Cooperband Butterfly Fish

[Kaush]

I have 1 small head of the Aipatisa( sorry about spelling) in my tank, because i know that they spread. I went to my LFS and they said that because it is not like a huge contamination of them a copperband butterfly fish should do the trick, and keep them under control. I have heard that they can be fussy eaters, and the man at the LFS said that they will be getting some in next week, and that they will be juveniles, and that they will eat frozen foods. Does anyone have any experience with keeping these fish for pest control? I have some zoas and a leather coral, will it pick at their polyps? I also have a fan worm, will it eat the fan worm? I know that they can be quite a difficult fish to keep but my tank has been running for about 5months now and the conditions are pretty good.

 

[xxBarneyxx]

Never really looked into this fish so cant give you specific information on it (though I know someone else will be able to).

What I would suggest though is that you only get the fish if you want to keep it and not just for pest control (given that it is taking up stocking space and may be difficult to keep).

For Aiptasia I would recommend zapping it with Joes Juice or Aiptasia X which will kill it off instantly in most cases. If you do want to have some biological controls in there I would suggest peppermint shrimp (assuming the rest of your livestock is shrimp friendly). These are probably cheaper than a copper band, easier to keep and dont really add to the bioload of your tank.

 

[Kaush]

I would like to keep the copperband, if it is eating. I don not think the rest of my stock would hurt the shrimp, but i have heard that the shrimp sometimes eat coral polyps. I have also heard that red legged hermit crabs can do the job as well. I only have a few small heads at the moment and i do not want to use any chemicals. Are there any other butterfly fish which are reef safe and will munch the Aiptasia? like maybe the racoon?

 

[ben1987]

What size is your tank? if its a 20 gallon or whatever you said in the other thread it is not big enough for a butterfly fish. They are also quite difficult to care for.
Buy some apistaX to get rid of them

 

[xxBarneyxx]

The joes juice is completely harmless as long as you dont go squirting a load if it in there at one go and dont get it on any other corals.

Ben is very right that a 20g is too small for a (maybe all) butterfly fish.

 

[kj23502]

In my opinion, yes… Not so much because of the water volume as these fishes are not quite so active as say the Tangs, but rather the limits in “real estate” prohibit keeping this fish in such smallish systems. Chelmon rostratus is often a problematic feeder, having a larger system (100g+) with ample live rock/substrate and the associated infauna (along with an in-line refugium to help sustain populations) will go a long way towards sustaining this fish while it is being trained to other foods, as well as continuous contribution to the long-term health of this species

 

[littleme1969]

I would never buy a copper band unless you saw it eating frozen... Saying they are fussy eaters is a huge understatment I tried everything to get mine to eat, Live foods, clams, frozen and even let a good crop of tube worms and apatisa grow so he had plenty of choice... Died after 2 weeks just starved to death Plus as mentioned above 20g is way too small.
Lemon juice works great on apatisa but you need a syriinge with a fine tip of some kind to get it in or as new to the mouth as possible.

 

[bitfishy]

that's interesting about the lemon juice, does it kill other corals too (like joes juice - which in my view is not far short of useless in my opinion!!)