Question about Butterfly Fish

[lodidodi]

I've got an Auriga Butterfly and I was wondering if anyone knows whether there are any kind of corals you can keep with them. Does anyone know if you can keep them with mushrooms or leathers?

[Delphinus]

No experience with auriga directly (nice butterfly BTW!! They get this keen little streamer when they get bigger), but from my own observations regarding a couple different butterflies I've tried - my guess is the mushrooms will likely be OK, the mushroom is maybe 50%. What I've found is that anything with tentacles or polypy little things that come out of it - those tentacles are irresistible to them. So LPS are usually OK at first until the butterflies discover that they send out feeder tentacles at night, for example. So depends on how good the leather polyps taste. It's possible they taste bad in which case it will be left alone.

Anyhow just my guess. Good luck!

[viperfish]

I had an Auriga, it was OK with pretty much everything but polyps such as Zoas, Palys, GSP, and it's favourite was Xenia. I was fortunate enough that I had a huge amount of Xenia so it grew faster that the fish could eat it. The problem with Butterflyfish is you just don't know what they are going to aquire a taste for. I think you would be pretty safe with leathers because of the awful taste (not that I've eaten them, LOL).

[lodidodi]

Thanks for the info. I originally got it cause it looks great and I had a serious aiptasia infestation. It cleared that up so amazingly fast but same as always you want to add more than just rocks. I just don't feel like buying it an expensive meal. Thanks again for the info.