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Tangs are certainly not he only fish that people shouldn't put in "small" tanks. I had a juvenile emperor and a PBT in my 100. Neither were over 31/2", yet. Unlike many people, i have a 250 in the garage waiting to be a sump. If there were any sign of slowing of growth, the 250 would be set up.

I find it interesting that some think it is ok to get a fish small with no intention of keeping it. This ,IMO, is poor reefkeeping. Just as it would be if your intention when buting a great dane would be to get rid of it when it is 1/2 sized. It shows a complete lack of respect for the animal. What happens if the LFS won't take it? Some might say they will, but what if they go out of business? Why is it so hard to research, determine one doesn't have the facilities to keep an animal , and not buy it?

Let's say one buys a large fish with the intention of returning it at a later date. Let's also pretend the asame individual buys some corals. Beyond his/her wildest dreams, everything does well and grows. Corals triple, even quadruple in size, coralline spreads, the rock becomes pretty well cemented together. Now, 2-3 years later, it is time to remove the fish because it is too big. Major stress to all the involved animals occurs because you have so many hiding places for the fish. Now, coral must be broken, fish must be stressed and a delicate balance must be disturbed just to get a fish out one knew they couldn't keep. Makes perfect sense to me.

The scenario isn't much different when planning to upgrade at a later date. My purchases were made after i had the upgrade tank. Still, not a real good idea, though. I truly shuld have waited until I had the tank set up to purchase the fish.

-Once we have finished making it taboo for the middle class to be able to keep the large marine fish, then perhaps we should set our sites on the corals themselves.

As previuosly mentioned, not a good arguement for anything. This is supposed to be a democrcy not socailistic or communistic. If I work hard enough to be able to afford a 1200 gallon aquarium (I'm close :D ) and my next door neighbor doesn't, he should have enough moral and ethical standing to realize he shouldn't get one. Instant gratification is one of the largest bug-a-boos in this hobby. People need to practice self restraint, of course that isn't politically correct. Corals can, and should be fragged. It is the easiest way to maintain the hobby, and a pretty good way to make some money, too. It is hardly inhumane to frag a coral and anyone trying to make that arguement is anthropomorphizing, and probably thinks abortion is ok.
 

Contender

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Let me start by saying that I don't want to create a world war, I am just stating my opinion. If we prod at this subject then it could evolve into something more concrete.

I have been following this post since it's conception. It began with a simple question, and I was very optimistic to learn more about this very sensitive subject.

However, as the thread evolved, I realized more and more that the "tang police" had very little evidence, facts, or information to back their claims. Everyone's qualms about keeping tangs is based on sympathy, a very unscientific criteria. Happiness, I am sorry to inform everyone, is a human emotion...projecting it on a fish is unsubstantiated.

I'm not trying to say that it is ok to keep big fish in a small tank. I am just requesting more concrete proof. I know it must exist. I myself would never recommend keeping a tang in a small tank. But it is just that: a recommendation...not a law. I have no backing for this claim, it is just because it doesn't make me feel comfortable.

The issue of tank size is always popping up here. However, the line is very hazy. What is the right size for a tang? 75g, 125g, 250g, 500g? Funny how I have never seen the 1' tangs you mention in huge tanks, either. In general, reefers don't have the capability to provide for a fish for it's regular lifespan no matter tank size. These fish are taken from reefs spreading hundreds of miles, and no tank, whether it is 2 feet long or 10 feet long, could provide the room a tang regularly swims in his natural habitat. To take a fish from his habitat, put him in a small area, and criticize others for doing the same is irresponsible. Granted, I am not saying one is not worse than the other, I am just saying that they both could be argued against.

Now all I ask is for everyone to truly sit down and think of concrete reasons why tangs shouldn't be kept in tanks smaller than a certain size. It seems very unethical to me to keep a tang in a 30g, but that would not make a very convincing argument for mouse to send to his local reefclub. As for me, I have decided that I will just stick to aquacultured animals.
 

tanzy

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I don't think animals such as fish experience emotions such as joy rather it's instinct that dictates them to swim around looking for food. It's natural for humans to apply our experience and emotions on to an animal or soft toy or pet or whatever, but I seriously doubt a 'happy' fish exist. If it does, spare a thought for the poor roach you stomp on (I am quite sure it was pretty contented before you smite it).
Don't get me wrong, I am not an evil mad reefer trying to torture all fishies out there. I believe that as humans we have dominion over all the living things in this world and we are answerable to God almighty if we are irresponsible. I suppose it's the conscience in us that wonder if the tang is really provided for. Are we going to argue if we should keep tangs in schools after the tank size debate has abated?
So lets get back on the thread and look for those data Mouse needs and not digress too much. This is an appeal for hard facts not an ethics debate right? Let's teach those that know less, influence their thinking and get that warm feeling within them to know better. Even if the fish has no feelings, we are all capable of some. Love that fishy!

