normal. When I inspected him closer, I noticed his face scared and a scale missing near his eye. He is not eating or really swimming. I thought it might have been an issue with the water or bacteria on the fish until the wife just told me that she noticed the blue fish pecking the other one. Now I found out that my Coral Beauty Angel is attacking everything in the tank. Is there a fish that you'll recommend stocking with the Angelfish that will stand a chance. He hasn't messed with the clownfish as for now. Moving the Pearlscale to a separate tank while he heals.

Thanks in advance

JumboShrimp · Jan 5, 2022

Just curious in what order those 3 fish were introduced. 75 gallons is not a huge tank, but it’s not tiny either.

bolar70 · Jan 5, 2022

Clownfish was first and about 2 months later added the Pearlscale Butterfly and Coral Beauty at the same time. They all lived without any issues for about 4 months. I just got the Heniochus about 2 days ago. The Heniochus didnt last 2 days and this morning the CB attacked the Pearlscale.

131696 · Jan 5, 2022

Get all peaceful fish sell the others easy peasy

Ryde · Jan 5, 2022

bolar70 said:
Hello, I'm kind of new to the marine tank hobby. I have a 75 gal tank that's about 5 months old. I lost a young Heniochus butterfly yesterday. He was eating and swimming fine until the day it wasn't. Unfortunately, he was dead in the morning. When I came home this afternoon, I noticed my Pearlscale Butterfly fish was not acting normal. When I inspected him closer, I noticed his face scared and a scale missing near his eye. He is not eating or really swimming. I thought it might have been an issue with the water or bacteria on the fish until the wife just told me that she noticed the blue fish pecking the other one. Now I found out that my Coral Beauty Angel is attacking everything in the tank. Is there a fish that you'll recommend stocking with the Angelfish that will stand a chance. He hasn't messed with the clownfish as for now. Moving the Pearlscale to a separate tank while he heals.

Thanks in advance

Sorry to hear. Somethings just don't work out as planned, best of luck mt friend!

vetteguy53081 · Jan 5, 2022

Were these first fish?
What is age of tank ?

JumboShrimp · Jan 5, 2022

The death of the H. bannerfish may be coincidental to the Coral Beauty being a bully; do you have a quarantine process— even just an observation tank? Did you use an acclimation box?

131696 · Jan 5, 2022

Before adding any fish do research please it will sabe fish and save you money.study about fish behavior

JumboShrimp · Jan 5, 2022

It’s true— feel free to ask a ton of questions here on R2R beforehand. Lots of ‘informal mentorships’ going on. And before to read a lot of info on online seller sites— pulse use the R2R “search” engine.

bolar70 · Jan 5, 2022

After looking at various materials and websites to include this one, I really didn't find any information saying that a coral beauty would not get along with Butterfly fish. I just knew not to put another dwarf angelfish in the tank with it. I will be more than likely re-homing the CB since I didn't really get any ideas as to what would be best to go in the tank with him. Yes, I have an acclimation box and I didn't see any signs of aggression before moving them in the same tank.

JumboShrimp · Jan 5, 2022

Unless drastically arranging your rock work and taking your CB out of the tank and trying him again a weak or do later, yeah, you might just need to re-home a bully. It might just be ‘one of those things’ where you really did nothing wrong.

Gtinnel · Jan 5, 2022

This doesn't seem like a lack of research IMO. I would've put a butterfly and a coral beauty in the same tank too and not thought anything of it. Since the Heniochus was very new I doubt it died from aggression if you didn't see any noticeable damage to it. My guess would be that it was more from being acclimated to a new tank, ecspecially if the salinity of the water you got the fish from was much lower (which it usually is). Also if the fish was shipped to you and slowly acclimated can be hard on them as well.
I agree with everyone else instead of trying to stock around the coral beauty that is a bully, I'd just get rid of it.

Zionas · Jan 6, 2022

I’m sorry but a 75 wouldn’t be large enough for a Heniochus in the long run anyway. I assume your Heniochus is a Heniochus Acuminatus, these are on the large side for butterflies and grow very tall. If it were left to me I wouldn’t put them in anything less than a 7’ tank. They’re supposedly one of the easiest butterflies, but the vast majority of butterflies do not respond well to any kind of aggression.

I would look into fish that can hold their own, butterflies need to be established without many similarly shaped fish like angels. If I wanted to keep butterflies I’d build my tank around them.

Look into:
-Clownfish
-Small Cthenochaetus Tangs
-Hawkfish
-Orchid Dottyback
-Chrysiptera damsels
-Smaller Halichoeres wrasses
-Midas or Starry Blenny
-If lucky, another Coral Beauty xD

Even the hardier butterflies need a peaceful environment without any bullies, so they can feed well enough and not get sick from stress.