Kole Tangs

[Anonymous]

Evening folks

I'm just considering the prize fish for my established reef system and am considering a kole tang.
The current inhabitants in my system is a pair of bangaii cardinals.

Anyone with comments on diet and the aggressivness of this fish are greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Patrick Ferguson

 

[Anonymous]

How large is your tank?Kole tangs can be difficult to get to eat.They are strong fish but well behaved.They need lots of algae to eat.

 

[Anonymous]

Patrick:

I kept a Kole tang in my 90 gal reef tank for a couple of years, and it did very well. It was not agressive with a yellow tang, green chromis, yellow clown goby, and a few others.

It would eat algae from the glass, most any other food that I added (flake, shrimp, clam, etc.) and it would eat the feces of the yellow tang. I've heard that the success rate is increased if kept with a yellow tang due to the feces eating, but I can't say it's for sure true.

------------------
Randy Holmes-Farley

 

[Anonymous]

hello all

Joe: The reef is a 50g <36x18x18> the kole tang or another from that family have been suggested as the best specimens for my size of reef. Currently in the 50g there is various algaes including c.racemosa, halimedia, and fan brush. I plan on losing most of these algaes with the addition of the kole tang but in my 33g <36x12x18> sump I have it partitioned into three sections with the middle containing various macroalgaes its lighted by 4 x 24" NO 6500k florescents. So when ever I need algae for the fish I can just feed the kole tang that along with the other various dried algaes soaked in selcon.

Randy: Thanks for the information about your kole tang interesting point about the feces.

Cheers

Patrick Ferguson


[This message has been edited by Patrick (edited 29 December 1999).]

 

[Anonymous]

hello Greg

Thanks for the information its greatly appreciated and is helping me gain the information I want before I purchase the kole tang

Thats neat about it not being interested in eating any of the macros in my reef. I really don't mind I was just *expecting* thats what he would eat. As I said earlier I'm not much of a fish guy and all of my text I own/read is geared towards corals and other inverts.

Is there any text on the internet or books that you suggest for additional reading on the kole tang.

Aswell has anyone out there noticed any change in color of the tang over the years I wasn't sure if it changed appearance like some angels do.


Cheers

Patrick Ferguson

 

[Anonymous]

Patrick,

Hate to burst your bubble with regards to all your plans for your Kole tang...but...I've had a Kole now for about 3 1/2 years. Due to the way the mouth parts of this guy are formed they are not particularly good at eating macroalgae (I really doubt it would touch the Halimeda or the fan brush). I've tried feeding mine algae sheets occasionally, but it really does not seem all that interested in these either. Mostly its mouth is designed to scrape algae off surfaces. I feed mine a wide variety of stuff, it eats everything (including poop as Randy mentioned), but has a problem if any of the pieces are too big (dispite the huge mouth). I do try to feed a bit more of the Formula II algae food, and spirulina type flakes to it more than some other fish, but it has never shown any signs of HLLE and has been very healthy. FWIW, mine also has not really grown appreciably in my tank (he's in a 65 G reef system) and I think yours will be at home in a 55 G, but don't be surprise if it hides for several days when first added to the tank, these guys are shy initially.

- Greg Hiller

 

[Anonymous]

Patrick:

<<As well has anyone out there noticed any change in color of the tang over the years I wasn't sure if it changed appearance like some angels do.>>

I believe it's a stress thing, and not an ageing phenomen, but most in a store are much lighter in color than once established in your tank. Mine darkened up quite a lot.

------------------
Randy Holmes-Farley

 

[Anonymous]

>Thanks for the information its greatly appreciated <

My pleasure.

>Thats neat about it not being interested in eating any of the macros in my reef. <

No guarantees. It is a tang after all.

>Is there any text on the internet or books that you suggest for additional reading on the kole tang.<

None that I know of. There might be a sentence or two in Scott Michael's new paperback book on fish. FWIW I think most of these guys are collected in Hawaii. I certainly saw a lot of them there while I was diving.

- Greg Hiller