Morish Idol Help

[creative]

I am getting ready to buy a Morish Idol and would like input on the best setup for acclimation and quarantine. The Morish Idol will end up in my 125gal reef, but will be quarantined in a 30gal. I will appreciate any input as I am consurned about the nutrition need without the help of liverock during that 3 week period.

 

[diablo]

morish are very hard to keep alive they dont ship very well and getting them to eat is a tottal pain so i would wait till you are fully set up and watch one that comes into your lfs and make them feed it to make shure that it is eating well and different foods. just my point of view

 

[michaelstern]

I was very lucky to find a fellow hobbiest selling his 1 year trained MI. He went through 6 of them before this one lived. And he felt lucky! I would say there is at least an 80% chance your MI will not make it, even if you do everything perfectly. Something to consider.

 

[jedi]

Originally Posted by creative
I am getting ready to buy a Morish Idol and would like input on the best setup for acclimation and quarantine. The Morish Idol will end up in my 125gal reef, but will be quarantined in a 30gal. I will appreciate any input as I am consurned about the nutrition need without the help of liverock during that 3 week period.
Moorish Idols should not be kept. They will die in captivity and if we as Reef keeprs/ Salt water fish keepers, all refuse to buy them, then eventually the demand will go down and then the ammount of these fish taken out of the ocean will decrease.
Listen to the advice given, do the research, and Dont buy one.
Jedi

 

[angelsrock]

Originally Posted by creative
I am getting ready to buy a Morish Idol and would like input on the best setup for acclimation and quarantine. The Morish Idol will end up in my 125gal reef, but will be quarantined in a 30gal. I will appreciate any input as I am consurned about the nutrition need without the help of liverock during that 3 week period.
this is one of those fish that should be left in the ocean. i know they are tempting to get especially since they were in that movie nemo, but there are better choices than this moorish idol. if you want something that looks similar to this you could always try a black and white heniochus aka bannerfish

 

[lion_crazz]

My best advice for you is to not buy the fish. I do not even want to give advice on it because I do not want to encourage even in the slightest of someone buying one thinking that they might be able to take care of it, only to realize that in 4 months they were wrong. Even the slightest problems or changes in water quality affect these guys terribly.

 

[stang66200]

I remember that in another post there was a fish that looked a heck of a lot like the Morish Idol, but it was a lot easier to keep.
Leave the Morish Idol in the ocean. I am starting to think that the capture and sale of some species needs to be more regulated.

 

[cowfishrule]

dont buy the moorish idol
if you want something like it, go with a heniocous aka bannerfish. only difference is length of banner and nose.
blennyguy has a nice one in his 125 (i think its 125)

 

[creative]

Has anyone had any luck I believe I have a good shot with my tank I am most interested in the quaranteen period. I do have a 30 gal reef with no fish I could quaranteen him in if that might be best. My 125 is well established with 300# liverock, 55gal sump/refug.

 

[teen]

30 gallons is probably too samll to quarantine him in, it will probablly put him under a lot of stress. i wouldnt buy one.

 

[ophiura]

The point I think people are trying to make is that LOTS of people who think they have a "shot" at keeping them -even in larger systems - do not have success. I worked with one that ate EVERYTHING, survived system crashes that wiped out far tougher fish (literally killed triggers, groupers and not the Idol), was babied, beat the crap out of any other fish put in with it, and died a year later like most do. Literally ate anything - getting it to eat was not a problem (and I often hear of cases where that is not an issue and they still die for unknown reasons). So I would truly think twice about trying. It is a fish that should, IMO, be banned from the hobby. I think you may very well waste some money.
I suppose, if you have a 30g long tank (36") and it is a small idol, and there are no other fish, then it might be OK but it is not a QT (it just allows it time to get established and not beaten up by other fish). If you have some emergency disease, you still need a QT tank.

 

[dogstar]

Their natural diet is sponges, tunicate/squirts so if you can find a pcs. of cured LR with alot of sponge growth could put it in the QT but IMO like everyone esle dont get your hopes up.

 

[angelsrock]

Originally Posted by creative
Has anyone had any luck I believe I have a good shot with my tank I am most interested in the quaranteen period. I do have a 30 gal reef with no fish I could quaranteen him in if that might be best. My 125 is well established with 300# liverock, 55gal sump/refug.
the point is it doesn't matter how much live rock, how big a qt tank you have, and how big your sump is. when this many people tell you that it is a bad idea maybe you should listen instead of killing a fish that does not need to die. the people are more worried about the fishes well being. you may have a well established tank and all the bells and whistles, but that does not make this fish more hardier. it is just delaying the inevitable. please take everyones advice and do not buy this fish. buy the black and white heniochus instead if you like the way this fish looks

 

[scubadoo]

Estimates place daeth rates for Idols in the home aquarium at well over 90%. Actually a horrible idea to quarrantine these animals as a QT tank is not suited to house a Idol for ANY period of time.
Please do not get one...it will die within a short period.
The only reason suppliers offer these animals is because hobbyist continue to buy them.

