The wicked koi scopas tang is alive and well in the United States and we’ve got the first pictures of this fish from an actual camera. The nearly one-of-a-kind Zebrasoma scopas was conditioned in Jakarta after its collection in Java and has now made his way to ACI Aquaculture in Florida.
Before you haters go trolling about how ugly you think this fish is, keep in mind that these photos are of the fish being his acclimation tank for just a little over a day. The wicked koi tang probably hasn’t even yet explored all four corners of his aquarium. Naturally, after spending 24 hours in a bag in a dark box, give or take, his color is definitely ‘off’ from what it will eventually settle into.
As we’ve seen with the other aberrant scopas tangs from Java, the color tends to improve dramatically once the fish settles into long term life in an aquarium. The darker colored patches will certainly become darker and more pronounced, developing that high contrast that we saw in the fish when it was freshly collected.
The wicked new Koi Scopas tang is headed to the best possible aquarium home at World Wide Corals where he is destined to be a show animal and pet right alongside the infamous Casper the white tang. At this point Lou and Victor are probably wigging out over how cool this fish looks in person, and will no doubt be coddling it, as much as you can coddle a fish, until he is ready to go into one of their world famous coral reef display tanks.
This is just a preview of one of the world’s rarest scopas tang mutations in captivity and we’re sure it’ll only be a matter of time until World Wide Corals is ready to introduce their beloved new pet to the world. Stay tuned!
