Kole Tang not taking to Nori.
 

My wife and I recently purchased a Kole Tang for our 90g system. The fish was kept at the LFS for us for 2 weeks prior to purchase, during which time I did watch it eat, and kept an eye out for any visable signs of stress or disease.

We added her, to our tank and she fits in perfectly.. She grazes on the rockwork and sides of the tank, and will even eat the mysis/reef chilli mix I feed. But she will not touch Nori (red or green)...

Is this common for this type of tang? We have kept a yellow in the past, but that is a different species.. It "seems" very healthy (stomach not sucked in) and she is very active and loves the open rockwork..

Just curious is all.. I have been added small pieces of the red and green nori to the tank each day on clips to see if I maybe she get used to it.. They feed only flake at my LFS and I personally HATE flake food, but will go to it if it means keeping her alive.

Try attaching the nori to a rock rather than putting it on the clip. I've had success with kole tangs with this method before, and I believe its due to their eating behavior of rasping algae off of the rocks. Mine would never touch the nori if it was on a clip. Also you can try the hikari seaweed pellets if you want to go another route. Iv'e used them before in my tanks and tangs go berserk over them.

Tried that route first.. Was the way my yellow would eat Nori.. I attached some green and some red to a rock and placed at bottom of the tank.. She didn't touch it then either. :(

I will try the pellets and see how that goes..

Like DustyReefer said above, just try another form of green-stuff.

As long as the fish has other sources of veggies; it won't hurt it a bit if he doesn't like the nori. If your kids eat the broccoli, but hat lettuce, who cares? He'll probably come around. I kept many tangs before nori was ever thought of. I still feed my tangs turnip greens, frozen to soften them. Even though they are considered herbivores; tangs also need, and love, meaty stuff, like mysis. Spirulina enriched brine is a good way to get more algae into tangs too.

Never thought about feeding "people" food to a tang.. I know my pleco loves cucumber in my freshwater setup..

Again I was just curious about the behavior.. Thanks for the information both of you.. Will press on and see what she likes. :)

Again willing to try multiple things here. :) Went out and picked up some hikari seaweed wafers (LFS didn't have the pellets) and I bought a "mix" frozen food. It is the same as the mysis I've been feeding but it has different types of seaweed mixed into it as well.. Will try that a couple times a week to add a mix to my tanks diet.

Thank you both for the ideas and help.

My blue tang don't touch any nori i put in the tank, all my other tangs and foxface start eating as soon as i put it in the tank.

But he will take Julian Sprung's SeaVeggies.

my kole didn't eat off the clip at first. It took him about a week to start that type of feeding. Now if the clip is empty he runs up and down vertically at the clip hoping some appears

Here's some info:

http://www.reefkeeping.com/issues/20...hcs3/index.php

I read that they were grazers, eating diatoms and detritus off the rockwork as primary food sources..

I am currently using Julian Sprung's SeaVeggies but thinking about hitting up my local grocery store for sushi grade nori.. It's gotta be cheaper than $11 a bag..

She does eat so I'm not worried about her starving, but as she gets bigger grazing might become harder so I'm trying to supplement with the nori/algea waffers, whatever she eats. I will continue to work with her on the nori.. Either on clips or banded to a rock on the bottom..

Thanks again for all the help

Do you have any other nori eaters in the tank? A blonde naso I had in QT for 2 months wouldn't touch it. Even after I put him in the DT and all the other fish would eat the nori, it took him a couple of weeks to catch on.

I see what your saying.. fishy see fishy do sort of thing. :) But no she is my only Nori eater..

I have four Tangs, Yellow, Regal, Tomini and PB, and feed them Agar in a clip. The Tomini does not eat it, while the others will eat it until it's gone.

Well she went nuts today when I tried the new frozen food.. It's called Emerald cubes or something like that..

Contains, mysis, krill, plankton, red romain, spinach, nori and a couple other things..

She flew around the tank grabbing all sorts of stuff..

Great news! I love these fish.