single Bangai

[ced]

A while ago I acquired a single Bangai.
He refused all kind of food (frozen, live brine etc....) by day as well as by night.
He died after 2 days in my tank.
I told the story to a LFS, and they told me that might have happened 'cause he was alone.

So is it true that Bangais don't want to be kept alone?

(I have a 40G/20Gsump, with 1 clown, 3 chromis and 1 one mandarin. And also a healthy RBTA, a Tridacna clam, a brain coral, a frogspawn and other less sensitive corals - everybody is doing great).

[Amphiprion]

Not at all. Banggai cardinals, if anything, do NOT like to be in groups. They happen to be much less tolerant of their own kind than many of the other species. IMO, it sounds as though something was wrong with it to begin with.

[nts9]

if paired improperly, one usually dies

[PoukieBear]

They are territorial, and will pick on each other if kept more than one per tank.

Wehn you say 'aquired', where did you get him from? a friend? the LFS?

[DaveBrader]

Banggai Cardinals are a very difficult fish to acclimate from my experience. I tried 4 times to acclimate a pair of them. Everytime they died within a few days to a week. All of these Banggai's were wild caught fish.

Finally, after reading more about them, I have found that the considered opinion on Banggai's is that wild caught they are very difficult to acclimate and keep alive.

However, tank raised Banggai's are a different story. I finally purchased a pair of tank raised and they are happy and healthy, eating well, and starting to attempt to breed after only two months in my tank. Of course I was very lucky to get a male, female pair first time out on the tank raised, since it is very difficult to tell them apart.

I absolutely learned a valuable lesson here about reading extensively before trying to add fish. It was very depressing to lose that many fish, since I had not lost any fish in two years.

Dave