Moorish Idol and SPS

[my2rotties]

I personally think it is totally awesome that you have kept one of these guys!!! I think two months is great and perhaps he is nipping at corals to get the nutrition that he is needing. Since you posted about yours, I did some research, and see a connection between the ones that survive for the longer term with coral nipping. Many of the other fish that did not survive lived in tanks without many SPS and LPS.

I have a regal angel that is thriving in my display, but he trashed my organ pipe corals, and does nip at other things. He is even growing at a fairly fast rate. I see him sampling a lot of things in my tank, and he loves sponges and tunicates as well. However he really liked the organ pipe more so then anything else. I have PMd you a couple of times asking questions about the fish you have and the success you have had in keeping them. I find you are a wealth of knowledge and commend you on keeping this fish.

I guess you might have to buy a few more corals to keep him happy, but I doubt he will do that much damage. My regal trashed the pipe organ pretty good but anything else is faring well.

Do you have any pictures of your MI?

Originally Posted by seanoman

Just so you all know, this was not an impulse buy for us either. We know the history of this fish and that they are supposed to be really hard to keep. There is an LFS that stocks these fish on a somewhat regular basis and before we bought it, we had a good long talk with the employees there. Whomever they get the MI's from, they have had fairly good success in keeping them healthy and eating.
The fish was eating at the store before we even took it home. I should also mention that the employees at the store were not willing to just sell it to anyone, they made sure that they asked us how long our tank had been up and running, and how big it was and who it would be housed with. He was the last one available as the others had been sold and he was missing part of his top fin and had no streamer. Since introducing him to our tank, both his fin and streamer have fully recovered and he is nice and chubby now. I wouldn't call us successful at keeping him yet though as it has only been a couple of months but I think we're off to a good start.
We're not ready to pull him quite yet and are keeping a close eye one him. I would hate to have to give him up.
Thanks to everyone for there help so far!