Help catching a Sailfin Tang

anthonymckay · Wednesday at 2:18 PM

I have a sailfin that is unfortunately just too much a bully to keep in the tang. He's trashed my Gem Tangs fins, chases the foxface around, and most recently the new copper band I added.

I bought an IceCap fish trap, (acrylic box with the sliding door). For the last week I've been feeding the fish in the trap, getting them comfortable with it. Now they'll go inside it and happily chow down on mysis shrimp. I finally setup the trap door this time, waiting for the sailfin to get all the way into back of it eating, pulled the string letting the door fall, and.... He's WAY too fast for that door. I did this three times in a row. Each time he swims out before the door can close all the way. I'm quite impressed with his reflexes and speed, but now at a loss for how I can successfully get him out of there.... Any ideas?

kvansloo · Wednesday at 2:23 PM

Put some fishing weights on the door so it closes faster.

Snoopy 67 · Wednesday at 3:02 PM

Try getting up around 2AM, turn on ALL the lights & use a big enough net.
The fish are in sort of a stupor & slow to react making it a lot easier to catch.

anthonymckay · Wednesday at 4:55 PM

kvansloo said:
Put some fishing weights on the door so it closes faster.

Great idea! I’ll give that a try

OutColdCRNA · Wednesday at 4:58 PM

Snoopy 67 said:
Try getting up around 2AM, turn on ALL the lights & use a big enough net.
The fish are in sort of a stupor & slow to react making it a lot easier to catch.

did the same thing for a pair of jerk clowns. If anyone would have seen me at 2 am, in my underwear, with a red headlight on, catching clownfish, it would have made a great reefing meme hahaha