Purple queen anthias

[Acronuts1]

Hello everyone,

I am interested in keeping a small harem of these gorgeous fish.
I know very little about them and want to find out as much as I can.

How many I can keep in a 180g reef tank?
Besides mysid shrimp what else will they need to eat?
Is there an area that these fish come from that are healthier than others?
Will they fight any exsisting anthias in the aquarium?
Are they ok with the brighter metal halides than lets say t-5's?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Anonymous]

Hello everyone,

I am interested in keeping a small harem of these gorgeous fish.
I know very little about them and want to find out as much as I can.

How many I can keep in a 180g reef tank?
Besides mysid shrimp what else will they need to eat?
Is there an area that these fish come from that are healthier than others?
Will they fight any exsisting anthias in the aquarium?
Are they ok with the brighter metal halides than lets say t-5's?

Thanks in advance!

I'd avoid them. They are probably the hardest anthias to keep alive long term in an aquarium. If you've kept all the others before with good success, give it a shot but know that you will need to come up with a way to feed them 5-6 times a day, minimum.

IME they won't eat mysis, even live mysis, for several months if ever. They tend to go for smaller prey in the range of cyclop-eeze, live baby brine, and fish eggs in the beginning. You may be able to wean them onto a small mysid like the kind Hikari sells but that will be a long term goal. You'll need to come up with other food items in the beginning. If you're determined to do it I would recommend a ready supply of these small food items before purchasing.

They are low on the aggression hierarchy for anthias. I've kept them with ventralis, dispar, and lori's without problems. Randall's, parvirostris, squamipinnis, et al will pester them a lot. Keep in mind they should be QT'd before adding to a display tank. They arrive weak, stressed, and starved at your LFS after a few weeks of being held in bare holding tanks, shipped in bags, etc and likely not fed the right type, amount or frequency of food along the way.

HTH