tang compatibility

[jeo]

I have been told that a yellow tang and a sailfin tang will not get along due to their similar shape, yet I have also see them together in tanks. If they were introduced to a 75 gal tank with sufficient LR for hiding places could they get along? I have a 75 gal tank, nothing in it yet, I have 80 lbs of LS and plan on ordering my LR soon, hopefully between 45 and 60 lbs. Any other suggestions for fish setups if the tangs won't work?

 

[stacy]

In a 75 gallon i would only keep one tang that will stay somewhat small. Most tangs are not very compatible. Are you going to be doing a reef tank? What kind of color are you looking to get as far as fish? I put several small fish in my 80. most only 2-3 in. to get a good variety.

 

[jeo]

I am not planning on doing a reef tank at this point, I would like to leave the option open for the future, possibly. I am a little divided at this point if I want to go for a few big fish like a lion, a tang, and maybe a more peaceful trigger or an eel or smaller fish and inverts allowing for the possibility of a few corals. Hard to decide. anyone have anything I should take into consideration? >((('>

 

[jeo]

thanks for the advice and the welcome jwtrojan, I still have a while to decide on what I want while I get my water going, I'm still divided as far as community or agressive. There are pluses and minuses for both. I don't like the fact that I couldn't keep any inverts with a more agressive setup and that would obviously rule out reef as well. On the other hand I really like lions and triggers. At the current time I am leaning more towards a community setup, how does the following sound: yellow tang, 3 or so clowns, flame angel (I have heard these are hard to keep so maybe another type of dwarf angel), cardinals? longnosed hawk? any other recomendations? Thanks again for the advice

 

[stacy]

I would probably not add the dwarf angel. If you decide later to switch to reef with corals then it could be a problem. I would also suggest just a pair of clowns. They seem to do better in pairs. If you left out the hawk then you could add some cleaner shrimp and other inverts. From the fish you are talking about it sounds like a good selection.

 

[jeo]

Thanks again for the advice, I have been thinking about possible setups all day at school and this is the fruit of my metal labor. My friend who works at my LFS said it would be ok to put a yellow tang with a hippo tang because they are different shapes. I do realize that hippos get big, probably too big for my tank eventually, I have also heard that they are somehwat hard to take care of, any feedback on the difficulty of care from hippo owners? Assuming the yellow and hippo tangs could work, I would also like to go ahead with the flame angel (I'm really not concerned with corals at this point), clowns (how many, someone said a pair is better, what about 3, 4, or 5 I think odd numbers are more interesting from an artistic point of view), 2 cardinals (2 to go against my whole artistic odd number theory), a royal gramma, and some shrimp, crabs, and snails. How is this setup as far as stocking level (75 gal, 80 lbs ls, hopefully about 50-60 lbs of lr) and compadibility? Let me know, I would really appriciate it, also I am still open to suggestions for different fish instead of the ones I mentioned. thanks guys