Sailfin Tang Eating Algae

[RonMidtownStomp]

This seems like the greatest thing to ever happen to this tank, but I wanted to make sure. We have all of this long, dense algae that we inherited with the liverock. We just put the Sailfin Tang into the tank (from LFS) and it immediately started feasting on the algae and pretty much hasn't stopped eating for the last hour. Are we to assume that it will eventually stop eating before it turms bulemic or explodes? Will we need to supplement this diet with more nutritious stuff? If so, what?

It also says on liveaquaria.com that it will eat meats. I'm having a hard time imagining this little guy (3" long?) eating a hunk of scallop.

He's fantastic so far. The idea is to move him to the 100 gallon tank when he appears too big for this tank. Liveaquaria also says 125 gallon min. and the LFS said they'd take him back if he outgrew that and we didn't have a larger tank by then. I figure we'll pick up a 200-250 gallon tank in the next year.

Thanks,
Ron and Deanna

 

[Gary Majchrzak]

Welcome to RC.
I'd let that little fella eat algae until it's all gone. It might take a couple of days :lol:

Nori is a good food for your Sailfin Tang. Mysid shrimps are probably the best meaty seafood you can give it. This species isn't too fussy and will eat almost anything if hungry enough. Good luck with it.

 

[RonMidtownStomp]

Oh, there's a whole bunch more than that little bit in the tank. Maybe 100x more? We bought an urchin to try to eat the stuff, and it's been working on it for a couple of weeks. Sounds great, though.

 

[650-IS350]

Mine mowed down nuisance algae all over the tank. Only reason why I have him for.

 

[mdog3000]

Mine must be broken, lol, He barely picks at all my algae.