The Moorish Idol Thread

I don't have pictures of it but it is brown and only grows a few inches under the water on floating docks.
It grows about an inch high from the wood and looks like the mushrooms that grow in the woods on rotting wood. You can scrape it off by hand and freeze it.
 
I don't know if it is bad but I have never seen them school in the sea and you would need a really large tank. I am not sure if a bunch of males would get along being they live in mated pairs
 
Paul B said:
I don't know if it is bad but I have never seen them school in the sea and you would need a really large tank. I am not sure if a bunch of males would get along being they live in mated pairs
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thanks for the info, i dont know why most websites list them as schooling fish. but i guess i should probably only have one in my tank.
 
i dont know why most websites list them as schooling fish.
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I don't know either but I personally saw a lot of them and never saw more than 3 together. The vast majority were a pair which looked to me like a mated pair. Maybe the young ones school, but I never saw any young ones so I can't tell.
 
Paul B said:
You can't but the sponge, but they love the New York sponge. I used to feed it every day and he would jump out of the water for it although he would eat anything, sponge was his favorite. I have spent a lot of time with them underwater in the South Pacific and the only thing I ever saw them eat was sponges.
Mine died in an accident after five years.
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That sucks to hear Paul, I've been lucky to keep my MI healty and alive for
2 1/2 yrs or so. And to be honest when someone asks me about my tank I always include the MI being the most difficult species to keep in captivity.
After I bought him most people at the Lfs were telling me "good luck and enjoy him while you can".

If anyone cares I feed my tank twice a day. everything from green, red brine flakes to spectrum pellets small and med pellets, nori. green and brown and of coarse krill.
Once a week I mix up enough frozen mysis, lifeline and Rods food and soak everything for a couple hours in some liquid vita-chem.
I also dose some reef solutions in the display tank once a month. I turn the skimmers off for an hour or two when I use RS.
And all my fish are very healthy and active with no diseases.
 
I have been reading through this thread for a couple of days now and I am very interested in a MI, have been for the last 6 years I have been in this hobby. I work in a LFS part time and can get one pretty much when ever I want. I have watched them come through the store and 90 percent of them eat like pigs the 1st day in. I just recently moved so unfortunatly I will need to wait a while for the tank to "mature" again. My question is weather or not to pull the trigger now and try to "seed" the tank with some different sponges to help keep the idol eating well. But if it doesn't work will the flakes, pellets, frozen all with vitimans and garlic be enough? How many of you have sustained an Idol long term with out sponge?? I don't have access to the ocean as I am on Lake Ontarion....
 
has any one tried the spounge based frozen food for the mi's? i am thinking about tryin gon eof these guys but i cant get spounges since i am land locked. my only option is frozen
 
I never fed my MI any sponge to my MI and he lasted just fine. Lost him due to pump failure and he sufficated.

My main foods were a varitey of pellet foods. Just a little of each kind I could find. I also fed sheets of Nori.

Not saying that you can't feed sponges, just that they will live without it. I had mine for just over 4 yeasr when my pump quit sometime in the night.

One of the biggest things I think that helped him to survive was the amount of swimming room he had. He was one of the most active swimmers in the tank, along with my two Naso tangs. This was also backed up by the Long Beach Aquarium who could only keep their MI's alive in their large outdoor pond. So keep that in mind when designing a tank for MI's.
 
Hi guys, I was hoping you could help. I have a beautiful moorish idol that is eating everything and looking great but another fish in my fowlr tank is doing a little head shaking and has an open mouth. Can I treat my tank with prazipro for gill flukes? Is this med safe for my idol?
 
Thanks, I feel very blessed to have this beautiful idol eating so well and was worried that adding prazipro would cause a hunger strike, I have read since that many of you treat idols with prazipro so I did a 1/4 dose yesterday.

I have a mesh partition that I made which divides my tank for adding new fish, my idol and 2 angels are in 1/3 of my tank and a flame angel, hippo tang, naso tang and marine betta are on the other side. How do I know when its safe to remove the barrier, right now the naso spends some time eyeing the idol and I don't like the look on his face, they are the same size as well.
 
The only thing that will permanently get rid of ich is copper, hypo, or quinine sulfate. All of which will decimate all coral.

IMHO - all the products that are sold as "reef safe" ich cures are nothing but a waste of money.
 
Quinicrine hydrocloride is safe for those animals you mentioned but not for corals. It is a prescription drug for malaria in humans.
It is not nearly as effective as copper which you can not use with those inverts.
 
Hi again, I treated my tank with prazipro and everyone now appears healthy and all are eating well, my idol is actually fat and the boss of the two angels that are on his side of the tank.

I have not yet felt comfortable to remove the barrier in my tank and let my idol meet my naso, both are aggressive. Any suggestions? To all of you who have an idol are they the boss of your tanks?
 
You might want to rearrange the rocks , this might help keep the aggression of the tangs more confused that their homes are gone, turn off the light too and possibly feed them right you try that.
 
Hi, I want to try a moorish in my 170 gal. The problem is that I have a salifin tang, and a hippo blue. The sailfin is very peaceful a bit more than the hippo which is not aggresive per se.
Only time I saw my sailfin upset was when I added a CB butterfly, it would sometimes chase it a bit, but not bite, and did that for two days, just like the hippo, and now everybody is happy, I have 0 aggresion problems.

But the moorish looks a lot like the sailfin, I don´t know. In terms of food I gues I could try many things and I´m setting up a plankton reactor and trigger pod reactor next week.

Is it a hit/miss situation?, I mean I should just try and see?. I also heard that total blackness kills them, and so moonlights are good, I have moonlights.
I also have a 50 gal tank with LPS and a peaceful wrasse. In terms of adaptation would it be better to introduce it to the 50 gal? which is to small for it but at least there are no tangs, or it will still do better in the 170gal from the beggining?.

Also I heard they can be very healthy for a whole year and suddenly die, is that common?, a local aquarist has had one for 1.5 years now.
 
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Hi again guys, I removed the barrier in my tank on 27th, the naso chased the idol a bit for the first day and remains boss but overall everyone seems to be getting along and eating well. The idol does have a few dark blotchy spots, does not look like ich but I'm not sure what it could be, do they get stress marks? Any other ideas?

He is eating nori, flakes, pellets, mysis, and brine. Thanks for your help
 
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