 

[kimc]

I was at LFS and bought a Morish Idol (before researching). After getting it settled in I looked it up and the book said "A fish to avoid" Well, I didn't want to take it back to LFS cuz I if it was going to die, I wanted to at least give it a shot. Well, after a few days I had to put him in QT. My first out break of ich. I read that hyposalinity is the best treatment. He's been in the QT tank for about 4 weeks now and ick is just about gone. I read that these fish are picky eaters. I guess I got lucky cuz my fish loves Nutrafin Max, morsels. He pigs out!!! I also feed him frozen food for carnivores which he dosen't eat as good as the morsels. Even if this fish dies, I know that I have done the best I can to take care of him and I have learned a valuable lesson. Always reseach before buying!!! I will never buy another one!!! Hope this helps!!

 

[lion_crazz]

Originally Posted by ScubaDoo
Please do not get one...it will die within a short period.
The only reason suppliers offer these animals is because hobbyist continue to buy them.
That could not be any more true. There is so many things that that can be said about, and Moorish Idols are one of them. If there was no interest, there would be no collection. It's like gonipora. If no one bought that coral, people would finally stop collecting it. Everyone with at least a little bit of intelligence knows to stay away from it.
As already stated, please do not buy a moorish idol. There are not many things where the census is 100% to either side, however, this is one of the few.

 

[sw65galma]

As a hard core car enthusiast, I like a good challenge.
So this weekend I picked up a MI for my 300 gal w/65 fuge with 700lbs of LS and 700lbs of LR.
I've read a lot about them and fully aware of how tuff it is to get them to eat and keep them. We'll see.
I don't recommend anyone in less than a 300 try them...and I say 300 not so much because of the room (which they do need) but more for water stability.

 

[ophiura]

Originally Posted by sw65galma
I've read a lot about them and fully aware of how tuff it is to get them to eat and keep them.
Best of luck.
IMO, it is not necessarily getting them to eat that is the problem. It is providing some relatively mysterious component of their diet that I think can't be met with prepared foods or even LR, that results in their short lives even if they survive the first several months. The question is this, should you succeed (and this will take more than a year to know), what will your message be to other hobbyists? Would you stick with your 300g minumum recommendation with 700lbs LR, or will you say after presumed success that no, you can go smaller?

 

[cowfishrule]

Originally Posted by sw65galma
As a hard core car enthusiast, I like a good challenge.
So this weekend I picked up a MI for my 300 gal w/65 fuge with 700lbs of LS and 700lbs of LR.
I've read a lot about them and fully aware of how tuff it is to get them to eat and keep them. We'll see.
I don't recommend anyone in less than a 300 try them...and I say 300 not so much because of the room (which they do need) but more for water stability.

taking an animal out of the wild and putting him where he is almost certained to die is animal cruelty. i really wish that some people would get their head out of their *** and realize that maybe this is an animal that should be left alone.
good luck with your idol, a heniocous (sp) would have been a much better choice, but whatever. its your conscience, not mine.

 

[sw65galma]

Originally Posted by ophiura
Best of luck.
IMO, it is not necessarily getting them to eat that is the problem. It is providing some relatively mysterious component of their diet that I think can't be met with prepared foods or even LR, that results in their short lives even if they survive the first several months. The question is this, should you succeed (and this will take more than a year to know), what will your message be to other hobbyists? Would you stick with your 300g minumum recommendation with 700lbs LR, or will you say after presumed success that no, you can go smaller?
I think due to thier physical size a 300 would be my min recommendation. Mine is very large, I will Post some pics tonight.
Any less than 300 he or she would be to constrainded at full size.
Again the LFS that I got it was is run by a very prestigious Dr. of Marine Biologist of 30yrs.
I talked to him personally about this purchase and he said water quality was the key to survival as they have kept many Idols for customers for many years. And also LR was another important factor, as it does contain stuff they need that we don't feed them. Almost like the blue linkia..
My system has over 400 gallons of water, so I'm hoping that all the factors combined with a little luck I hope to be successful.
And yes if this does work, that would be my min recommendations....as that is a known working combination. I couldn't say for sure that less would work as it would have to be tested.
Maybe if anyone else has idols they can post their combos and we can get a better sense of how they are doing..