Curious what your Biota's ate the first few days after arrival and what you currently feed?
Hawaii Yellow tang
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TDO x-small pellets combined with various frozen mixed in - mysis shrimp, blood worms, and LRS herbivore. One also loves nori a few times per week. Both constantly graze too.
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I've had my Biota Yellow Tang for 4 years. Eats like a pig and is a vibrant yellow. Personally I'll be shocked if Hawaii reopens for collecting.
I live on the Big Island, and I was a fish collector until the permits were revoked. It will still be a battle to re-open the fishery. There is not much appetite at DLNR to go against the public sentiment that the fishery is destructive. I also have a Ph.D. in coral reef fish ecology, so I know from the long term monitoring data that the aquarium fishery is probably the most sustainable fishery in the state. Someone asked what other species were affected...no aquarium fish collecting is allowed at all, so there are no species coming out of Hawaii. But the Yellow Tang is the only one that cannot be easily collected elsewhere. The ban did likely impact prices of Achilles Tang and Chevron Tang.
If the state does re-open the fishery along the lines of the EIS that was prepared and presented to them by a small group of collectors, there will only be a handful of people given permits (less than 10), so prices may still stay high.
If the state does re-open the fishery along the lines of the EIS that was prepared and presented to them by a small group of collectors, there will only be a handful of people given permits (less than 10), so prices may still stay high.
As someone who values a fish based on things that aren't just money, I'm of the opinion that yellow tangs were always worth a lot. What other tangs stay (relatively, for a tang) small, have amazing color, and aren't total ******s? Just because you could whip them out of the ocean like hotcakes, doesn't mean they should be worth squat. The only thing making a fish cheap does is lower how much the average person cares about said fish. Just think about how many people see fish like green chromis as disposable. Wouldn't you make more of an effort to keep your $160 tang healthy than the $50 dollar one? It's still an animal at the end of the day, but the money does have a say in things (like it does in everything else in life).
Also, all the people saying CB yellows aren't colorful like the wild ones haven't seen wild babies. Living in Hawaii, you can see that some of the babies are white, just like the CB ones. Plus, it has everything to do with environment and feeding. Here's a pic I took of the Biota yellows in our store before they were sold. Bigger one was maybe 1.5" but they got plenty of mysis, pellets, and greens every day.
I don't mean to rant, but the people complaining about the price of these fish aren't considering the value that these animals bring to our hobby on an enjoyment level.
Also, all the people saying CB yellows aren't colorful like the wild ones haven't seen wild babies. Living in Hawaii, you can see that some of the babies are white, just like the CB ones. Plus, it has everything to do with environment and feeding. Here's a pic I took of the Biota yellows in our store before they were sold. Bigger one was maybe 1.5" but they got plenty of mysis, pellets, and greens every day.
I don't mean to rant, but the people complaining about the price of these fish aren't considering the value that these animals bring to our hobby on an enjoyment level.
People will complain about the price no matter what it is regardless of if/what is comes down to...I'd definitely expect it to stay relatively high
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Funny, I just said in another thread that some wild fish need prices raised so people don't treat them as disposable. My example was the mandarin dragonet.
I'd only agree with price raises if the increased income is being fairly distributed through the supply chain (especially the collectors in most cases) and not just jacked up by the LFS or importer
If you consider the complete lack of Hawaiian fish available to hobbyists as suffering, then yes.
Now of course I was buying yellow tangs in the 1990’s. They were like $25 each. I didn’t consider them disposable fish, but when you should either have one or a school, even $160 makes them tough. I would love to add a school of 3-5 to my reef. It is the fish I have missed the most. However pretty tough to drop $800 for a school. That being said, when I was setting my tanks up a year ago, I couldn’t find CB available. Would like to get a few at some point. Do love them.
Coral Fish Hawaii in Aiea. They used to dive and wholesale lots of the local fish. I used to be able to get Hawaiian fish there so cheap. I bet they’d know about all the rules for collection too.
Coral Fish Hawaii in Aiea. They used to dive and wholesale lots of fish. They probably are very familiar with all the rules and potential changes to collection too.
OP
OP
Even paying 40 bucks for a yellow before I didn’t see it as disposable. Even now a chromis will get in my sump sometimes which I bought for six bucks. Takes me 30 minutes to chase it around before I can get it out. But I still do it because I want it to survive and it’s an animal that depends on me. My point is price doesn’t dictate how You care for a fish the person you are dictates that.
It’s just another plain old yellow fish… the Forcipiger butterflies do the same thing, add elegance but minus the attitude. And yes Yellow Tangs are aggressive, they are nasty as adults.
Yellow Coris Wrasses are another Yellow Fish that take out Aggressive tendencies, add pest hunting and remain much smaller.
The reality is, Yellow Tangs just aren’t worth it as there are 100s of different yellow fish out there that do the same job as a yellow. Foxfaces are a good one and they stay the same size as an adult yellow can get.
Another small tang with beautiful colours are any from the genus Ctenochaetus. And before you say anything about this, they really are colourful however in the LFS they’ll be washed out and you also won’t see how much their pattern actually changes in the day.
I will say though, I’ve never really found yellows to be special (As I said, they’re just a hyperactive, aggressive, yellow fish). And find them to be more than overrated in the hobby.
Money is often a factor due to not everyone can go a spend millions on their tanks, I’m sure if we could we’d all be hunting the true dream things we’d want. But ignoring the price just isn’t happening all the time - I try to maximise myself to only 3-4 triple digit fish and often try to remain close to the 100-300 marks. I honestly wouldn’t waste one of the 3 to being a yellow tang purely because there is bound to be another stunning beauty that is yellow for that same price.
Also, very few people think of their fish as disposable. The people that do think this are mainly the big YouTubers that are just in this hobby for the views and nothing else (they often then hide the fact a fish has died and just never mention it).
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Its funny that you say that... There is a guy here that owns a mostly dry goods store in town and wholesales to IndoPac. He used to be a collector back in the day, in fact I probably got some stuff from him back in the day... (Before Winter came to GOT and more like HOD) He will bend your ear for hours about how the courts threw out a $200,000 study funded by fisherman and a University of Hawaii study that backed it up about how the collecting was sustainable.
According to him, this all had something to do with tourism and the dive boats didn’t want local fisherman on their reefs.
I mean, I can see the scenario where some midwestern tourist on a snorkel boat saw a fisherman collect a yellow tang...
"FRANK! FRANK! DID YOU SEE WHAT THAT MAN JUST DID... WE HAVE TO STOP THAT! THAT POOR FISH!"
Would love for to to comment on my post for it accuracy... because I am just relating and its just hearsay from me. but I would like a second opinion. The post just before this one...
There are hundreds of fish that used to be in this hobby that cannot be collected anywhere else due to them being Hawaiian endemic. I don’t really understand what you mean by the yellows being the only one.
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