Tang still has HLLE over a year- still don't know the fix.

[William Spak]

I've been giving him vitamin dosed seaweed daily, and we fixed the stray electricity in the tank. The last thing it could be is nitrates- can this cause HLLE, they're rather high.

My tank is a 75 gal and I have a purple tang.

Thanks,
Will

 

[dwest]

I've been giving him vitamin dosed seaweed daily, and we fixed the stray electricity in the tank. The last thing it could be is nitrates- can this cause HLLE, they're rather high.

My tank is a 75 gal and I have a blue tang.

Thanks,
Will

I have a blue tang in a 180. He’s had head erosion (not sure if exactly the same as HLLE) for his entire adult life. I’ve had him at least 7 or 8 years now. I have done everything I have read about as well. I feel your pain. I’ve had many other tangs in the tank that have been completely healthy. If you figure it out, let me know.

I doubt high nitrates are the problem.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-06/sp/index.php

 

[William Spak]

I have a blue tang in a 180. He’s had head erosion (not sure if exactly the same as HLLE) for his entire adult life. I’ve had him at least 7 or 8 years now. I have done everything I have read about as well. I feel your pain. I’ve had many other tangs in the tank that have been completely healthy. If you figure it out, let me know.

I doubt high nitrates are the problem.

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-06/sp/index.php

How bad is it on him? Mine's getting pretty bad but he seems okay.

 

[HuduVudu]

I've been giving him vitamin dosed seaweed daily, and we fixed the stray electricity in the tank. The last thing it could be is nitrates- can this cause HLLE, they're rather high.

My tank is a 75 gal and I have a blue tang.

Thanks,
Will

I fixed this in some very large blue tangs. They are herbivores, so no meat ... NONE. This may be difficult to accomplish, but you HAVE to get them on a all plant diet or it will never go away. The stray voltage thing is a red herring.

 

[William Spak]

I fixed this in some very large blue tangs. They are herbivores, so no meat ... NONE. This may be difficult to accomplish, but you HAVE to get them on a all plant diet or it will never go away. The stray voltage thing is a red herring.

I thought they liked mysis shrimp and all that? Also I mean't to say purple tang, I'll change that now haha.

 

[xxkenny90xx]

I had a sailfin tang for about 5 years with the same issue. I kept the tank healthy and fed it lots of algae and it got a bit better over the years (never completely went away)

 

[xxkenny90xx]

Fwiw I also fed it lots of meaty seafood (shrimp, clams, mussels, ext)

 

[HuduVudu]

I thought they liked mysis shrimp and all that? Also I mean't to say purple tang, I'll change that now haha.

Ohhhh they very much do like those things ROFL, and I like Dominos for dinner every night

 

[K7BMG]

From my research it will never go away as it is scar tissue.
The best that can be done is to find out why and stop it.
For me it was my fault as I did not give him the proper diet in the QT process.
Figured that out and it stopped.
Moving forward three months, and in the DT he is doing great.
The scaring may have reduced a tad, then I added carbon, to help with some water clarity and in a weeks time it was way worse.
Pulled the carbon and it stopped.
Yes I used the BRS 8.0 Rox or whatever its called, the stuff that is not supposed to cause HLLE in fish.
I have to assume that because he previously had to deal with it he is now susceptible to the condition.

 

[K7BMG]

How bad is it on him? Mine's getting pretty bad but he seems okay.

He is not ok if it continues.
HLLE is a fatal condition.
You need to find out the cause to stop it.

 

[Reverend Turtle]

Years ago, I had rescued a purple tang from a lfs with horrible HLLE. He was given to the store who then gave him to me. Within about three months, all the signs of hlle were gone, and all damage had returned to normal colored tissue. These are what I attribute to healing him. 1. 10% weekly water changes.
2. Lots of flow in the tank.
3. Fed daily with Lifeline herbivore frozen food, and Zoomed spirulina 20.
Not sure which did it, but all I know is there was nothing special about the tank.

 

[lion king]

I've said it over and over through the years, but for some reason people just won't do it. People continue to think nori and sheeted dry algae will help. Sure water quality is a given, but the answer is....LIVE macro algae. I have seen many cases of severe HLLE reversed once the hobbyist became committed to provide live macro algae. You'll have to find what your tangs like, but caulerpa and gracilaria is a good place to start. My tangs and angels love the fern type of caulerpa.

