New Regal Tang Question

[patersonmj]

HI all,

I just bought a juvenile Regal Tang from my LFS. He was eating well at the store, was looking incredibly healthy alongside his tank mates at the shop too.

Took him home, acclimatised him to the tank very slowly, between 60-90 minutes in total. I noticed that whilst in the bag he was very skittish, it was a large bag so he had plenty of room (as much as he can have in a plastic bag I guess).

He is the only Tang in the tank, there are only 2 Clowns in there, and some shrimp / hermits. However, getting him into the tank, he's taken off, and hidden in the corner of the tank, next to some Live Rock. He's been there since, not moving very much at all, the clowns came to investigate him and he swam a little then, but overall, he's stayed in the same place for a long time now.

Is this normal behaviour? Water parameters are absolutely fine, lights have been off (I turned my blue lights on and he seemed to panic a bit) in order to keep him comfortable.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Mike]

HI there - if you are talking about the Paracanthurus hepatus (I call it the blue tang ) then it can be normal for some to be very shy when first introduced. When they get really nervous they actually will lay on their side and try to hide under items in the tank. Mine has never been shy though and is always out and about and is growing very fast.

According to your aquarium info your tank is 125 liters which is approx 30 gallons? That's way too small of a tank to keep any tang in IMO.. I would take him back to the store for credit.

 

[patersonmj]

HI there - if you are talking about the Paracanthurus hepatus (I call it the blue tang ) then it can be normal for some to be very shy when first introduced. When they get really nervous they actually will lay on their side and try to hide under items in the tank. Mine has never been shy though and is always out and about and is growing very fast.

According to your aquarium info your tank is 125 liters which is approx 30 gallons? That's way too small of a tank to keep any tang in IMO.. I would take him back to the store for credit.

Hi,

Firstly, the aquarium info is sort of out of date - when I joined the 125 litre tank was my only tank, I'm now up to 3! The 125L tank is my main freshwater tank, my marine tank is 400L. I just haven't upgraded my profile info!

In terms of the Tang, he's out and about a little more, I performed a small water change today (10%) and that's made him hide again, he does sit behind the Live Rock quite a bit. He does spend time with the Clowns though, swimming in the current of the wavemaker. No sign of parasites or infection, thankfully.

Cheers for the info