Blue Tang question
- Thread starter Chirp
- Start date
The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
carey
Aquarium Advice Addict
No.its not enevitable, I have had my blue tang for a couple years now and have never had any issues at all with him. I bought a sustainable aquatics blue tang when he was a tiny little guy and now he is huge and fat. 
I qwt'd him for several weeks before i added him and feed him a varied diet of frozen foods as well as pellets and flake. i also keep a seaweed sheet almost always available.
I have never had ich, thank the lord. I also have not added much in the way of fish to the tang tank so that might play a role in me keeping mine alive and healthy. Every fish you add increases the risk of introducing ich or other illness. Qt'ing can be very important in this regard, so if you can do it then do it.
I qwt'd him for several weeks before i added him and feed him a varied diet of frozen foods as well as pellets and flake. i also keep a seaweed sheet almost always available.
I have never had ich, thank the lord. I also have not added much in the way of fish to the tang tank so that might play a role in me keeping mine alive and healthy. Every fish you add increases the risk of introducing ich or other illness. Qt'ing can be very important in this regard, so if you can do it then do it.
Same her. I've had mine for a little over a year now and never had a battle with ich or HLLE. Like carey said, Kepp it fat on a good high quality diet of varied foods and nori sheet 3-5 times a week. Thats worked for me over the course of keeping my tang. Also a proper tank size will aid in reduced stress which will cause other health in the future. No tang policing, it's just the honest truth.
Gregcoyote
Aquarium Advice Addict
Same here, when I tried to keep them in a 55 gallon years ago, they were always coming down with something, since the construction of my 300 I haven't seen any disease in decades in my tangs, including my hippo. No tang police here either, just fact.
huma-huma
Aquarium Advice Addict
I currently have a LT. tang and a purple tang, just lost a yellow tang about 2 months ago. never battled ich or HLLE with them. I did have a PBT that came down with ich about 4-5 months after I got into this hobby, but I contribute that more to my inexperience than anything else. I also feeed a decent variety of food, use a food booster, and keep algae sheets available.
Just in case someone was interested
Marine Head & Lateral Line Erosion: A Description of the Syndrome and a Review of its Speculated Causes by Steven Pro - Reefkeeping.com
Marine Head & Lateral Line Erosion: A Description of the Syndrome and a Review of its Speculated Causes by Steven Pro - Reefkeeping.com
Gregcoyote
Aquarium Advice Addict
In reading this, it is excellent. I especially liked the passage I am including at the bottom of the post. In modern infectious diseases in humans, the role in environmental stress is extremely important, can't imagine other organisms don't respond accordingly. Stress is caused by poor water, poor food, predation, territorial threats as well as other effects. If you grow up in a room full of tobacco smoke, you may well develop a disease, same with fish. We cannot test for all the toxins a aquarium can accumulate. Nor discount the stress a fish can encounter in a environment that doesn't suit them. It isn't a coincidence this condition targets surgeonfish as they are very broad ranging browsers that don't always accept confinement as well as other fish do.
Chronic Stress and Autoimmune Disease: This is probably one of this most interesting and novel ideas offered with regard to the causes of MHLLE. The basic premise is that fish held under certain conditions can be subjected to chronic stress and that due to this chronic stress, their immune system does not function properly (Bartelme, 2003a, b, c). This malfunction causes the body's own immune system to seek out and destroy healthy cells that it should otherwise be protecting. The author suggests a variety of ways this might occur, and I encourage all to read his works for further information. It simply would not be fair to try to sum up in a paragraph or two Mr. Bartelme's thoughts on this topic from his entire three part series of articles, so please follow up with my references (Bartelme, 2003a, b, c) below to read the complete and thorough explanation he offers. What I found most interesting about this theory is that it ties together most all of the other theories of MHLLE's causes (Note: there are at least a dozen other theorized causes. Just about anything and everything has been blamed at one time for causing this affliction.), groups them under the general category of stress, or as an opportunistic infection that thrives under stressful conditions, and then addresses what to do about this "disease complex." The practical application of these articles is in the recommendations Terry gives for combating this ailment. The first part of the treatment would be to eliminate or reduce any and all stress. This is broken down into four broad categories: extreme changes in the physical environment, animal interactions (such as predation, aggression and competition), poor water quality (low pH, high nitrate, heavy metals or dissolved organics) and human interference (such as overcrowding). The second step is to improve the diet as well as to add vitamin supplements and highly unsaturated fatty acids (HUFA's) to the fishes' food. Third, improve water quality via water changes and protein skimming while also limiting the use of activated carbon just in case it plays a role. And finally, he recommends enhancing the fishes' immune function by adding beta glucan and garlic extract to their food as immunostimulants.
Last edited:
mr_X
Aquarium Advice Addict
Sounds plausible to me. I have a non-QT'd hippo that showed no signs of disease as well. He's in a 300 at the moment.
jeffaquarius
Aquarium Advice Addict
To sum up everything what the author had mentioned, they all come down to exposing the fish to stress. Once the fish immune system goes down it can easily be infected with all kinds of viruses and bacterial diseases or even parasites. I have learned that this happens too often with blue or yellow tangs. Moving them to a new home is critical and if acclimation is not done properly they usually will not make it.
Gregcoyote
Aquarium Advice Addict
I have lived with this philosophy only to be labeled tang police. But my own eyes don't lie. I haven't seen disease in my tangs for as long as many of the posters are old. This is a direct result of meeting their requirements and giving them a calm home. Feeding is part of it as well. It all reduces stress. If you do that, the fish is perfectly capable of taking care of itself in most cases
Last edited:
Same here. I got my hippo at 6" so I didn't think a 30 gallon QT for a month was very humane. So I slowly acclimated it and dropped it in when the lights went out but before my eel comes out so she could find a good home to rest in without anything bothering her. Been going strong ever since and stays the gayest of all the fish lol
