Moorish Idol

Zanclus cornutus

The Doomed Fish (8 inches / 20 cm). Made famous as 'Gill' from Finding Nemo, the Moorish Idol is notoriously known in the marine hobby as the 'Impossible Fish'. Unless housed in a 500-gallon public aquarium, its survival rate past one year is virtually zero. They are notoriously impossible to feed, slowly starving to death by refusing almost all captive foods.

Family: Zanclidae
Origin: Indo-Pacifico
Tank use: Used in 0 tanks

Temperature

24 °C - 28 °C

8.1 - 8.4

Water type

Freshwater

Tank level

All levels

Adult size

23 cm

Care and observations

The Starvation Sentence: The Dietary Crash. They are evolved exclusively to pick at toxic marine sponges. If you put them in a glass box, they will refuse frozen food and starve. Even if you trick them into eating pellets, they lack the nutrition they need and will slowly waste away to skin and bones over six months.

The Tang Aggression: Never put them with Tangs (Surgeonfish). Tangs hate them and will relentlessly slash them to death with their scalpel tails.

Fish profile

Tank level: All levels
Adult size: 23 cm
GH: 15 dGH - 25 dGH
KH: n/a
TDS: n/a
Conductivity: n/a

Image gallery

Licensed images linked to the species or, when marked, to the closest representative taxon.

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