Tang Aggression - Understanding and Combating

[i cant think]

Hey all - thinking of adding a White Tail Bristletooth probably in 3-4 months once my current fish order is acclimated. I'd like to add 2 tangs, and introduce them at the same time to the tank. Any ideas on what would be a good tank mate with the White Tail? Should I go with a different genus? Or stay with the Ctenochaetus - specifically the Blue Eye?

What tank size is it?

 

[Digitalfirex]

A different genus may be to your benefit otherwise place bristletooth in acclimation box and allow the other two to explore tank.
Tomini tang
convict tang
Hepatus Blue
kole eye tang
gem tang

White tail bristle tooth and yellow eye kole tang would be ok?? Sorry, bit confused by your response.

 

[4FordFamily]

White tail bristle tooth and yellow eye kole tang would be ok?? Sorry, bit confused by your response.

They may fight since they’re in the same genus. White tail can be particularly aggressive within the bristleooth tang family. But as with any mix of fish, each has their own temperament.

 

[vetteguy53081]

White tail bristle tooth and yellow eye kole tang would be ok?? Sorry, bit confused by your response.

This may be a risk

 

[cdnco2004]

Anyone know of a good place to get a acclimation box large enough for tangs? The only ones I can seem to find are tiny meant for mushroom corals.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Anyone know of a good place to get a acclimation box large enough for tangs? The only ones I can seem to find are tiny meant for mushroom corals.

octoaquatics.com

 

[Dave-T]

Hi!

I have a 240 gallon reef tank (72"x28"x28"). The tank finished its cycle a couple of months ago and I've been slowly adding fish. I could use some tang advice. Right now, I have a 4 inch gem tang in the tank, along with 12 other fish. I have a 3 inch powder blue and a 5 inch orange shoulder in quarantine (the QT is a 40 breeder). (I also have a second 40B QT that has a yellow coris wrasse and a regal angel in it). And a local reefer has a 3 inch yellow that I'd like to get. I don't know as much as I should about tangs, and just stumbled across this thread. I'm now a bit worried about my PB. The gem in the display tank is fairly aggressive, he keeps going after my magnificent foxface, although the foxface just puts out his spines and seems unperturbed.

Can someone advise me as to the best way to introduce these fish in my display tank? Again, I have a gem in the tank currently, and want to introduce a yellow, PB, and orange shoulder.

Also, the yellow is healthy and in a stable system, so I might talk myself out of QT for him, if that works within the introduction strategy.

Thanks!

 

[4FordFamily]

Hi!

I have a 240 gallon reef tank (72"x28"x28"). The tank finished its cycle a couple of months ago and I've been slowly adding fish. I could use some tang advice. Right now, I have a 4 inch gem tang in the tank, along with 12 other fish. I have a 3 inch powder blue and a 5 inch orange shoulder in quarantine (the QT is a 40 breeder). (I also have a second 40B QT that has a yellow coris wrasse and a regal angel in it). And a local reefer has a 3 inch yellow that I'd like to get. I don't know as much as I should about tangs, and just stumbled across this thread. I'm now a bit worried about my PB. The gem in the display tank is fairly aggressive, he keeps going after my magnificent foxface, although the foxface just puts out his spines and seems unperturbed.

Can someone advise me as to the best way to introduce these fish in my display tank? Again, I have a gem in the tank currently, and want to introduce a yellow, PB, and orange shoulder.

Also, the yellow is healthy and in a stable system, so I might talk myself out of QT for him, if that works within the introduction strategy.

Thanks!

Hello,

Regarding skipping QT, I highly advise against this. Zebrasoma tangs such as yellows, gems, purples, sailfin, black, etc can be VERY resilient to parasites. If the person did not stringently quarantine, there is a high liklihood that it will bring parasites to your system which will infect everyone. Powder Blue tangs are among the most susceptible and I've not seen many successes with them more than a few months in the absence of proper QT.

Regarding adding them - I would add them together. This increases your chances. Gem can be fiesty, but adding multiples at a time will spread the aggression well. In a large tank with few other fish, the Gem will be accustomed to not needing to share its' space with many direct competitors. This is why it's heckling the foxface a bit. The risk factor in lowly stocked tanks is higher for this reason. Thankfully, Zebrasoma tangs don't seem to "hold grudges" against new additions as long or violently as their acanthurus cousins (particularly powder blue, achilles, powder brown, goldrim, clown tang, and sohal tang - in no particular order). Thus, if the new fish can survive the first couple of days without getting too beat up, things will likely be fine. I would be surprised if the gem would harass a coris wrasse, so I wouldn't worry about that. The coris can hide in the sand to stay safe if things get ugly (and likely will either way when added).

One option is a large acclimation box for adding new fish. This is best used when adding one tang to a tank containing a tang or tangs. Even better would be to add several at a time as mentioned. Adding mirrors on either side of the tank to distract the aggressor can also help.

