Best & Worst "Reef Safe" Angelfish for Your Reef

[Pilotmojo]

The best behaving Angel is my Holo Holo ( Bandit Angel )

I REALLY want a bandit angel!!!

 

[i cant think]

also, my G. melanospilos is in a mixed reef and behaves perfectly. I find Genicanthus to be the most reef safe families however I like Bellus are the least reef safe in the genus - The swallow tails may be on the better behaved side because they’re found a lot deeper down and the only corals there are often things like the easier NPS

 

[Calm Blue Ocean]

I really want an angel. They are such classic reef fish. But I'm sure I'd be one of the unlucky ones that would later have to come on here and post a "how do I catch my angel, he's eating all my corals" thread. Part of the problem is that most of my colonies are still small and immature so I don't think they'd tolerate much nibbling. I won't rule one out completely, just maybe later.

 

[RUKelly]

I have a pygmy flame angel that is very well behaved but most of my reef consists of soft/mushroom corals.

 

[Larz_1]

Currently have a Regal Angel in my mixed 220g reef with no problems…..as long as I don’t try to add any zoas…… he loves to eat them. Other than that, he leaves all my other coral alone - Acros, blastos, plates, brain, frogspawn - are all fine.
Gets along with my other fish as well - copperband, clowns, chromis(5), royal gramma, lawnmower blennie.

I have also had good luck in the past with Potter’s angels and my add one to this tank in the future…..

 

[Reefvision]

I have a coral beauty and flame angel together in 220gal reef . The flame was in tank for a year before I added coral beauty that I had move around to two other tanks. The cb was a bit of a bully in those tanks . I thought it would hold his own in the big tank. It did but I thought both angels would kill each other with the initial two day battles. Fins torn on both and flame in top corner looking like a goner. Fast forward 4 mos and both “ tolerate each other pretty much and are healthy ect. No polyps getting nipped ( hammers , Duncan’s ok) just a bit of flame chase cb angel but not more than a few seconds time . I feel like they are reef safe.

 

[Dbichler]

I have an emperor and flame back neither touch any of my soft corals but my flame back never touched any in my other tank when he was in there. Don’t know that I would trust the emperor with any fleshy corals though.

 

[MtlReef25]

Emperor, Lamarck and Cherub. All model citizens for nearly 3 years! Emperor is a bit of a boss but no troubles.

 

[jaganshi066]

Flame: Success
Flameback: Fail
Coral Beauty: Success
Lamarcks: Fail, but does not do too much damage

It's been luck of the draw for me.
Sometimes they will only be interested in certain types of coral. Some like elegances, some like acans, some like everything under the sun lol

I have flamebacks in 3 of my tanks and they never touched corals, also my multicolor and Pygmy are model guys too! What did you end up doing with flameback and what kind of corals did it eat?

 

[jaganshi066]

Will those of you reporting success please state what kind of corals you keep them with, too?

I kept my flameback, multicolor, and Pygmy with mostly softies, but pretty much everything. I had zoas, montis, gonis, hammers and more but they all did fine

 

[Jeffcb]

I had an African Flameback in my reef tank until I added a Scoymia. He nipped at it every time he swam by. I had to drain the tank completely to get him out! He is happy in the 240 fowler now and gets along with a Flame and Cherub quite well.

 

[Snoopy 67]

I have a Male & 2 females of Watanabie angels from 3 juvenile females.
They never even looked @ any coral I had.

 

[o2manyfish]

I have a little bit of every kind of coral in my 560g. Corals Missing from the tank are Acans and Blastos.

Angels in the tank -
Pair of Spawning Gold Flakes - Eat plentiful patches of zoas and acans once they start to flourish
Spawning Bellus - Don't touch anything - ever
Trio Spawning Flamebacks - Don't touch anything
Pair of Spawning Goldens - Don't touch anything
Flame Angel - Occasional pick - never enough to damage
Pair of Venustus- Tore apart a rare red/pink elegance but left green elegance alone
Yellow Belly Regals - No Problems
Emperor in Frag tank - No problems
Navarchus - Raised in Frag tank, no issues, was in display tank 2 months with no issues
Previous pair of Joculators - No Issues
Multi-bar angels - Nipped at everything but only destroyed acans

My tank has all types of corals - SPS, LPS, Sinularia, Coco worms, feather dusters, mushrooms, Gorgonians and Clams.