 

[K7BMG]

I've said it over and over through the years, but for some reason people just won't do it. People continue to think nori and sheeted dry algae will help. Sure water quality is a given, but the answer is....LIVE macro algae. I have seen many cases of severe HLLE reversed once the hobbyist became committed to provide live macro algae. You'll have to find what your tangs like, but caulerpa and gracilaria is a good place to start. My tangs and angels love the fern type of caulerpa.

Yes I am gona have to try this.
First time I have heard this and oddly did not use my common sense.
Of course fresh veggies will beat the heck out of manufactured processed stuff.

So this dillrod is slapping onself on the forehead saying duh....
Thatnks

 

[Thespammailaccount]

If you use carbon remove it

 

[HuduVudu]

Here was the before ... unfortunately this was many years ago and I didn't get the after. I also want to say that though the blue part recovered both of these fish had visible scars.

 

[BradB]

In my case, I added 3 identical healthy yellow tangs from the same source at the same time 6 years ago. 1 developed horrible HLLE almost immediately, and looked "on death's door" for 5 years, although swam around as if unaffected. I had something horrible happen to my tank that wiped out almost all my coral and anemone's and this fish did not survive. I still have 2 yellow tangs, 1 is missing a large portion of his dorsal fin, but otherwise shows no signs of HLLE. I am not sure if there is any chance of it regrowing, or if it is beyond repair - the fish looks the same over the last 5 years. The other tang appears in perfect health, and in 6 years, has never shown any visible HLLE.

So while I cannot say for certain whether this is diet or water quality, I can say all 3 tangs have been in the same water, had the same food available, and all grew at the same rate (so it unlikely they ate differently). Maybe this affects different individual fish differently, or maybe my fish did actually eat differently.

My hypothesis is this is a combination of 2 factors - diet and water quality weaken the fish in leave it susceptible to some sort of bacterial or viral infection that actually does the damage. Almost like what is going on with COVID-19 now, some people are exposed and asymptomatic, some almost die, others die. But you can be extremely susceptible and never exposed to the virus and remain in perfect health.

Unfortunately, other than removing carbon and ozone and making quality food available, there is little you can do that goes beyond speculation.

 

[h2so4hurts]

it's never stray voltage. It's always a red herring. For basically everything. I would say it's mostly likely having a highly active tang in a 75g. Minimum for a regal is 180, recommended is at least an 8x2x2. And you have a purple in there too? That's it. Too small of a tank for two very active and aggressive fish.

 

[lion king]

Yes I am gona have to try this.
First time I have heard this and oddly did not use my common sense.
Of course fresh veggies will beat the heck out of manufactured processed stuff.

So this dillrod is slapping onself on the forehead saying duh....
Thatnks

Just remember, this didn't happen overnight, and it won't reverse overnight. It may take 2-3 months, for a fish that will be with you over a decade, it will be well worth it. You can keep your supply in the sump, get an expensive refuge light and secure your supply from your favorite supplier. Supply the display daily as a routine, the fish will love it and you will see an overall improvement in health. Each tang is different as to what they will like, and give each offering a few days for them to get used to something new. The nutrient content in live macro is amazing.

 

[OrionN]

It cause by a combination of things, most important of which is poor water quality and limited, mono food source.
I would make sure that you have good water quality. High Nitrate means poor water quality. You need to fix this in order to have healthy fish. Regarding food, I would feed the tank a variety of foods. Use several dry sea weeds and even terrestrial fresh vegetable. There are plenty of tangs so well on this mixture of variety of food and clean water.

 

[najer]

As in comments above, fresh macro.
I rescued this little girl when my lfs got her in as a rescue, she wouldn't eat.
I went in every day for a week and got her eating macro from my fingers, I own her but she lives at my lfs in their sps coral tray and has a little baby friend that I bought to go with her.
I already have two scopas tangs in my tank so I am doing them a new home.
First is my sump refugium and then my little tank, fed daily to my display elastic banded to a piece of rubble, it doesn't last long!