We need to ask if the large range of tangs is necesary for health(exercise) or for the population to graze and be sustainable? Is swimming around in circle bad as long as it is able to turn? We run on threadmails too and go nowhere. It looks cruel but if the tang looks fine and does well, is it still wrong?

I'm real scared of flamers outthere. Just wondering ok....
 

Ritteri&Bubbles

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This time when i spoke to the editor, she asked me if i would like to write an article about the reasons why a Tang is so unsuitable for anything under 100G. So i thought id ask you guys for some hard evidence as to why this practice is unacceptable and should not be tollerated.

I personally think that 99% of fish in our captive tanks shouldn't be in anything less than thousands of gallons of water if the ethics commitee wants to chime in here.

BTW I didnt bother reading any other post besides the topic starter, but I feel that this is the plain truth, yet we all keep fish that naturally belong in the wild. Realistically most all fish are unsuitable for anything less than thousands of gallons and even this is a huge stretch.
 

Mouse

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Dizzy, before i go back to read the replys to this post id just like to claify that the reason i went off on one was due to your proposition that by making it taboo to inadequately house large marine fish, i was somehow deniying the working classes of the right to keep such animals. That remark led me to beleave that you were being sarcastic with the remainder of your post, as i fail to see how anyone could take such a comment sereously.

This group could be basically shutting down support for tang owners

I really dont think that 100G is allot to ask in light of the charicteristics tangs posses. There are many people with 100G tanks out there, and for someone who apreceates the physical demands of a Tang without using econimics as the lowest common denominator im sure would still wish to provide more. If you think you cant afford a 100G reef then im afraid you have to look more realistically at what you want. Im sure you could buy a 200G FOWLR for about the same ammount as a well lit and powerfully circulated 50G reef. So what it really comes down to is that people want to have their cake and eat it, ethically or not. If a tang is what you want then a tang is what you must provide for.

In actual fact i think the accumulation of hardware neccessary for the adequate housing of a tang can be achived quite quickly.

1) 100G tank, about £150 - £200
2) Adequate circulation, i think 500GPH would do to start - Ehiem 1060 - about £70
3) LR - about £200 would provide shelter and enough biological filtration for 2 small tangs or one medeum one after about a fortnight of cycling.
4) 1 6ft VHO tube and Ballast - £50
5) limewood internal skimmer & air Pump £100 would sort it to start
6) 100 G RODI water - probably another £50 if your LFS are tight

there you go, a tang adequately housed for about £700 Quid, about the same price of a second rate 25G "reef" system that we all to often see these animals cramped up in. Everything else can now be bought and added to create a reef at a later date should the owner wish. More LR, Live Sand, better lights and circulation. And the whole time you can have your "so important" little buddy there to watch the whole thing, and he'll be happy and strong and more resilliant to infection desease and the general rigours of life with a newbe/wanabe reefer.
 

Mouse

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I don't think animals such as fish experience emotions such as joy rather it's instinct that dictates them to swim around looking for food

Been keeping fish long have we :wink:

dont know about your fish, but mine tend to hide from strangers. :D
 

Mouse

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These fish are taken from reefs spreading hundreds of miles, and no tank, whether it is 2 feet long or 10 feet long, could provide the room a tang regularly swims in his natural habitat. To take a fish from his habitat, put him in a small area, and criticize others for doing the same is irresponsible. Granted, I am not saying one is not worse than the other, I am just saying that they both could be argued against.

But your Clowns stay with their host anenomie, and Jawfish with their burrows, its a question of terratory and not terrain. The majority of fish that we keep are terratorial, with the exception of tangs and angels. Yet we seem to group them all together.
 

dizzy

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Mouse,

I must admit I was a little sarcastic in my earlier post. I own a lfs and I get a little tired of all the lfs bashing, and all the praise for the cheapest online stores that I see on this board at times. I always try to teach people the longterm needs of the animals they keep, but if I insist that they must buy a 200-gallon tank before I sell them a 2.5" yellow tang or a 2" clown trigger we would very rarely get new people into the hobby.

