Banghai Cardinal Frustration

[m00rishIdol]

I have purchased Tank raised pairs on two different occasions. Too young to determine if they are are a mateable pair. My first pair, both ate vigorously and survived for about 1 week until one of them died, then a couple days later the other. I purchased 2 more over the weekend and within 2 days one of the two appeared stressed and pumping gils rapidlly. I placed him in a hospital tank, where he died within 12 hours. The other seems to be healthy, but seems to only be interested in live brine. I try to feed varieties of foods, and he didn't seem interested in frozen mysis shrimp or frozen brine. I recently had my water put through a complete analysis and everything tests out extremely well. This tank has been established for quite a while, and the 5 fish in the tank prior to adding cardinals are extremely healthy. (2 false percula, Royal Gramma, 2 firefish Gobies.) Has anyone had this problem with these cardinals ?

 

[MikeandNicole]

We just picked up a pair of tank raised cardinals like 2 weeks ago. They were very small, like an inch. The LFS had them for about a week, and originally we were going to buy 4 but 2 died before we picked them up. That should have been our first clue. We lost the first one the night we put it in, woke up and it was gone. The second one lasted about a week and vanished. We fed with numerous small sized food and live food and they were acting normally.

We did have a pair we bought a year and a half ago that were tank raised but bigger and they are still doing very well. We don't have them, we gave them to a friend, but we still see them reguarly and they are fine (did not have the room at the time, we were moving the tanks in a different direction).

My conclusion is that I am not going to buy a pair until they are bigger.

 

[m00rishIdol]

Thanks for sharing your experience....Those little tiny suckers are so cool that you can't resist. If the second one dies, I'm either gonna buy bigger next time or just steer clear of them.

 

[dsalomone]

Just had the same thing happen. One lasted 10 minutes and the other 2 days.

 

[Darth Chingas]

I read somewhere they are nocturnal feeders so when I feed my corals about an hour after lights off, I see my BC out and munching. Might want to try it out.....

 

[NexDog]

Isn't there some disease that is killing all these Bangais? I have 5 in my tank, 2 are paired, one is a loner. They have lived together a year now. I had a pair orginally and the other 3 are kids that have survived.

 

[MikeandNicole]

I don't think it is disease, I just think they are coming to market too small and not readily accepting prepared foods.

 

[sahin]

I lost my bangai cardinal today. Had him for a few days...:sad1:

I also bought green chromis, perc clown, firefish etc, all those are doing fine and eating well. He was a decent size, but didnt look happy from day one.

I called my LFS who said they will replace him, but I am going to steer clear of them...

 

[ir_danno22]

Must be a bad batch. Anyone try the farm raised ones? I started with 3, one died and the other disappeared. Have had the last one for a year now and is doing well.

 

[MikeandNicole]

We only buy the tank raised ones, the wild caughts are notorius for high death rates and at one point they were being dangerously over collected.