Angels in reef tanks

[Bam327]

Yeah I axed the Foxface from my list because I heard they can get to like 8”. What kind of Chromis do you have?

What size tank do you have?
Fox face can get up to 10”, swallowtail Angel 9”, purple tang 8-10”, convict tang 7-9”. This fish can all get pretty big

blue green chromis

 

[Zionas]

Planning a 130. I’m an expat living in China and currently unable to go back due to Covid. It will be about 6’ long or between 5’ and 6’.

I checked the sizes and don’t think the average specimen gets that large (Purple and all the smaller Zebrasoma seem to cap out at 5-7” from what I’ve gathered), the angel maybe 5-6”, Convicts maybe 6-7”, and Foxfaces around 8”. The Foxface will be the largest fish of them all.

To show you what I mean:

20+ year old Purple Tang- A bit over 7”
16 year old Purple Tang- About 5”
26 year old Yellow Tang- About 5”
16 year old Yellow Tang- About 5”
10 year old Yellow Tang- About 4.5”
10+ year old Scopas Tang- About 5.5”, maybe 6”
20+ year old Yellow Tang (same owner as the 20+ year old Purple, died in an accident)- A bit over 6”
8 year old Scopas Tang- About 5”


I see. Any plans to add more Chromis?

 

[Bam327]

Planning a 130. I’m an expat living in China and currently unable to go back due to Covid. It will be about 6’ long or between 5’ and 6’.

I checked the sizes and don’t think the average specimen gets that large (Purple and all the smaller Zebrasoma seem to cap out at 5-7” from what I’ve gathered), the angel maybe 5-6”, Convicts maybe 6-7”, and Foxfaces around 8”. The Foxface will be the largest fish of them all.

To show you what I mean:

20+ year old Purple Tang- A bit over 7”
16 year old Purple Tang- About 5”
26 year old Yellow Tang- About 5”
16 year old Yellow Tang- About 5”
10 year old Yellow Tang- About 4.5”
10+ year old Scopas Tang- About 5.5”, maybe 6”
20+ year old Yellow Tang (same owner as the 20+ year old Purple, died in an accident)- A bit over 6”
8 year old Scopas Tang- About 5”


I see. Any plans to add more Chromis?

Well you just made me feel a whole lot better about the max size of these fish. I guess I should have accounted for some stunted growth in captivity. Also the web site that show max size must be max size for wild specimens. Thank you.

 

[Zionas]

Yes I think the website says list record sizes in the wild. For example FishBase gives a maximum record size of 14” for the Purple Tang, and 16” for the Scopas Tang, but in captivity I think the one that gets to 8” would be a rarity. 5-7” for the smaller Zebrasoma seems to be the consensus. You’re welcome.

There is also another guy with a 20-year old Purple Tang that he managed to keep in a 90 for pretty much the whole time lol. Not sure how big it got, and I’d say a 90’s pretty borderline for the smaller Zebrasoma, but he did it lol.

 

[SaltISlife]

I have a lot of fish in my 135 gallons.

5 tangs (Yellow eye kole, tomini, sailfin, blond naso, yellow tang), a foxface rabbitfish, Purple Dottyback, sunset dottyback, purple stripe dottyback, 2 green chromies, cleaner wrasse, melenarous wrasse, neon wrasse, pair of clowns, a Rusty Angel, Flame Angel, Potters angel.

The only fish that bother my corals are my Neon Wrasse, who will grab them and move them around the tank or flip them, so i have to glue everything down. He does this to look for food under the rock/coral. And recently my like 7-8 inch sailfin tang has been nipping at corals. Like hes hungry, i might have to feed them more, but the problem with that is feeding them so much raises my nitrates too quickly. even with nitrates exporting using various methods feeding 4-5 times a day is too much.

So might have to remove him and put him in another tank or something, not going to have a free fish i got from a guy getting outa the hobby.. eat $200 a pop corals.

My dwarf angels dont touch anything.


As for fish sizes, my sailfin is 7 years old now, it was 5 when the guy gave it to me, and it was living in a 350 gallons 8 foot long, by 3 feet wide, and 2+ feet tall tank.. And its only 7-8 inchs. I think the sizes we see online really are sizes for ocean fish, i dont think the fish will get nearly as big in aquariums.. even in larger ones

 

[Zionas]

Wow that’s a pretty big stocking list. What are your tank’s dimensions? Any plans to move fish?

 

[SaltISlife]

Wow that’s a pretty big stocking list. What are your tank’s dimensions? Any plans to move fish?

A regular 6ft long 135g. Its 72 long, 18 front back, 24 1/2 tall. Its basically a 125 but 2 inchs taller, much like the 150's that are like 27-28 inchs tall i believe ?

Right now i have no plans to upgrade the tank, its in my bedroom on the 3rd floor, and i dont trust the floors to support much more weight than they aready are. I have a 20g qt tank next to it, and 2 feet to the left a 27g hexagon, and 6 feet in front of that a 60g hexagon. Plus my computer and everything else in the room. I have alot of weight up here.

