klein butterfly reef safe?
 

ive got a 55 reef that houses
1 tomato clown
1 scopus tang
1 anthias dispar
1 yellow watchman
1 pajama cardinal

some mushrooms and a whole lot of xenia.

i saw a klein butterfly at a lfs i visited. it looked pretty good and after doing a slight bit of research came to the conclusion that it might be reef safe. since its a butterfly im a little sceptical about having it in a reef but im not to worried about my xenia and i do have a slight aptasia problem. anyone else have thoughts on the matter. thanks

I had one in my semi-FOWLR and it decimated the mushrooms in the tank within days of being introduced. It left all the other softies alone.

will eat mushrooms and xenia very fast...

thats a bummer. it was a good looking fish.
ive heard longnose butterflies and sometimes copperbands can be reef safe. is this true?

anyone know of any reefsafe butterflys, they're such interesting fish and i'd love to add one to my reef tank.

pyramids, copperbanded, some of the deepwater ones. yellow big longnose.

No butterfly is 100% reef safe. It's just like buying an angel. There is a chance it will be ok, but there is also a high chance it will munch your corals.

Pyramids are the safest but NO butterfly, like Zaita says, is a guaranteed safe fish.

I have a pyramid for about 6 mounth now in my reef and everything is great no probleme and even got rid of my majanos

I have four of them and they are terrific. But I don't ever count on them being reef safe despite being planktivores (pyramids)

As a side note, in a 55, I wouldn't add any more fish this size. You're quite full now, and my sense is the scopas tang would not take kindly to a butterfly in such close quarters.

snorvich, what makes the Pyramids not reef safe, when they are not? I mean, do they eat corals or kill shrimp or what?

Thanks

120% agree. I have 2 Scopas tangs and added a CBB. The Scopas and CBB will get along for 95% of the time, but the rest of the time there is aggression between them. The CBB can hold it's own as the scopas do not wanna be jabbed by it's spines. They also in a 125g so they can escape each other if necessary. In a 55g the butterfly would become stressed and likely die.

Amanda,
In theory any planktivore is reef safe e.g. Genicanthus angels, and pyramids are definitely planktivores. I have four of them in a reef tank without incident and I will add another group to my other tank. But some fish, like flame angels and regal angels "turn" that is they go from being reef safe to not. In the tank where they currently reside, I have clams, sps, lps, shrimp. No issues. I am just nervous when it comes to butterfly fish. BUT, if you ask me to recommend, I would.

Are there any other Butterflies you would recommend? I think I remember the longnose ones is fairly safe. Any others?