I just find that it works better ( in our small town) to let the people start with a system that is a little less hard on the pocketbook while they gain a little experience with the marine hobby. We recommend the clowns, psuedos, gobies, blennies, and damsels for the beginners, but they always want the tangs, triggers, angels, and puffers. I always tell the people the fish will grow and need to moved into a larger tank at a later time. We always take back fish that we sold and often take in ones other stores sold. A 75-gallon is the minimum size marine tank we recommend for beginners. We actually do discourage a lot of people from getting into the marine hobby and just sort of steer them to the freshwater section. It's a hell of a note Mouse, but at times I am actually paying my employees to talk people out of buying stuff. One of the saddest parts of owning a lfs is hearing how people killed the fish you sold them.

Go back and look at Contender's post. Henry's too. Both of them made some sense. IME many tang and angel species do not grow all that quickly in the aquarium. I am always trying to further my understanding of the marine hobby and I would welcome any hard evidence that shows a certain size tang needs to be in a certain size tank to stay healthy.
 

Mouse

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I always try to teach people the longterm needs of the animals they keep, but if I insist that they must buy a 200-gallon tank before I sell them a 2.5" yellow tang or a 2" clown trigger we would very rarely get new people into the hobby.

If a 100G system is too much for them to swallow now, i dont see how selling them a 50G system this year and then a 100G system in two years time works out any cheaper. If they find the prospect of adequately housing their chosen animal too much then unfortunately i have to say they cant have one. Just in the same way that allthough i may want a Great Dane, the flat i live in is only adequate for a King Charles Spaniel, and all the stamping of feet and bitching in the world isn't going to make any difference.

And if anyone who's starting into the hobby isn't satisfied with blennies, chromis, anthias, bangii's etc etc, i would sereously question if their ever going to be satisfied and if this was really the hobby for them at all.
 

gregt

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I've spent many hours photographing fish underwater, and when I'm trying to get a shot of a tang, I will find myself swimming all over the reef, it's very difficult as they do not stay in one location for long. On the other hand, getting a shot of a jawfish, or a damsel, or a hundred other species can be done without ever moving from one spot.

The point I'm trying to make is that it is very easy to see that different species act very differently. I've spent hours watching them on the reef, and while I may not be able to tell if they are "happy" or not, I can tell you that they do not "act normally" when they are in a tank too small for them. In larger tanks (I work with tangs in tanks ranging from 300 to 500,000 gallons) they act just as they do on the reef. Is this proof that a larger tank is necessary? Perhaps not, but when coupled with what we know about animals in general and how they react to changes in natural patterns combined with the increased cases of disease, I think it's safe to say that there is a definite connection between health and tank size in tangs.

That said, I also believe that there are other fish that fall into this category. Most notably and even more so than tangs, would be sharks. Slightly less so would be large angelfish such as Pomacanthus and Holocanthus genus.

As one of the most famous "tang policemen" often says, "Always strive for the optimum environment, not merely an adequate one."
 

dizzy

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I think this thread should be of interest to people on both sides of the tang keeping issue. The bigger the tank the better, I think we all agree on that. Should we raise the bar to a 300-gallon minimum for tangs? Perhaps we should.

I don't get to dive all that much, but I thought normal behavior for tangs was traveling around looking for algae and things to eat. I think that when we put fish in tanks and start providing them with two or three meals a day we are encouraging abnormal behavior. The fish begin to look at their human keepers as a meal ticket and start to believe there is free lunch.

Is a 5000-gallon FO tank with fake corals, heavy skimming, carbon, ozone, and fine particulate filtration a healthier enviroment than a 100-gallon reef tank with DSB and LR for the filtration? Why have I seen so many Hippo, yellows, purples, korans, imperators, etc. with HH & lateral line problems in these huge public aquarium tanks? We don't have all the answers yet, but we are learning.
 

gregt

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The fish begin to look at their human keepers as a meal ticket and start to believe there is free lunch.

If this were the case, then they would not act differently in a larger tank. In fact, an example you make is regarding large FO tanks with fake substrates. They are "acting normally", yet are relying solely on the "human meal ticket". Foraging is not the driving force here, at least not directly, IME.

