Quote:
Originally Posted by lastlight
*lays a man-slapping on lance*
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+1
I do advocate for tangs to have a decent sized tank to swim in and I often recommend at least a 90g for smaller tangs like koles/scopas/yellows and 180g and up for larger tangs and even more space 8-10 feet long tanks for naso tangs. IMO a baby tang under 2" is not going to need as much room to swim in as when the tang gets larger (over 6") so if you want to keep a baby tang in a smaller tank and plan (and actually do) re-home it then go for it, however the problem is when the person gets attached to the baby tang they have in their small (say under 40g tank) and the next thing you know you see a 6-7" tang who is the same length as the tank they are in, which at that point I will get on a soap box and say that isn't right. However I have seen the smaller tangs koles and scopas in 45g tanks and they seem perfectly fine and healthy so I while I would recommend a 90g to that person I am not going to freak out on them, however if it was a 8" unicorn tang in a 45g I would, but one of the smaller tangs no.
Now I am far from perfect and even admit that while I think bigger/longer tanks for tangs are better I have a 230g which is only 6 feet long and I do plan on adding a blonde naso to it. So really I'm not much better then the person who keeps a yellow tang in their 40g tank. This is a bit of a selfish hobby and while I do believe you should try to do you best to provide a decent home for the fish, there are times when we talk ourselves into adding a certain fish that we know might not be "ideally" suited to our tank.
A quote from the article "The members of the genus Naso and Prionurus are the true open water swimmers; they are the ones that require special consideration." I have to agree with this 100%. When I was cycling my 230g reef tank I saw a great deal on a naso tang he was 2-2 1/2" and I knew I wanted to add a naso to my 230g reef, so the deal was to tempting to pass up. However at the time the tank I had available to house the small naso in while the 230g finished cycling was a 30g cube
I knew it was wrong to put a naso (even a small one) in a 30g cube but because I knew a had a bigger home for him to go into in a few weeks I talked myself into it being ok. He was in the 30g for 2 months before the 230g reef finished cycling and he was a dark grey stressed out colour the whole time he was in there. He also swam speractically all over the tank, at the time I convinced myself that he was eating so he was fine. However I didn't even realize the colour change and the (IMO) stressed out swimming patterns until I transferred him to the 230g. After the transfer he was no longer a dark blotchy pattern colour and changed to a lighter solid grey colour and he no longer did jerky swimming movements, he swam across the length of the tank and IMO seemed significantly less stressed.
I think this part of the article is important to point out, so that people do not get the wrong idea from the article
"Hopefully you don’t think that I advocate keeping fish in overly-small aquariums, as I do not. I always strive to give my captive fish the best possible environment. The exhibits I use for tangs at the public aquarium where I work range from 450 to 1,300 gallons. What I am advocating for here is a more civil discourse, more careful consideration of measurable husbandry parameters, and less reliance on subjective personal opinion."