Yellow tangs keep dying all the time!

[plancton]

Its becoming a nightmare, I don´t know why I can´t keep yellow tangs.

I have kept blue tangs before with no inconvenient, I currently have a 2 inch blue tang which is kind of shy but living happily for a year.

Before that I used to have a 3 inch blue tang which became to agressive and I sold it.

The only blue tang casuality I´ve had was one of those cute little baby blue tangs which got sucked by the overflow.

But now lets go to the yellow tang issue: So I introduced a yellow tang about 1.5 years ago. It was about 2 inches and not very bright in coloration, it seemed to eat but to little. and It died after a month.

Then I bought another 2 inch yellow tang, I saw it eating at the LFS I took him home and he would eat slowly plus the tank was full of algae he could graze upon. Died in 3 weeks for no apparent reason.

Then 3 days ago I bought a 4inch yellow tang, very bold, excellent coloration eating everything at LFS, I took him home and today the third day, I found him laying on the substrate on his side and breathing fast, I don´t know if you could call that a way to sleep because the lights were off at that time, but the fact that he was breathing fast wasn´t a good signal, and I have absolutely no explanation.

I never saw the blue tang even bother him, my blue tang is quite shy and is 2 inches smaller. This is really weird, advice apreciated. Thanks.

[Kannin]

I would say you might have a water quality issue that your blue tang is used to but, the new fish are getting poisoned by it.

[plancton]

But that cannot be because, I changed the water 6 days ago, thats 3 days before adding the yellow tang, and even before that nitrates were 0 as well as phosphates. Etc.

Its a 175 gal by the way.

[MileHighFish]

are all these fish from the same LFS?

[OceanAV]

Were they from the same store?

[plancton]

Nope, they came from 3 different stores, in fact the last one I thought was going to be perfect because it was big, colorful and bold and came from another tank, in fact the owner got rid of the tank and sold all the fish to this LFS, so you would think that this tang was part of his collection for a long time because of the color, and size.

In fact it hasn´t died yet, as I said, I found him on the sandbed on a side and breathing fast in the morning when the lights were off, I am at work now and haven´t seen him.

But seriously, this makes no sense to me, I have seen them with other blue tangs before, I never saw him attack my blue tang or the other way around.

[MileHighFish]

how old are your test kits? it sounds like a water issue.

[plancton]

I tested in 2 different LFS don´t know how old but I don´t think is a water issue as before the introducton of this tang I only had 2 clowns, a blue tang, and a wrasse in this 175 gal. My skimmer is not producing that much dark stuff since 2 anthias carpet surfed. But just for the record, one of those anthias was new, been there for 3 months, bought it 4 months ago, and died because of carpet surf, not water quality.

Now that I have almost no hair algae the water smells really good, I use RO DI, changed the ressins about 2 months ago, corals and everything is fine in fact I been feeding the anemone weekly in order for it to grow and it has, everything is thriving really well, except of course, yellow tangs...

[sunfish11]

Well, it is a mystery. If it was me I would not keep trying. I would chalk it up to Not Meant To Be and that would be the end of it. I have seen people go through 3-5 of the same kind of fish because that is the fish they feel they must have and still never get that particular kind of fish to live in their system. I guess the first one could have brought in some kind of specific pathogen that doesn't bother the other fish, but kills yellow tangs or tangs in Zebrasoma or something. Maybe there is something in the tank that the zebrasoma tang ate that the others don't that is toxic. Those thoughts are really a stretch, but it is the best thing I can think of.

Lisa

[plancton]

Yes I´m starting to think I should not keep trying, What other tang could get along with a very pacific blue tang?, I was mostly interesting in a powder blue because of its intense powder blue color but I´ve heard they are extremely agressive. Any advice on this?. Its a 175gal.

[MileHighFish]

this is a tough one, you may want to set up a QT to weed out any other factors.. good luck to you..

[plancton]

What is your opinion on acquiring a powder blue tang with my current blue tang?

[agreeive?fish]

I cannot keep yellow tangs either.. infact i cannot keep a yellow fish at all..after i gave up on yellow tangs i got a powder bule( a year ago) a purple tang and moorish idol (3 months ago) and all 3 are thriving...and i have tried yellow tangs in several diffrent tanks all ending in death within 3 weeks max but usually within the 1st week..no more yellows for me

[MileHighFish]

Do you think it is the collection techniques they are using to get the yellow tangs? Cyanide etc?

[sunfish11]

Don't most yellow's come from Hawaii? I don't think they use cyanide there.

Lisa

[MileHighFish]

Could it be a temperature issue then?