Why have I seen so many Hippo, yellows, purples, korans, imperators, etc. with HH & lateral line problems in these huge public aquarium tanks?

That's easy. Incorrect / insufficient diet.
 
A

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A disappointing characteristic of these threads is the way that so many fish keepers attempt to rationalize the confinement of free-swimming, active fish into small tanks, and then justifying that decision by stating that there really isn’t a difference between 30 gallons and 300 gallons compared to the ocean.

The concept is true enough. No one can have a tank large enough to duplicate the environment fish encounter in their natural habitat. However, we must start this discussion by accepting that we can never duplicate the natural setting, but we can try to adapt our captive environment to mirror as close as is reasonable to the native conditions.

I can’t offer “proof”, scientific or otherwise, that a tang shouldn’t be in a small tank. I CAN offer proof from my own experience that the difference in behaviour of these fish as tank size increases is stunning. In my opinion, the problem so many people have with keeping tangs is related to choices they make in fish husbandry, most importantly tank size.

It seems that every other supporter of these stocking levels will post something like "My 3 tangs in my 75 gallon are best buddies and all swim together". Well, if they do, it is not natural and not by choice. They are swimming together because they each want to find a place to call their own, and there physically isn't enough room in that size tank. Or, someone will post that they have a tang in a 55 gallon tank and it never swims around, so any larger space is wasted. These people don't understand that if the tang isn't swimming around, it isn't acting like a tang is supposed to. Shouldn't we STRIVE to provide a home that the fish acts naturally?

I was asked to respond to this thread, and I have decided to do so, even though I have long wearied of the cries of “tang police”. I have found that the most ardent supporters of tangs in small tanks are those who practice this, and the most strenuous supporters of large tanks are those that have experienced first hand the difference tank size makes in the activity level of these fish.

Not to beat a dead horse, but with all the beautiful choices available for marine tanks (fairy wrasses, chromis, dwarf angels, dottybacks, etc), I don’t know why people want to so limit their choices in a smaller tank by putting a large fish in them, when they could add many smaller fish with higher activity levels, beautiful colors, and minimal bioload impact.

People will always ask if they can add x fish to y size tank, and then attempt to support their decision. In my mind, the question shouldn't be "can I do this" but "should I do this"?

Brian
 

dizzy

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Brian,

What is the minimum size tank that you would recommend for a 2.5" yellow tang to be kept by itself?
 

naesco

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BrianD
Thank you for an excellent summary of the postioon taken by many to justify keeping tangs in small tanks.
 
A

Anonymous

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Hi Izzy

The problem with choosing a tank size for a 2.5" fish is that fish won't stay 2.5" for long :). I am not big on "minimum tank sizes". There are too many variables (amount of live rock in the tank, other fish, dimensions of tank) to be absolute.

Besides, as Gregt has mentioned, my personal rule has been to always strive for the optimum environment, not the minimum environment

Brian
 

dizzy

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Hi Brian,

I agree with you about striving for the optimum not the minimum, but we need some sort of guidelines to begin with. You guys have me getting into my fish library a bit. The following is a quote from The Conscientious Marine Aquarist by Robert Fenner p. 304:" Yellow and Hippo (Yellow-tail Blue) Tangs can easily get along on a 10-15-gallon allocation when they are small: the larger species double the capacity. I would recommend at least a 50-gallon system for a growing surgeon."

I next got out Baensch Marine Atlas by Debelius and Baensch. The tank size recommendation are listed as TL or total length and not in gallon or liters, as swimming room is important. I will go to Zebrasoma flavescens(Yellow sailfin tang) It lists the yellow's adult size at 18CM and has TL: from 100CM or about 40" I believe. I guess that would put it at about the 50-60-gallon size.

Baensch has P. hepatus Length of tang L: 30CM TL: from 80 CM (juv.), 150CM adult. I guess 150CM would be around 100-gallon.

Both authors seem to agree that juvenile specimens of the tang family can be housed in smaller tanks than those needed for adults, but recommend larger quarters as they grow.

I feel a little better, but I agree we need to house our marine guests in as large of accomodations as practical.

What are any signs of unusal behavior that we might be looking for when observing our tangs? How is yellow tang that is behaving normally supposed to act?
 

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