Plus we might be moving in a few months, and im not sure where we are going yet.. depending on where we go ill upgrade then to something like a 180-220g or something for more front to back room. Its gonna suck when we move too, ill probably have to buy a 40-50g tub that they use for horse's water, made of that thick black plastic. And put it in the back of my old Jeep wagoneer and fill it up with tank water using a hose, and transfer my fish to it, and to another tub at the new house, and same with my corals.

I just hope we dont move far like accross the country and stay in state lol. I refuse to give up 10,000$ in corals and fish and everything else i invested, just because someone "cough" wants to move. Because if we do that, ill rent a U-haul trailer and put a 100+ gallon tub in the back of it with a inverter and put my corals and fish in that with a fan/heaters and pumps and stuff, and drive accross country like that LOL. Im serious

 

[Zionas]

Amen to all that! My tank will be very similar to yours. Is your apartment low rise?

If I upgrade, maybe a 220-240. Preferably 7-8’.

 

[SaltISlife]

Amen to all that! My tank will be very similar to yours. Is your apartment low rise?

If I upgrade, maybe a 220-240. Preferably 7-8’.

Its a townhouse, my floors are wooden not concrete like an apartment.

I have 2x10's for joists, pine. but luckily my room has 2 load bearing beams supporting it on the front and back of the joists. So im not too worried. My tank though is parallel to the joints.. meaning running length wise, so its sitting on only 2 of them and in the middle of them too. Id esitmate 1700 lbs or so is on the 2x10's. Thats pretty much max load there. I cant do the other way where itd be on 5-6 joists as itll block a window

 

[Jase4224]

I have a Majestic, flame and coral beauty in my Euphyllia dominant tank. I have some sarcophytum, elegance and a pectinia also. Flame and Coral beauty do not touch my corals.

My Majestic angel leaves Euphyllia and softies alone but does nip at elegance corals. He’s taken out an orange tip Elegance and every afternoon nips at a purple tip. He also nips at the shaded sides of my pectinia and has caused it to recede.

 

[Zionas]

Yeah I thought that’s going to be about the limit. My place is an apartment, second floor, building is 5 stories total. Load bearing walls according to the management, wooden floors paved with concrete underneath. That’s as far as I know. And yes the tank will be right in front of my bed as it’s only a very small suite maybe 246 square feet.

 

[McPuff]

Most recently I had an annularis angel (raised from tank bred juvenile) that didn't touch a softy or sps. I now have a blueface (raised from small juvenile) that's been in the system for 2 years. It started to pick at softies but leaves all sps and mushrooms alone. I didn't even bother trying LPS in the system... I keep them in the lagoon.

In the past I've had French, eibli, flame, emperor, annularis, and blueface angels. I won't do french again but mostly due to size. Everything else was fine but you never really know. I agree with another poster that suggested to get a small juvenile and raise it to adult. That seems to work well.

 

[Zionas]

Hey that’s a good collection of angels you’ve kept. How did the Eibli and Flame do for you and what happened? How long did you have them?

 

[McPuff]

The only angel I have right now is the blueface. The annularis went to a new home a year ago. I lost a few of the others in a crash caused by an electrical fire while I was out of town. Most of them were in the tank for about 2 years at that point.

 

[drblakjak55]

My Caribbean Dwarf is three years a model citizen along with four tangs. 90 g softies, shrooms, and two big clams. What got me into this hobby was the transformation of a pan Emperor juvenile into an adult Any chance I could raise one in a mixed reef?

 

[rmay6850]

The only angel I have right now is the blueface. The annularis went to a new home a year ago. I lost a few of the others in a crash caused by an electrical fire while I was out of town. Most of them were in the tank for about 2 years at that point.

How was the blue face with corals?

 

[CanuckReefer]

I think @Rmckoy had considerable luck with an Emperor for awhile in his reef, from what I remember....

 

[Wen]

I have a transitioning emperor in my mixed reef.
When it was 2” it immediately started sampling the large trachys to a point where they were irritated all the time, so I moved those out. Now it will occasionally take a nip of something (slimer or paly) but doesn’t harm them...I have large colonies. Emp doesn’t even look at the torches, yumas or gorgonians. It does occasionally inspect the palys and out of the various acros, only the slimer.
my goal is to feed it throughout the day (5x) and hope for the best, so far, so good.

 

[Rmckoy]

I think @Rmckoy had considerable luck with an Emperor for awhile in his reef, from what I remember....

It’s possible !!

buy and place corals depending on what fish you have .
Most emperors will destroy lps . But ok with sps

so I kept sps .
he didn’t bother with Xenia , palys , gsp ,
Acro frags were good .
monti , even green pavona were ok .
Favia , acan , Duncan’s open brains , plate corals , all on the menu

 

[Darksidereefer]

I have 2 bellus angels and they are model citizens. Recently one of them transitioned to male and its definitely gorgeous. Have a mixed reef and have not seen them nip at all. Peaceful, hardy, bought them qtd so they ate as soon as they went on the display.