Orangeshoulder tang

[ColeBC]

Does anyone have pics of their orangeshoulder tang in different color phases?

I'm trying to figure out how long it takes from a solid yellow to the adult colors.
I know some of them never change to adult colors and stay almost yellow.
I'll try to take a better picture of mine later today if I can get him to come out of the cave when the camera is pointing at the tank.
He's about 5.5-6" now.

 

[marrone]

I've never heard of them not changing color. You should start to see a line in the middle of the body and the back half of the body will start to get darkier. Some times if you have other tangs in the tank, that are aggressive, the Orange Shoulder tang may not change for quite some time until it's large enough where it feels it can start to change into an adult. Even then it may change back into the yellow form when it feels treaten by another tang. This happen to mine for awhile before it finally stuck with it's adult colors. Once it starts to change though it's usually pretty fast into the adult colors. You should also see the spot on the body getting darkier and larger, this is a sign that it's starting to change also.

 

[mrferrit]

not sure if this helps not sure of age but here he is (rip) little fella

 

[ColeBC]

Thanks for your replies Marrone and mrferrit.
I thought I was imagining that mine was more 2 tone yellow for a while and then changed again to almost solid yellow.
Here's another pic of him. I'll take more once the sun sets.
My tang lost his scalpel but I think it will grow back eventually.

 

[marrone]

From that picture I can see that it's starting to change into the adult colors and in time it should darken and you should start to see the bar get the ring around it with the yellow in the middle. You need to remember that it's adult size in about 2 1/2 time,12"-18", what it is right now.