In my opinion, and experience, most reef tanks follow a minimalist approach to aquascaping. Also the average length of a hobbyist in the hobby is less than a year. When you combine these two things you end up with a tank that can't naturally support it's live stock. I didn't start regularly feeding my fish till I started keeping anthias. My fish have enough natural things to hunt in the tank that they leave the corals alone. They may take a nip at a coral, but then they swim away and move on to something else - no damage done. Regal Angels, Venusuts, Multi-bar, Golden Angels - These fish will go a year with out taking any prepared or manually added foods (even live brine). There is enough for them to naturally hunt.

Even an imperator and a Navarchus in a frag tank with nothing but frags and racks were raised without being fed by me and I never once saw them go near the SPS, Clams, LPS, aptasia, anthelia, xenia - Nothing in the frag tanks.

I always had good luck with the lil Atlantic Cherub pygmy - But once you start collecting Flame Back Pygmys then the cherubs are less interesting and they get their butts kicked.

Angels I would never consider adding to my reef-
Singapore
Bicolor - Always bad experiences
Multi-Bar - Did too much damage
Chrysurus - Decimated 100's of Zoas in just 90 mins
Multi-color - Always went dark and ugly in my reefs - never did anything to enhance the reef
Elibi - Tried a harem in the frag tank and they were destructive
Lemon Peel - Trouble and grouchy
Hybrid Lemon Peel - Cool to look at - but still picked on frags
Deborae - Why would I buy a fish I will never see and may cause problems.

 

[Privateye]

My experience from my tanks and my old maintenance accounts:

Flame angel: worked well most of the time.
Coral beauty: worked well the vast majority of the time.
Bicolor (my favorite): rarely worked out. They always found a coral to pick at.
Pygmy flameback: worked except he really liked picking at nepthea.
Bellus: worked the couple of times i tried.
Midnight: worked about half the time.
Lemonpeel: also about 50/50 I'd say.
Multi-barred angel: only tried it once. 0 issues.
Blue Koran: worked most of the time.

Just IME!

 

[lba4590]

I have a Lamarcks that was sent to me by mistake instead of a Bellus. He occasionally bullies my fairy wrasses but he’s never touched a single coral. Still waiting on my Bellus lol

 

[tigre44]

I have a lemon peel, African flame back, flame all get along fine only the lemon peel went for a lobo others haven’t touched coral. I have had most of these for several years

 

[WhoaTangs Clan]

I've had my reef tank up since 2016. Both bi colored angel and flame angle have been in the tank since it was started. I guess I got extra lucky because they don't touch any corals at all. The only down fall is I can't add any other angle because they will both gang up on them. I tried adding a coral beauty and a regal and both fish stayed up in the corners and were more than happy for me to take them out by hand and return them to my LFS. I also lucked out with my Sohal because it doesn't fight with any of my other tangs.

 

[G Santana]

I have kept, Rock Beauty, Coral beauty, flame angel and dwarf angelfish with no issues.
I currently have a Flame angel who is a perfect tank mate!!!

But I cross my fingers daily lol

 

[MnFish1]

1. What's the BEST behaving reef safe angelfish?

They are variable. Most people haven't had all of them - and in different reefs, one type of angel might do better or worse. For example - I had a lemon peel angel - that literally Ate every LPS in my tank. (while I was trying to catch it to bring it back - which took days)

2. What's the WORST behaving reef safe angelfish?

Same answer. I think the pygmy angels are the worst - the larger angels less so - I've had several large angels with no problems at all.

 

[jdiefenbaugh]

Have kept many angels in reefs, and to me their personality and appearance is worth the trade off of their picking and not keeping certain meaty corals that some species like to eat.