Extremely shy blue tang

[plancton]

My blue tang became timid about 6 months ago, and has been continuously hidding for 3 months now, in fact I've noticed that as soon as he sees people far away from the tank 12 feet away and still he quickly hides. Its my only fish who does that, and saddly its the best looking one, so this situation stinks.

Even in feeding time, he does not come out anymore, in fact, he survives by eating algae from the tank, (Since I had a major algae bloom) For now he has a lot of algae to eat so it hasn't lose weight or anything.

But his shyness is annoying.

Possible solutions?

 

[TheSaltwaterGuy]

Do you have bullying new additions? Have you changed anything major in the tank lately? These could be reasons why your tang is so timid lately.

HTH and Good luck!

 

[chrissreef]

solutions...
1. In my QT tank I have a damsel and a 2" blue tang that neeever came out. I added a md/large blue tang and now he's out all the time - he just wanted a friend or feels safer in numbers =)

2. In my other QT tank I have a rabbit fish and a spotted cheek tang that was veeery shy... after 2-3 weeks I got fed up and bought 3 green chromis. 2-3 days later he stays at the front of the tank begging me for food. Conclusion - he needed a signal from other fish that it's "safe to come out - no danger near" and green chromis was a cheap/easy way to do that.

at least that's what i think =)

 

[plancton]

OK, this is a 175 gal and there are 7 other fish in it, no other tangs though, no hostile fish, nothing bothers him, the only thing that has changed was the absolute algae bloom which is now receeding.

I don't know if he will come out begging for food once the algae problem is over, or if introducing a yellow tank would help.