Though a yellow tang and gem are of the same genus, and thus a bit at risk of clashing harder than the others -- I find that oftentimes zebrasoma co-exist better within their genus than many others. Of course, individual fish have indivudual personalities and thus there are NO guarantees.

Good luck!

 

[Dave-T]

Hello,

Regarding skipping QT, I highly advise against this. Zebrasoma tangs such as yellows, gems, purples, sailfin, black, etc can be VERY resilient to parasites. If the person did not stringently quarantine, there is a high liklihood that it will bring parasites to your system which will infect everyone. Powder Blue tangs are among the most susceptible and I've not seen many successes with them more than a few months in the absence of proper QT.

Regarding adding them - I would add them together. This increases your chances. Gem can be fiesty, but adding multiples at a time will spread the aggression well. In a large tank with few other fish, the Gem will be accustomed to not needing to share its' space with many direct competitors. This is why it's heckling the foxface a bit. The risk factor in lowly stocked tanks is higher for this reason. Thankfully, Zebrasoma tangs don't seem to "hold grudges" against new additions as long or violently as their acanthurus cousins (particularly powder blue, achilles, powder brown, goldrim, clown tang, and sohal tang - in no particular order). Thus, if the new fish can survive the first couple of days without getting too beat up, things will likely be fine. I would be surprised if the gem would harass a coris wrasse, so I wouldn't worry about that. The coris can hide in the sand to stay safe if things get ugly (and likely will either way when added).

One option is a large acclimation box for adding new fish. This is best used when adding one tang to a tank containing a tang or tangs. Even better would be to add several at a time as mentioned. Adding mirrors on either side of the tank to distract the aggressor can also help.

Though a yellow tang and gem are of the same genus, and thus a bit at risk of clashing harder than the others -- I find that oftentimes zebrasoma co-exist better within their genus than many others. Of course, individual fish have indivudual personalities and thus there are NO guarantees.

Good luck!

Thanks! To be clear, the PB is already in quarantine (along with the orange shoulder). It's the yellow I'm considering not quarantining, because he's healthy and been in the same system for 2 years. I do have an acclimation box.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Hi!

I have a 240 gallon reef tank (72"x28"x28"). The tank finished its cycle a couple of months ago and I've been slowly adding fish. I could use some tang advice. Right now, I have a 4 inch gem tang in the tank, along with 12 other fish. I have a 3 inch powder blue and a 5 inch orange shoulder in quarantine (the QT is a 40 breeder). (I also have a second 40B QT that has a yellow coris wrasse and a regal angel in it). And a local reefer has a 3 inch yellow that I'd like to get. I don't know as much as I should about tangs, and just stumbled across this thread. I'm now a bit worried about my PB. The gem in the display tank is fairly aggressive, he keeps going after my magnificent foxface, although the foxface just puts out his spines and seems unperturbed.

Can someone advise me as to the best way to introduce these fish in my display tank? Again, I have a gem in the tank currently, and want to introduce a yellow, PB, and orange shoulder.

Also, the yellow is healthy and in a stable system, so I might talk myself out of QT for him, if that works within the introduction strategy.

Thanks!

Mixing tangs always poise a challenge but is often accomplished. I would be cautious on behavior of powder blue tang and tang introduction. My PBT is my tank jerk but overall is that way first 2-4 days of new intro and settles down a bit

 

[Dave-T]

Yes, I am worried about the PB. I think they’re beautiful, but I got him before I realized how aggressive they are. At least he will be the smallest one, although he’s the boss of my quarantine tank and the orange shoulder is about twice his size.

 

[Digitalfirex]

Hello,

Regarding skipping QT, I highly advise against this. Zebrasoma tangs such as yellows, gems, purples, sailfin, black, etc can be VERY resilient to parasites. If the person did not stringently quarantine, there is a high liklihood that it will bring parasites to your system which will infect everyone. Powder Blue tangs are among the most susceptible and I've not seen many successes with them more than a few months in the absence of proper QT.

Regarding adding them - I would add them together. This increases your chances. Gem can be fiesty, but adding multiples at a time will spread the aggression well. In a large tank with few other fish, the Gem will be accustomed to not needing to share its' space with many direct competitors. This is why it's heckling the foxface a bit. The risk factor in lowly stocked tanks is higher for this reason. Thankfully, Zebrasoma tangs don't seem to "hold grudges" against new additions as long or violently as their acanthurus cousins (particularly powder blue, achilles, powder brown, goldrim, clown tang, and sohal tang - in no particular order). Thus, if the new fish can survive the first couple of days without getting too beat up, things will likely be fine. I would be surprised if the gem would harass a coris wrasse, so I wouldn't worry about that. The coris can hide in the sand to stay safe if things get ugly (and likely will either way when added).

One option is a large acclimation box for adding new fish. This is best used when adding one tang to a tank containing a tang or tangs. Even better would be to add several at a time as mentioned. Adding mirrors on either side of the tank to distract the aggressor can also help.

