Should I get rid of my yellow tang?

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darthgoby

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Dec 28, 2006
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I have a yellow tang in 55 gallon tank and I'm starting to have some problems with him. He was really aggressive with the coral beauty I added over the weekend. That seems to have calmed down a little but now he is hiding the rocks most of the time.

I'm feeling guilty since I've come to learn that my tank probably isn't going to be big enough for him as he grows and I would like to remove him before he gets too big or becomes unhappy with the tank situation and gets sick. Right now, he's about 3-4 inches from front to back. He still eats like a pig and isn't sick (don't see any HLLE) or any ich on him.

Does anyone think I should keep him in the tank or should I bite the bullet and get him out? By getting rid of him, I would take him back to the pet store I got him from and trade him for something else.
 
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OldManOfTheSea

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Mar 21, 2007
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Tangs in general need larger tanks, but one could while this tang be a young juvenile can be in a small tank, but would seriously require to be moved to a much larger tank.
 

Dustin83

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Nov 17, 2005
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Orange County, CA
Some people may disagree with this statement... But as far as your tank size goes, 55 gallon IS pushing it a little bit, but it's not TOTALLY unacceptable size in my opinion. If you do have plans to move onto larger tanks within foreseeable future, I don't think 3-4" right now is a problem. As far as the aggression is concerned, both are known to be pretty aggresive towards their own kind but not so much toward other kind. I think, therefore, there is a very good chance that they will get along fine over time.
 

Subliminal

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Feb 21, 2007
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Princeton, NJ
My tang (see avatar) and my coral beauty fought like crazy when I first got my CB. Now that they've been together for a few weeks, they get along a lot better, but still occasionally chase each other around.

I'd say give it a few days...if it's still bad, then chose which one you like better. Personally, I like my tang a lot more than my CB, although i'd never tell that to the CB! ;)
 

darthgoby

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Dec 28, 2006
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I've been monitoring him. He still eats like a pig. I gave them some mysis shrimp and everybody ate including the coral beauty. I then put in a couple of sheets of nori and the tang went to town on that as well. He got into a wrestling match with an emerald crab who grabbed the veggie clip and pulled it into his rock.

At first, he was aggressive to the coral beauty. Now the coral beauty isn't hiding as much and is out much more. The tang seems to be hiding more.

I'm still leaning towards moving him out unless I plan on getting another tank, which has me thinking. I'll see what the wife says. If I can get another larger tank down the road, maybe I"ll keep him.
 

USCavalry19d

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Oct 27, 2005
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i find Tangs to be more territorial than aggressive. My Yellow tang is perfectly fine with anything i put in the tank. As soon as anything tries to eat some of his nori though its on like donkey kong. For instance my saddleback clown went up to get some nori and the yellow tang basically beat the clown up into a hole in one of the rocks. Needless to say the clown has never gone up for some nori since then. Tangs do require larger tanks. I have seen some places say a 55 gal is a min, however i feel that this is for the juvenile size tangs. As others have said if you plan on upgrading tanks then keep the tang. If you plan on keeping the 55 gal tank then sadly the tang will have to go.
 
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