Pyramid Butterfly

Hazey

Hazey

New member
Hi, I have a little bit of an aptasia problem going on in my tank. I am sick of zappingvthem with kalk paste only for them to reappear a week or two later & in greater numbers. Last count I had 14 & 3of them are in hard to reach places. I was told a Pyramid butterfly fish would eat aiptasia's, is this true?
My tanks mainly sps with a few lps.
My other fish are Labouti wrasse, clown fish, anthias, twin spot goby, bells angels & a yellow tang.
My tanks 100 gallons

Thanks, Dave
Ps: would anyone recommend anything else & before you do I've tried peppermint shrimps ;)


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Pyramids are great fish, but they are primarily planktivores. I don't know if they will eat aiptasia at all. I also don't know if your yellow tang would tolerate it.

Other butterflies will eat aiptasia (copperbanded, klein's), but have other issues (don't do well in captivity, eat corals, etc.). Bristle tail or matted filefish are said to eat them, but it varies from fish to fish.

What happened when you tried peppermints? How many did you have in the tank? I ask because they did the trick for me, but sort of snuck up on me. The shrimp mostly staid in the rocks, so I never saw them at work, then ne day I just realized that there weren't any aiptasia around anymore.
 
Personally I have had a bristle tail filefish and a kleini butterfly. I didn't like the butterfly much, he swam all funny IMO and he ate wayyy too much fish food compared to all my other fish, he would literally devour everything instead of bothering with aptasia so I didn't want to keep him any longer. The filefish on the other hand, I found to be much more effective, very peaceful and a bit shy fish but I did notice much less aptasia after I added him to the tank. Never really saw the filefish eat an aptasia but they did diminish to almost nothing after he was added. Butterfly and filefish were not in the tank at the same time so I know for a fact who did what lol
 
I've tried copperbands on aptasia with great results. Unfortunately, after exhausting the aptasia supply, they withered away and died. I have also had success with just a pair of Kleini butterflies clearing a heavily infested 600+ gallon tank of Majanos. They're still going strong and aren't bothering zoas.
 
I had a Longnose butterfly that ate every aptasia in my tank, unfortunately after a while he started eatin other things so I had to take him back
 
If you want to eliminate the pest anemones and destroy your coral population in the process, try a double saddle :)
 
rssjsb said:
Pyramids are great fish, but they are primarily planktivores. I don't know if they will eat aiptasia at all. I also don't know if your yellow tang would tolerate it.

Other butterflies will eat aiptasia (copperbanded, klein's), but have other issues (don't do well in captivity, eat corals, etc.). Bristle tail or matted filefish are said to eat them, but it varies from fish to fish.

What happened when you tried peppermints? How many did you have in the tank? I ask because they did the trick for me, but sort of snuck up on me. The shrimp mostly staid in the rocks, so I never saw them at work, then ne day I just realized that there weren't any aiptasia around anymore.
Click to expand...

I added 3 pepps into my 180lt tank I used to have. They ate my aips at first but then got lazy & just went for the food I added to the tank for my fish & they never touched my aips again so I still had an aptasia problem...
The Kleini butterfly, I have my doubts about as I've heard they can nip at corals. I have a large derasa clam, a few lps but mainly sps corals in my 500lt tank.
I have thought about a Bristle tail file fish as a couple of my friends bought them to sort their aip problem. Yes they ate all of their aips but also took a liking to their lps corals.
Yes my YT will hassle it at the beginning but that's expected from a tang but dealt with this in the past so not overly concerned with that.
Jury is still out then on my solution??

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scar79 said:
If you want to eliminate the pest anemones and destroy your coral population in the process, try a double saddle :)
Click to expand...

Lol

That's the problem/risk with certain/most butterfly fish

Dave

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I looked after my friends Copperband for a few weeks but he took a liking to my acan corals so had to get him out.



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I've had great success with peppermint shrimp. I have a 75gal tank and once before I added the shrimp I tried counting them and got somewhere around 110 on only the front side and they were in just about every little spot there was in the rock coming in all sizes. I finnaly decided on trying the inexpensive peppermint shrimp and now maybe two or three months later I have no aptasia at all. I bought I think it was 6 shrimp. Butterfly's are very neat fish though so I wouldn't discourage you from getting one, the only thing is you have to find one the wont eat your coral.
 
The tank is just too small for pyramid butterflies.

A matted filefish will be a great way to go... it'll also eat majanos, in case you have some of those too.
 
Hazey said:
I added 3 pepps into my 180lt tank I used to have. They ate my aips at first but then got lazy & just went for the food I added to the tank for my fish & they never touched my aips again so I still had an aptasia problem...
The Kleini butterfly, I have my doubts about as I've heard they can nip at corals. I have a large derasa clam, a few lps but mainly sps corals in my 500lt tank.
I have thought about a Bristle tail file fish as a couple of my friends bought them to sort their aip problem. Yes they ate all of their aips but also took a liking to their lps corals.
Yes my YT will hassle it at the beginning but that's expected from a tang but dealt with this in the past so not overly concerned with that.
Jury is still out then on my solution??

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Click to expand...
No, I think the verdict is in - a pyramid won't help your aiptasia problem. And, as Peter point out, your tank is marginal for this fish.
 
Right so it's looking like a file fish or pepps then
Ta, will do some more research before going down that route

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I live in England. There's lots of good fish shops within a 25 mile radius so I'm lucky

Dave

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