I shall call it: WILMA!!!!!

[dgasmd]

Well, I had been considering to give a Moorish Idol a try for a long time, but it was not until I saw John Coppolino's tank (copps) during MACNA and saw his MI that I really got fired up about it. A local friend had gotten a gorgeous one about 3 months ago. It had just gotten in to the store, look healthy and curious, was fat, and was eating flakes!!! He got it and took it home. Over the next 3 months, he just got fatter and fatter eating pellets mostly. My friend decided to move out of state a few weeks back and was selling everything in the tank including the fish. I said I would get it when the time came if it was looking good. I had not seen the fish again until yesterday when I picked it up, and to my surprise it was much fatter than I remembered. It looked great and the streamer had grown back to over 4" long.

The pictures below were this AM with the lights off. He is picking at the rocks and doing well so far. The picture is deceaving as the fish is a good 5-6" diamter and a good 1" thick at the belly, which is impressive for a fish that is very flat to begin with.

DGASMD

 

[sixxer]

Awesome! I love the M.I.'s! Hope it continues to thrive! Nice Regal as well.

 

[BradL.]

Beautiful fish

 

[Cokeman69]

Hope it goes well.. I haven't been a big fan of keeping these in the home, mainly because of their poor survival rate... It definately looks good though....

Good luck

 

[Mantis]

Sweet fish, good luck.

 

[dgasmd]

Hope it goes well.. I haven't been a big fan of keeping these in the home, mainly because of their poor survival rate...

To be quite honest neither have I. I know of a few people that have them and they are thriving. A lot has to do with the specific fish you get and how well they do with shipping. I sincerely think shipping is almost a death sentence with these fish. Specially the juvenile and larger ones. We'll see how it goes.

 

[jeffbrig]

Beautiful fish, dgasmd. If there's ever a tank big enough to keep an idol happy, 750 should suffice. Interestingly, I've read that they are happiest when kept in pairs, which seems to agree with what I've seen.

You may be interested in watching this, it's a short clip of a moorish idol pair I followed around the edge of the reef in Maui this summer. They never went more than a few feet from each other.
http://home.comcast.net/~jbrigman/temp/moorish_idols.mov

Oh, and stay safe with the hurricane tonight/tomorrow.

 

[dgasmd]

Jeff:

I saw the clip before. Pretty cool. Stay safe and I hope you have a generator or some other good plan for your tank. If you need one and I am not using mine, you are more than welcomed to come get it. I'll PM you a number.

 

[mm949]

the key to keeping moorish idols is to treat them like a TANG...may people feed them to much protien and frozen food which will cause intestinal blout..good luck...

 

[copps]

Sorry to add fuel to the fire Alberto... Good thing I didn't have a gem tang ... Good luck with the idol and everything... mine continues to do well... here is a shot of it feeding amongst the frenzy in my system, and a clearer shot of him beneath... fat and happy...

 

[ckuhndog77]

Hope you didn't lose power to long - saw report of 6 million without power in So. FL.

Fat & happy - what a way to go through life :eek1:

 

[nbd13]

Very nice Alberto!

John always seem to find a way to add fuel to the fire, haha.

good luck with him and keep us posted.

Nick

 

[dgasmd]

Update:

Wilma lost its streamer shortly after being introduced to the tank. It was eating like mad still, but appeared that it was loosing a little bit of weight. Witht he hurricane and the week without power, the up and down of temps, and the minimally running tank, it got some external signs of ick as did my achiles tang. It has continued to eat very well everything I add from cyclopeeze to pellets and everything in between. Certainly not a fish that is very good at catching food from the water collumn. The streamer has ebgun to regrow again and it is about 1" now, which is pretty impressive to me. It gets alone with everyone and it is not harassed by anyone as I thought it would be by the achiles or affectionately called "the tank's assassin". I looks like it is getting back to its fat self too. In other words, the fish is doing very very well. Interestingly enough, lots of people report the importance of feeding it sponges. My tank has tons of it growing everywhere and neither the idol nor the regal angel touch it. Go figure.........

 

[pwhitby]

dgasmd

Has Wilma pecked at any corals in your system?
My wife has loved MIs since we vacationed in Hawaii and I would love to add a pair at some time.

Paul.

 

[palermodals]

MI

MI

Hello from the UK. What a beautiful fish! I had one for three years a few years back which ate everything!! Good luck with this fish I think its the ultimate in Marine fishkeeping and considered near impossible in the UK

Daza:strooper: :strooper:

 

[Louey]

Glad to hear this MI is doing well.

I'd love to have on in my 300G one day, but I'll only do it if I luck into one that someone already has kept in captivity, like you did. Ya lucky dog!

Glad to hear your tank survived the latest hurricane. 6 days without power is a lot. I only lost power for 3 days this time, but had a generator after a day and a half.

Good luck with the MI and kept us posted.

Louey

 

[dgasmd]

Nope. He has not picked at anything. Yet.........

This is a very iffy fish if you can call it that. I would highly discourage anyone from "trying it" and even more so in a tank with a significant number of LPS or softies in it. Despite that, even people in my own club like gregm779 cannot help themselves when they see one and even mroe so one that eats. It is very hard temptation to say the least.

 

[Chaotic Reefer4u]

dgasmd, very nice bro.

 

[Energy]

Nice fish- Good luck with it. I would love to have one but I'm worried about it eating all my sponges.

 

[dgasmd]

Nice fish- Good luck with it. I would love to have one but I'm worried about it eating all my sponges.

Like I said, he him or the regal have not eaten any at all yet. He picks off the rock here and there, but not sponges. I have not heard of anyone local reporting theirs eating sponges either. Just like with the aregal angel, I think it is an overly reported non-fact. On a tank like yours, I would seriously thing about getting one. Getting him out if it proves to be a pest is a completely different story.:lol: :lol: :lol: