Reef butterfly fish?

OpenOcean33 · Jun 16, 2019

So at the store I seen this little guy I've never seen before. Labeled as a reef butterfly fish. I see only little info on him onlin I have no idea for tank size requirments or reef compatibility or even diet any one have more info? Sorry for photo quality.

Dsnakes · Jun 16, 2019

Likely a reef eating butterfly fish

most of them are.

OpenOcean33 · Jun 16, 2019

Dsnakes said:
Likely a reef eating butterfly fish most of them are.

Haha this is unfortunatly to true

norfolkgarden · Jun 16, 2019

Short answer is fish only tank.
:-/

Long answer is it may not be anymore disappointing than a flame angelfish.

Make sure you have a tank where you can catch and remove any fish forcibly if it goes badly.

(I need to use a food based fish trap in our tank and that only works with the aggressive feeders. Anyone shy or smart enough to hide stays and I have to live with it.)

https://m.liveaquaria.com/category/25/butterflyfish?c=15+25&s=ts&start=1&page_num=1&count=24

The pic you posted is interesting.
Nearly all butterflies have diagonal striping.
It doesn't look like any of the butterflies for sale at Liveaquaria.

WMR · Jun 16, 2019

Atlantic Reef Butterfly, difficult to keep,not reef safe, like 99% of all butterflies

OpenOcean33 · Jun 16, 2019

norfolkgarden said:
Short answer is fish only tank.
:-/

Long answer is it may not be anymore disappointing than a flame angelfish.

Make sure you have a tank where you can catch and remove any fish forcibly if it goes badly.

(I need to use a food based fish trap in our tank and that only works with the aggressive feeders. Anyone shy or smart enough to hide stays and I have to live with it.)

https://m.liveaquaria.com/category/25/butterflyfish?c=15+25&s=ts&start=1&page_num=1&count=24

The pic you posted is interesting.
Nearly all butterflies have diagonal striping.
It doesn't look like any of the butterflies for sale at Liveaquaria.

Yeah this is why I'm unsure of the comparability I go to liveaquaria for everything. It dosent appear to be common in the hobby.

Jesterrace · Jun 16, 2019

Yup, with butterflyfish it's still pretty much the same story

Pyramids-Reef Safe
Copperband-Mostly Reef Safe
Longnose Yellow-Mostly Reef Safe

Everything else starts at about the same risk of a dwarf angel to being a fish designed to devour coral.

mattzang · Jun 16, 2019

schooling bannerfish is also reef safeish

zoster is reef safe

the atlantic longnose butterfly is supposedly mostly reef safeish. not many people have that one, though

then there's the roaps butterflies that are apparently kinda hit or miss

my lfs claims kleins are reef safe, but seems like a lot of people say they ate soft corals, especially xenia (might be a good thing? lol)

and the lemon butterfly is apparently deeper water and semi reef safe

OpenOcean33 · Jun 16, 2019

mattzang said:
schooling bannerfish is also reef safeish

zoster is reef safe

the atlantic longnose butterfly is supposedly mostly reef safeish. not many people have that one, though

then there's the roaps butterflies that are apparently kinda hit or miss

my lfs claims kleins are reef safe, but seems like a lot of people say they ate soft corals, especially xenia (might be a good thing? lol)

and the lemon butterfly is apparently deeper water and semi reef safe

That's I'd really like a butterfly fish I'll look more into it if not I can always buy another tank [emoji12]

JMM744 · Jun 16, 2019

Klein’s eat coral. Mine is just about done with a large chalice coral I didn’t care about so put into the fish only tank. I would never trust most butterflies except those mentioned above, Zoster and Banner and maybe the copperband and longnose, maybe.

mattzang · Jun 16, 2019

the longnose and copperband are apparently pretty hit or miss with things like acans too. someone made a poll about the copperband recently and it was straight up 50% safe with acans 50% weren't

seems like with a lot of these reef safe with caution type fish you gotta avoid stuff like acans zoas meaty corals etc. just too tempting for the with caution fish

OpenOcean33 · Jun 16, 2019

JMM744 said:
Klein’s eat coral. Mine is just about done with a large chalice coral I didn’t care about so put into the fish only tank. I would never trust most butterflies except those mentioned above, Zoster and Banner and maybe the copperband and longnose, maybe.

Yeah my copperband was fine untill he found my acans lol I thought of trying another !

Mark Novack · Jun 17, 2019

I just had to try a Chelmon Rostratus when my SPS/LPS tank was up. A few minutes after going into the tank my son calls out "come quick, it's stuck in some tube thingy". Yeah, stuck for sure. Stuck its big snout into a fan worm for a delicious snack! It took care of all of those pesky fan worms, ornamental and hitch hiker alike. That's all it touched. It ate really well and dropped dead a few months later. Needed more fan worm based nutrition perhaps?

Mark