majestic angel

Question
QUESTION: hey i just got a majestic angel and i put it in my 75gal tank today and ever since i put him in my yellow tang has been going after him! what should i do? should i take him back or is their a way to make them stop i have turned the lights of for the rest of the day and i was thinking i could take the yellow tang to my LFS and keep him ther for a week for him to calm down? what do you think please help!

ANSWER: Hi Ryan. What to do is all going to depend on what level of bullying is going on here. If your tang is simply chasing him away from a certain area that he feels is his territory then eventually a truce will be established and everyone should get along in a peaceful but hightened alert state. Tangs are very territorial over their feeding area. Your angel is also a very territorial fish and after the initial settling period they should be okay. If the tang is going after the angel aggressively enough to cause bodily harm then you may want to consider getting rid of one of them. A 75 gallon tank may be a little on the small side for these two larger semi-aggressive fish to get along in. Typically these two are more aggressive with fish of their own kind and get along okay but in a smaller tank there is always going to be more problems due to the fact that most disputes are over territory and territory is at a minimum in yor tank. Majestic angelfish can grow to about a foot in length and should really be housed in a tank that is at least 6 feet long. They are usually shy when first introduced but as time goes by they will get bolder and more territorial by the day. You may have to give it some time to see what happens. Every time you move a fish it is very stressful and moving the tang may not only stress it out but when you go to add the tang back to the tank you may find that the bullying has turned the other way and the angel may start to pick on the tang. My advice to you would be that as long as there is no bodily damage going on here to let them argue out their differences on their own until they can live peacefully together. I would also suggest upgrading to a larger tank in the future for this angelfish requires a larger tank for long term health.

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: on the majestic angel a little bit of its bottom fin is missing i think its from the yellow tang i told the LFS he said give it 4 days and everything should have calm down but im really confused? and he chases him all around the tank well only when they get close to each other. also would a flame angel go with a majestic angel?

Answer
I think that in time these two fish will reach a truce. The guy at your LFS is right. I'll give you an example. I have a four to five inch maroon clown fish. She is a b_tch! She will bite me and draw blood when ever I put my hands in the tank to clean, especially if I get close to her anemones. Six months ago I added a sailfin tang. He is about four to five inches as well. For the first week or two the tang was forced to do nothing but hide because every time he came out the clown would chase him and nip at him. I was very concerned and you could often find me tapping on the glass to reprimand the clown(it didn't work but made me feel like I was doing something!) After a few days the tang started to come out more and more avoiding the clown's territory(there are six anemones in my tank so this territory is quit large). After a week or two the tang would even start to venture closer to the clown and now when the clown tries to give the tang crap for being too close to the anemones the tang will fight back and I have even seen the tang chasing the clown around a few times. The moral to this story is that if given some time and left to argue out their disputes most fish of different species will eventually get along. This is not the case for any semi-aggressive fish of the same species or that have similar body shapes and looks. I would not chance adding any other angel to your tank. Angels of the pygmy variety like the flame, usually do not tolerate the presence of another angel in the tank and the same holds true for the larger types of angelfish. The similarity between the body shapes may cause them to look at each other as enemies and a truce may never be formed. These two fish may eventually get along in a larger tank but extreme caution needs to be taken for there is always a chance that they never will get along. Right now you are having trouble with your tang getting along with the angel you have. Adding another angel weather it is a larger variety or the pygmy may cause a whole new set of problems. The tang will most likely go after this fish as well and the other angel may start to go after it as well. This fish will have very little chance in your tank at this moment due to all the hostility already in your tank. Adding him will only add to the tension not take away from it. If you really have your heart set on getting a flame angel then wait for a few weeks to see if your tang and angel can work out their differences first. After all has calmed down in your tank and you are sure everyone is getting along then you may want to consider adding the flame angel to your tank. Just be warned that your other angel may not tolerate this new addition and you may have to get rid of one of them in order to resolve this and get some peace back. Fish of the same or similar species will often fight to the death so be aware of this potential and expect the worst but hope for the best!