Hippo Tang won't eat seaweed

[naesco]

Originally Posted by GongShow

Hey I have a Hippo tang (first tang) for about half a week now and i was told it would eat seaweed of a tank side clip like crazy yet mine wont even touch it it'll graze the rocks and eat that but it's pretty much cleaned 3/4 of it and it'll eat the flakes and pellets i put in. Are the flakes going o be enough to sustain him. Is that normal that he wont touch it and what can i do to try and coax it into eating the seaweed.

Your LFS was wrong to say that it eats seaweed.

The Hippo or Regal or Blue tang is a carnivore. It is the only meat eater tang as all the rest are veggie (seaweed) eaters.

You need to get some dry mysis shrimp or any other non veggie food, soak it in garlic extract (garlic extreme) for 10 minutes and throw it is the current. It will also pick up shrimp pellets from the bottom. Feed often and only garlic soaked food. Frozen food will not suck up the garlic.
The reason for the garlic is to avoid the fish getting ich and they are fish magnets and it also assists a fish's appetite.

Hippo's will also eat algae (nori) but it needs meaty foods. Mine also loved algae.