heniochus ID

yman182 · May 31, 2021

Hello,

can anyone ID the type of heniochus this is? Is this the reef safe variety or not?

I was told it was, but wanted to get a second opinion.

kzenoni · May 31, 2021

Not sure what it is but did recently see a beautiful reef tank with one in it so my guess is that it is good .

nereefpat · May 31, 2021

The difference between the reef safe one (diphreutes) and the one that isn't (acuminatus) is tough for me.

It's about the snout, breast, anal fin, and where that last black stripe ends.

To me, it looks like acuminatus. They are much more common too.

yman182 · May 31, 2021

nereefpat said:
The difference between the reef safe one (diphreutes) and the one that isn't (acuminatus) is tough for me.

It's about the snout, breast, anal fin, and where that last black stripe ends.

To me, it looks like acuminatus. They are much more common too.

Yeah that is what I am worried about. Hoping to get some kind of consensus on here.

ScottR · May 31, 2021

@saltyhog knows about these.

saltyhog · May 31, 2021

nereefpat said:
The difference between the reef safe one (diphreutes) and the one that isn't (acuminatus) is tough for me.

It's about the snout, breast, anal fin, and where that last black stripe ends.

To me, it looks like acuminatus. They are much more common too.

I agree. That second picture at first glance made me want to say diphreutes but the first one which is more squarely a side view looks like acuminatus. If you know the origin it can help a lot. If it's from Hawaii (I know...not now) it's highly likely to be diphreutes.

I've only seen a handful of H. diphreutes in the last 7-8 years. Two of them were in a local store but they wouldn't sell them because they had lympho (they treated them for ich and they didn't survive) ;Facepalm

. I so wanted them.

jdiefenbaugh · May 31, 2021

Unless the pic is at a weird angle, it is H. diphreutes, as the anal fin goes straight down. Either way, that's the easiest way to tell the difference between the two. I kept a large group of both species in a large tank, and both seemed to pick at stuff, but I would not put H. accuminatus in a reef tank. They both get too large for most home aquariums, IMO.