[Santoki]

Without more information, it's very hard to say what the cause has been. I could offer some guesses based on the description you've provided so far...Assuming the tangs you purchased were healthy:

-Your observation of the current tang seems to suggest that it is starving for oxygen. This could be due to the large amount of algae you have in the display (as you mentioned earlier) releasing carbon dioxide through respiration. Too much CO2 can suffocate fish which require or are used to more oxygenated water.
Your current inhabitants could have simply adapted to the lower oxygen levels at night over time. Newcomers would not be able to do so. Corals and anemones are not as sensitive to the lower oxygen levels at night, which would explain why they are fine.
-You mentioned that your tank is full of algae for the tang to graze on. Are you certain that the tang is eating your algae? Are they also eating quality food provided by you? If not, they could be weakened due to starvation.
-You might also want to check you water again. Perhaps salinity? What are you using to measure your salinity?
These animals can live in all conditions listed above if they have adapted over time. However, it would seem that based on your many identical experiences, one or more factors in your tank is to blame. I would hold off on the powder blue, or any fish for that matter until you figure out what is killing them.

[phil519]

agree with the prior poster. More info is required. Especially since your tank is in Mexico. You don't mention what kind of water is used, what water parameters etc. etc.

[Michael]

did you QT, tangs get stressed easily and yellows can get white or even black spot easily as well, a couple of weeks in QT will be best, and how did you acclimatise them before sticking them in the tank? also dont let the temperature get too high either, i have a yellow myself, its been in QT for 4 weeks now, its had blackspot and is now cured but from what friends have told me they are easy to keep but difficult to introduce to the main DT, if not handled properly

[Sk8r]

I once had a specimen rock turn out to be a lump of tar, which began to break down. Are you sure of your live rock/specimen rocks so that you don't have something dissolving into the tank?

You might ask around some of our marine biologists if yellow tangs have a particular sensitivity to certain substances.

You might also run some Polyfilter to see if it absorbs anything unusual. The color of the resin pad will tell you.

[eyesinthedrk]

I have noticed at my LFS that all his fish look pretty good but if there is a sick fish its the yellow tangs, his supposidly hard to keep fish look fat and happy, but the yellow tyangs seam to look like they are on an episode of house

[furball713]

i too have the same problem with keepin YT. All of my other fish are doing fine. Ihave a 500 gal tank with 150 refigium. I have angels, tangs, wrasse and they all get along and getting fat. It's something about YT that i cant seem to pinpoint. My best bet would be cyanide.

[mm949]

it could be an acclimation issue....i would also run a night time pH....if falls below 7.8 your tangs will NOT be happy

[plancton]

Well the tang died while I was writting the first post. I will never keep that fish again.

[Paul B]

Well the tang died while I was writting the first post. I will never keep that fish again.

It was not the tang's fault that it died. The condition you describe sounds to me (without seeing the fish) like only two things. One of them, a water issue, it should not be because the other fish appear fine, the only other thing I can think of that would make a fish breathe fast is gill paracites.
The LFS you bought the fish from (and most lfs's) treat the tanks with copper. They almost have to concidering the fish are just about all infected. When you put the fish in your un coppered tank (without quarantining) the paracites completed their cycle and killed the fish.
THe rest of the fish may not be infected now and they may never become infected, for some reason, in some tanks ich does not pose a problem. But in a few days you may find many or all of your fish have a case of ich.

About that water issue I mentioned, that would not be nitrates or phosphates, these things would not cause a fish to breathe fast.
Nor would pH, calcium, salinity, or iodine but ammonia and carbon dioxide would.
Thats why I never ask about water issues or test kit results.
If it is one fish exhibiting symptoms you could ruls out water issues.

[plancton]

Absolutely, the water is really good actually, and its got many pumps, and so few fish that it just can´t be a case of low oxygen.

[Santoki]

I would not rule out with such certainty something you have no way to confirm through testing. Plants/algae respire much like animals at night and release CO2. You mentioned you had a lot of algae in your tank, so the fact that you have few fish and many pumps doesn't rule out the possibility of excessive CO2. I have lost fish in the past during tank emergencies in which I had to keep them in temporary holding tubs with live rock overgrown with algae. At the same time, I had fish also in buckets with no algae/live rock. Both were aerated with a powerhead. The next morning, all the fish in the algae filled tub were dead while the ones in the bucket were fine. In those instances, the only difference between the two holding containers was the presence of algae.
I am not saying that your fish death is caused by excessive CO2 at night. However I don't think you should rule anything out at this point.
IME, fish can fight off many different types of infections and parasites if they are in a healthy environment without any intervention from the reef keeper. The fact that you have had so many fish losses suggests that either you have been very unlucky each time and purchased extremely unhealthy fish, or something in your system is killing them. I hope you figure it out without having to lose too many more fish.

[plancton]

Lots of algae to feed upon, not really lots of algae on all of the tank and also I have a fuge with macros which is lighted at night therefore co2 and ph in theory should be stable at night as well.