Naso Tang Trouble

[vaguelyreeflike]

Hi reefers!

I’ve been having endless trouble with Naso tangs lately. I have had about 6 pass on me within 1-2 weeks of shipping over the last year, and I’m hesitant to continue trying if this is going to keep happening.

Symptoms start about 1-2 weeks in, this time it was a full 2 weeks, and are shown as light lethargy day 1 of symptoms, then by day 3 they are listless and curling on the bottom of the tank, day 4 dead.

Upon arrival I feed right away, and feed frozen mysis and squid 2-3 times a day. They all come in with lymphocystis, they go right into therapeutic copper levels (2.5ppm with coppersafe), and they live long enough to get nice and fat before randomly passing. The lymphocystis usually clears up within this time frame as well, and I keep the system very clean (NO3 5-20ppm, SG 1.026, no NH3 or NO2)

Is it the copper? I ramp the level up slowly over the course of 48hrs, however I lost 2 at the same time that were not in the copper system.

Is it how they’re being collected from the wild? All of our other tangs from the same place come in looking amazing, usually nice and fat, and they have no troubles. It’s JUST the Naso tangs exclusively giving problems.

Hoping for some answers

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Hi reefers!

I’ve been having endless trouble with Naso tangs lately. I have had about 6 pass on me within 1-2 weeks of shipping over the last year, and I’m hesitant to continue trying if this is going to keep happening.

Symptoms are usually light lethargy day 1 of symptoms, then by day 3 they are listless and curling on the bottom of the tank, day 4 dead.

Upon arrival I feed right away, and feed frozen mysis and squid 2-3 times a day. They all come in with lymphocystis, they go right into therapeutic copper levels (2.5ppm with coppersafe), and they live long enough to get nice and fat before randomly passing. The lymphocystis usually clears up within this time frame as well, and I keep the system very clean (NO3 5-20ppm, SG 1.026, no NH3 or NO2)

Is it the copper? I ramp the level up slowly over the course of 48hrs, however I lost 2 at the same time that were not in the copper system.

Is it how they’re being collected from the wild? All of our other tangs from the same place come in looking amazing, usually nice and fat, and they have no troubles. It’s JUST the Naso tangs exclusively giving problems.

Hoping for some answers

Are these "blonde nasos", Naso elegans? If so, we've been seeing horrendous mortality with these for unknown reasons. My guess is that this all stems from Hawaii closing down the collection of Naso literatus. Suppliers then shifted their importations to SE Asia and started getting this species. These just do not handle long transport/handling times well and very often just up and die within a few weeks. My recommendation is for people to stop buying Naso elegans at all....

Jay

 

[vetteguy53081]

Jay is indeed correct and to collaborate on this, Unfortunately for about 16 months now- this has been a trend. An influx of these fish are coming from Sri Lanka and it is suspected that a method of capture is contributing to this trend in which the fish appears healthy the first few days and then weakens quickly with loss of appetite and strength and as you found laying on its side, thin body and breathing heavy until death. It may be due to cyanide capture but unconfirmed.
Sorry to hear of this and being the bearer of bad news. Often in this state of health , recovery is very low as they are moribund and adding air stone may or may not help, but there is no additive that can be recommended for this

 

[Dr. Reef]

in many 3rd world countries collection is done using cyanide and unfortunately fish looks healthy on the outside but internally its shutting down and once it really gets to damage the organs fish dies out of no visible sign.

 

[zheka757]

HAVE YOU RESENTLY PURCHASED BLONDE NASO TANG?

In last 6 month have you got one and it died on you? Like with in days or weeks? Looked good, ate, then stoped eating and died. I'm one of alot of cases lately!

www.reef2reef.com

scroll through this thread if interested, i ran through this problem also, until I called live aquaria and ask them, for specific blonde naso, that has being there for couple month already. i got that one and he is happy for about a year now, I highly recommend get one only after it being in captivity after 40-60 days.

 

[vaguelyreeflike]

Are these "blonde nasos", Naso elegans? If so, we've been seeing horrendous mortality with these for unknown reasons. My guess is that this all stems from Hawaii closing down the collection of Naso literatus. Suppliers then shifted their importations to SE Asia and started getting this species. These just do not handle long transport/handling times well and very often just up and die within a few weeks. My recommendation is for people to stop buying Naso elegans at all....

Jay

Jay is indeed correct and to collaborate on this, Unfortunately for about 16 months now- this has been a trend. An influx of these fish are coming from Sri Lanka and it is suspected that a method of capture is contributing to this trend in which the fish appears healthy the first few days and then weakens quickly with loss of appetite and strength and as you found laying on its side, thin body and breathing heavy until death. It may be due to cyanide capture but unconfirmed.
Sorry to hear of this and being the bearer of bad news. Often in this state of health , recovery is very low as they are moribund and adding air stone may or may not help, but there is no additive that can be recommended for this

It seems they have all been Naso Elegans, that makes a lot of sense!
I’ve been trying to order N. Literatus however this is what they have been sending me, which explains it all if the blondes are coming in instead. I will definitely not be ordering any more until this resolves, that is super unfortunate. It’s good to know that it isn’t anything I’m doing wrong, and I know it’s no fault of our wholesaler due to the other tangs and fish coming in so healthy. I will be letting our customers know who are looking for Nasos.

