how to keep a regal tang

[at]

Is there a secret to keeping or raising regal, hippo, or blue tangs, (Paracanthurus hepatus). I have tried 3 times and they all died within 2days of the quarantine tank. The water test ok and everything else seems to do ok. The regal tangs just seem extra fragile. They where all about 2 inches long when purchased.

[Fatman]

I purchased a hippo tang in my 1 month old tank about 2 weeks ago, and she seems well, I left for a week and the water got cold so she developed ick, but after returning (and the cold front passing) she seems alot better and fine. I think they need a steady diet of greens and some live rock to hide behind and some algea always helps, gives them something to pick at. I purchased my yellow tang because of hair algea and it was gone within 2 or 3 days of having him.

[at]

My quarantine tank has 20lbs of live rock and I always keep a seaweed clip with marine algae on it. The first one Ihad seemed Ok for a day then the next morning he was covered in ich or something and died that afternoon. I lied one did live for two weeks but never ate abit of food, I tried live brine shrimp and assorted frozen foods but he just starved to death. Number 3 was ok for a day then contracted ich or something and died the next day.

[dakar]

Tangs are notorious ich magnets, they are extremely susceptable to shipping stresses which in turn allows any parasites that may be present to really wreak havoc on them. You were doing right by QT'ing the fish.

Did you do a fresh water dip with them before introducing them to the QT? How much time had elasped between each fish being put into the QT?

As a side note, ich parasites can survive in your tank for up to4-6 weeks without a host (fish), after that period of time they should be gone.

[Fatman]

What was the temperature in your QT? As I mentioned cold temperatures are known to make tangs get ick easier.

[dsfdbutterfly]

My success was due to asking a lot of questions from my LFS. When I first brought home my Regal he did fine. After a month my temp. dropped in the tank due to a problem with the heater. Ich soon followed. I immediately got on the phone. Since he was one of the most expensive fish in my tank (I didn't go with a small one and here in Arizona they think these guys are gold).

Raise your OT tank to 80 and drop your salinity as low as you feel you can go. I have a fish only tank with no live rock so I went down to 14. After a month of this I slowly adapted him to the higher salinity of 18 that I keep in the tank and slowly dropped the temp down to 78. This process took two months.The highter temp and lower salinity keeps ich and other parasites at bay while giving the fish a chance to recover from transport. After that treatment I placed him in my display tank and since then no problems.

He does pick at the brine shrimp offered and some of the sponge food for my emperor angel but his main food is algae. Get yourself a clip and some green stuff. He eats my flake that I feed in the morning and then loves the stuff I clip in there for him and my Naso. I occasionally throw in a few other treats that the LFS has for tangs. Just ask there's a whole gammet of things. Including regular iceburg lettuce from your grocery store. Also get a supplement of garlic and soak your flake in it for all your fish. This will help them all immunity wise.

It is possible to keep this delicate tang healthy and beautiful. Mine has no marks from his ich and his color is beautiful. They are a joy to watch "bounce" around the tank too. :D

Good luck, Angie

[Reef_Angel]

I'm happy to say that we aren't having to many problems losing my beauty's. I'm on my 3rd tang now in our tank. He's been with us about 2 months now. We actually purchased from an LFS which I generally don't do. I usually catalog order them from "saltwaterfish.com', and they always come so beautiful and carefully packaged.
They even had my Sailfin in a blackened bag for her shipment. You can shorten your lighting cycle for a while as that will help a bit, and maintain a constant tank temperature. For the most part, I watch them closely at first, and they inevitably do suffer some acclimation stress. I've never seen one yet that hasn't. It goes away quickly, but while they are adapting to a new tank, it's common for the stress to cause their outbreak. I don't do much of anything with those first spots. In the past when I've lost hippo's, I immediately went into "fix it" mode which only seemed to put through more stress and then die. I give them their time and just watch the few spots closely. I always keep their clip full of fresh live plant macro. There are also some good foods out there that I feed my tangs with, like "Bio Blend". There is one formulated for Tangs and Angels as it helps even the fussiest of fish eat well. I don't purposely feed my Tangs Brine or mysis, but my herbivores really enjoy some brine or mysis shrimp soaked DT's Phytoplankton. All our fat and happy. Currently I have a yellow tang *Bubbles*, sail fin tang *Sally* , and my powder-blue tang is named *Bahllou*. The one we have coming next is juvenile Atlantic Blue Tang that both Dakar and I are exited about. He's still just a juvenile still in the coloring,, so we'll be able to watch him change to the striped faze, and then finally the adult blue color change to the beautiful blue he'll become. I was going to get a purple tang for the next one, but we decided that having the opportunity to watch all the color transformations the Atlantic Blue has to offer would be fun to experience! I love them all, but would have to put up an additional tank, and 4 big tangs in our 180G up is enough! Hang in there with your ich problem and hopefully have him for a long time!
Good Luck! j ...Angel :angel07:

[at]

Thanks for all the tips. I keep the temp aruond 78 and the salinity 1.024. Does anyone have a good idea for a freshwater dip? I have read to use 100% freshwater, some books say to add saltwater or malachite green. Also I have live rock, some caulerpa algae,snails and feather dusters in my quarantine tank, and was wondering if there is any medicine that would kill ich and leave everthing else alive.