Baby regals eat coral?

[corey904]

For a long time I’ve debated getting a regal anglefish. Every time I see one at the lfs I have to stop myself from pulling my wallet out to buy it because I’m simply not ok with the chance of it nipping on corals. However after talking to a friend an idea came up about babies. Since the adults have naturally ate coral and live rock in the wild it’s only natural for them to do the same in our tanks however if the babies have never seen coral while growing up would they respond the same way? At least would the odds be better?

 

[725196]

Your friends theory is sound. IF the regal angel never ate coral it MIGHT not look at coral polyps in the aquarium as a food source. This is caveated with, it need to be feed well so it does not look to coral as a food source. This MAY or MAY NOT work. Every fish is different, and of course they never read the fish books so they may not act like a book (or internet article) says they will act.

 

[725196]

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[KrisReef]

If you keep them well fed they may not nip much but two years of growth they may suddenly find out that they like natural food and destroy your favorite coral overnight. They won’t eat the star polyps, always they find your prized center piece the most delicious?

 

[Tamberav]

I doubt it. Take baby captive bred aiptasia eating filefish, they still nip coral.

Non-reef safe fish are not made reef safe just by captive breeding them. I would think the "with caution" fish are still.. with caution fish....

Instinct is instinct and angels naturally nip at rock, ect. If they take a nip passing by a fleshy coral by just chance, that may be all it takes to decide it tastes good.

If you have NO tolerance to coral nipping, I would not take a chance.

 

[amoore311]

Captive breeding fish does not remove any of their wild tendencies.

I have had my baby regal from biota over a month now, she has not touched any corals at all. Even if she did, the fish is so small you'd never notice.

If the fish gets a taste for corals down the road, those corals will be moved to another system if they go down hill. I have a lot of corals in a large tank though, I think spreading out the nipping will be helpful in the long run to keeping the fish and the corals in the same system.

 

[i cant think]

Angels don’t naturally eat coral in the wild, in the wild they naturally eat the sponges that grows around the bases of many large coral. In captivity they could confuse the coral for being a sponge - Most angels only go for Fleshy LPS, sound familiar? Sponges are fleshy and if you’ve ever held one then you’ll know they feel similar to many of our well known LPS coral such as Trachys and Scolys.

In theory if you had enough sponges in your tank, the Angel will ignore most of your coral if not all of it. If I had room in my tank I’d go for a young regal and test this theory out however unfortunately I don’t as it’s a 4’ tank with 11 fish in it already, 3 of them get quite large (CBB, Foxface, Jade Wrasse). But maybe someone can test it out one day.

Also by a lot of sponges I mean a ton, having an easy to keep sponge growing in your sump is a great way to get sponges growing in the main tank as the mother in the sump will send out young sponges which some can then get into the main tank.

 

[Jbell370]

I've had my Regal for over 4 years in a mixed reef environment, leathers, zoas, torches, gonis and sps. He doesn't eat anything in the tank, but certainly inspects any new additions. We currently have a disagreement in which any new zoa can not be red, he will pick it out of the frag rack and dump it. I do feed a variety of foods and he goes after all of them, perhaps just well fed and always has been, so no need to hunt anything down.

On the other hand, the red tail blenny I picked up eats any and all smooth skin pink sps.