Thank you for the information! It has saved a lot of future headache, if only I had asked sooner. My latest one is currently taking his last breaths and it’s absolutely heartbreaking to watch, he got so plump in the 2 weeks he was doing well.

If we do get any more in the future, I’ll be methylene blue dipping them upon arrival to see if that helps, I’ve been having better luck with Anthia doing this as well.

 

[Dr. Reef]

HAVE YOU RESENTLY PURCHASED BLONDE NASO TANG?

In last 6 month have you got one and it died on you? Like with in days or weeks? Looked good, ate, then stoped eating and died. I'm one of alot of cases lately!

www.reef2reef.com

scroll through this thread if interested, i ran through this problem also, until I called live aquaria and ask them, for specific blonde naso, that has being there for couple month already. i got that one and he is happy for about a year now, I highly recommend get one only after it being in captivity after 40-60 days.

This is no guarantee.
We are in business of quarantining fish. We hold these fish anywhere from 45 to 60 day sometimes and sometimes damage is not known and one day fish simply dies.
Although longer the history of the fish we have it's better off surviving.

 

[vetteguy53081]

It seems they have all been Naso Elegans, that makes a lot of sense!
I’ve been trying to order N. Literatus however this is what they have been sending me, which explains it all if the blondes are coming in instead. I will definitely not be ordering any more until this resolves, that is super unfortunate. It’s good to know that it isn’t anything I’m doing wrong, and I know it’s no fault of our wholesaler due to the other tangs and fish coming in so healthy. I will be letting our customers know who are looking for Nasos.

Thank you for the information! It has saved a lot of future headache, if only I had asked sooner. My latest one is currently taking his last breaths and it’s absolutely heartbreaking to watch, he got so plump in the 2 weeks he was doing well.

If we do get any more in the future, I’ll be methylene blue dipping them upon arrival to see if that helps, I’ve been having better luck with Anthia doing this as well.

Do what I did- Look out for a pre-owned- One that has gotten too big for someone's tank or someone taking their tank down and make an offer. I gave a 9" one and bought it at 6" at a fair price of $180

 

[vaguelyreeflike]

Do what I did- Look out for a pre-owned- One that has gotten too big for someone's tank or someone taking their tank down and make an offer. I gave a 9" one and bought it at 6" at a fair price of $180

I would definitely do this if I was looking to stock for my tank, however I work in a locally owned fish store and we are trying to stock one for sale, so we will just have to let people know why we aren’t ordering more. I will definitely recommend people try to find rehomes vs ordering online unless the store has had the tang for a month or two.

 

[MnFish1]

HAVE YOU RESENTLY PURCHASED BLONDE NASO TANG?

In last 6 month have you got one and it died on you? Like with in days or weeks? Looked good, ate, then stoped eating and died. I'm one of alot of cases lately!

www.reef2reef.com

scroll through this thread if interested, i ran through this problem also, until I called live aquaria and ask them, for specific blonde naso, that has being there for couple month already. i got that one and he is happy for about a year now, I highly recommend get one only after it being in captivity after 40-60 days.

This really makes sense - and whether buying from an LFS or someone else

 

[Rach77]

It seems they have all been Naso Elegans, that makes a lot of sense!
I’ve been trying to order N. Literatus however this is what they have been sending me, which explains it all if the blondes are coming in instead. I will definitely not be ordering any more until this resolves, that is super unfortunate. It’s good to know that it isn’t anything I’m doing wrong, and I know it’s no fault of our wholesaler due to the other tangs and fish coming in so healthy. I will be letting our customers know who are looking for Nasos.

Thank you for the information! It has saved a lot of future headache, if only I had asked sooner. My latest one is currently taking his last breaths and it’s absolutely heartbreaking to watch, he got so plump in the 2 weeks he was doing well.

If we do get any more in the future, I’ll be methylene blue dipping them upon arrival to see if that helps, I’ve been having better luck with Anthia doing this as well.

unfortunately, I received a naso unicornis from live aquaria friday morning, it is now sunday. He arrived alive but has nothing but swim in upside down circles once he started moving. I am so depressed about this. Wish I would have known. I don't think he's going to make it.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

unfortunately, I received a naso unicornis from live aquaria friday morning, it is now sunday. He arrived alive but has nothing but swim in upside down circles once he started moving. I am so depressed about this. Wish I would have known. I don't think he's going to make it.

Sorry to hear. Are the other fish in your tank doing ok?

 

[Rach77]

Sorry to hear. Are the other fish in your tank doing ok?

They are all doing ok. Everything else I have is also captive bred. Water parameters are all still just fine. I found him at 0900 this morning . I believe I will never have a fish shipped again. So upsetting. I buried the little guy in my flower garden

 

[Qasimja]

I've never had success keeping a naso tang they will be fine for weeks then just all of a sudden stop eating and die within days after showing no signs of disease. I gave up trying to keep one.