Angel fish help..

kraken724 · Jul 17, 2015

looking to start an angel and tang tank.. Any angels I should stay away from.. Any I should completely go for.. Running a 250.... With soft corals just for color... Lol but mainly fish... Any help is welcome.. Already have 1 jug emperor and 1 small to med scribbled angel.... .

StevenBell · Jul 17, 2015

Red Sea Imperator...The holy grail of them all!!!

4FordFamily · Jul 17, 2015

Red Sea regal you mean?^

4FordFamily · Jul 17, 2015

Regal angel are very difficult to keep I would say they should be kept only in very established systems and by very experienced aquarists

3Twinklets · Jul 17, 2015

Any Angel that you buy needs to be an established feeder.
My Regal eats anything and is probably the better behaved Angel that I have.

4FordFamily · Jul 17, 2015

3Twinklets said:
Any Angel that you buy needs to be an established feeder.
My Regal eats anything and is probably the better behaved Angel that I have.

Yes but regal angels are probably the most difficult angel to get feeding. I do exorbitantly well with expert only fish, even singling them out to buy. That said my first regal angel was 2 months of hell to get eating and I know all of the tricks. My current regal ate same day but that's VERY unusual.

What's worse is I saw the first one eat voraciously at the store and it still was near death starving and took two months to tackle feeding well

bumperbeetle · Jul 17, 2015

I have a 4" Singapore Angel and it gets along with all of my other fish, including my OS Tang and Foxface.

kraken724 · Jul 18, 2015

Cool, thanks for the feedback guys....

3Twinklets · Jul 23, 2015

3FordFamily said:
Yes but regal angels are probably the most difficult angel to get feeding. I do exorbitantly well with expert only fish, even singling them out to buy. That said my first regal angel was 2 months of hell to get eating and I know all of the tricks. My current regal ate same day but that's VERY unusual.

What's worse is I saw the first one eat voraciously at the store and it still was near death starving and took two months to tackle feeding well

I believe that any fish that you know ate prior to moving into your tank probably has another issue in the new tank. I would look for other issues. In other words why else besides current diet may he not be eating? Is he being picked on? Is he not happy in his new home? Some that I have had, just were not able to settle in well. Some just do not travel well.

4FordFamily · Jul 23, 2015

3Twinklets said:
I believe that any fish that you know ate prior to moving into your tank probably has another issue in the new tank. I would look for other issues. In other words why else besides current diet may he not be eating? Is he being picked on? Is he not happy in his new home? Some that I have had, just were not able to settle in well. Some just do not travel well.

This fish pulled through. Regal angels are immensely finicky and can be borderline impossible to get eating. My point was that even a fish eating at the LFS isn't guaranteed to do so at home.

3Twinklets · Jul 23, 2015

Yes they can be for sure but they are worth the effort for certain[emoji5]️

4FordFamily · Jul 23, 2015

3Twinklets said:
Yes they can be for sure but they are worth the effort for certain[emoji5]️

Here is the thread showing the minor tweaks that improved my odds and how I succeeded with a tough regal:

Namely removing a bully Achilles (didn't bully the angel) and raising temp from 76 to 79 roughly. This fish seemingly looks for any excuse to starve!

But yes well worth the effort! I would say though that only experienced aquarists should attempt these fish as its not fair for inexperience to kill a fish most often best left in the ocean.

https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/having-trouble-getting-regal-angel-or-other-fish-to-eat.201581/