Though a yellow tang and gem are of the same genus, and thus a bit at risk of clashing harder than the others -- I find that oftentimes zebrasoma co-exist better within their genus than many others. Of course, individual fish have indivudual personalities and thus there are NO guarantees.

Good luck!

So what you are saying is... throw the bristle tooth white tail and the yellow eye kole in there together and let them figure it out? :0

 

[4FordFamily]

Thanks! To be clear, the PB is already in quarantine (along with the orange shoulder). It's the yellow I'm considering not quarantining, because he's healthy and been in the same system for 2 years. I do have an acclimation box.

I would advise against not quarantining the yellow. It would be very easy for him to bring bugs with him that haven’t ever showed symptoms on him.

 

[4FordFamily]

So what you are saying is... throw the bristle tooth white tail and the yellow eye kole in there together and let them figure it out? :0

Haha it’s better than one at a time, at least

 

[Dave-T]

Hi!

I have a 240 gallon reef tank (72"x28"x28"). The tank finished its cycle a couple of months ago and I've been slowly adding fish. I could use some tang advice. Right now, I have a 4 inch gem tang in the tank, along with 12 other fish. I have a 3 inch powder blue and a 5 inch orange shoulder in quarantine (the QT is a 40 breeder). (I also have a second 40B QT that has a yellow coris wrasse and a regal angel in it). And a local reefer has a 3 inch yellow that I'd like to get. I don't know as much as I should about tangs, and just stumbled across this thread. I'm now a bit worried about my PB. The gem in the display tank is fairly aggressive, he keeps going after my magnificent foxface, although the foxface just puts out his spines and seems unperturbed.

Can someone advise me as to the best way to introduce these fish in my display tank? Again, I have a gem in the tank currently, and want to introduce a yellow, PB, and orange shoulder.

Also, the yellow is healthy and in a stable system, so I might talk myself out of QT for him, if that works within the introduction strategy.

Thanks!

Update on this. I moved the 3 tangs (yellow, powder blue, and orange shoulder) from QT to my display tank the other day. I already had a gem tang in the display. I thought the gem and yellow would be the contentious ones, and the yellow would win. This was far from true. The gem remains the boss of the tank. I thought he was smaller than the yellow, but he's actually a fair amount bigger. But he pretty much leaves the yellow tang alone. The fish that he goes after is the orange shoulder. He pesters the OS pretty mercilessly throughout the day. It is what it is, but can anyone explain this? I thought that tangs were supposed to not get along with other tangs in their same genus, but ignore tangs outside their genus.

 

[i cant think]

Update on this. I moved the 3 tangs (yellow, powder blue, and orange shoulder) from QT to my display tank the other day. I already had a gem tang in the display. I thought the gem and yellow would be the contentious ones, and the yellow would win. This was far from true. The gem remains the boss of the tank. I thought he was smaller than the yellow, but he's actually a fair amount bigger. But he pretty much leaves the yellow tang alone. The fish that he goes after is the orange shoulder. He pesters the OS pretty mercilessly throughout the day. It is what it is, but can anyone explain this? I thought that tangs were supposed to not get along with other tangs in their same genus, but ignore tangs outside their genus.

It may be due to the size difference, usually you want to add tangs from the same genus either as the same size or have one being considerably smaller. This usually knocks one out of the battle.

 

[Dave-T]

It may be due to the size difference, usually you want to add tangs from the same genus either as the same size or have one being considerably smaller. This usually knocks one out of the battle.

Yes, but they’re not the same genus.

 

[i cant think]

Yes, but they’re not the same genus.

It’ll be the size of the orange shoulder, the orange shoulder is the tang that will become the peace keeper however as a new introduction the OS is most likely to pose threat to the Gem’s “status” in the reef.

 

[4FordFamily]

Update on this. I moved the 3 tangs (yellow, powder blue, and orange shoulder) from QT to my display tank the other day. I already had a gem tang in the display. I thought the gem and yellow would be the contentious ones, and the yellow would win. This was far from true. The gem remains the boss of the tank. I thought he was smaller than the yellow, but he's actually a fair amount bigger. But he pretty much leaves the yellow tang alone. The fish that he goes after is the orange shoulder. He pesters the OS pretty mercilessly throughout the day. It is what it is, but can anyone explain this? I thought that tangs were supposed to not get along with other tangs in their same genus, but ignore tangs outside their genus.

Mixing tangs is always a risk, different genus may reduce risk. I am guessing that this will blow over in time, however.

 

[Digitalfirex]

Haha it’s better than one at a time, at least

So slight update:

I added two small yellow eye tangs to the tank (in an acclimation box) and the bigger white tail bristle tooth keeps attacking the acclimation box with its switch blade... looks like a scene from West Side story. Anyway, how long in any of your experiences has a tang attacked an acclimation box? Like is there a point where I should be concerned for it hurting itself? (I'm picturing someone head butting a wall here) should I try to add a mirror?