Getting my fish to eat??

Have you tried using a couple live feeders like I told you last time I talked to you? Guppies will work the best, otherwise try rosy reds. Also, you've only had the puffer for half a day, how can you say you can't get it to eat? Both of those will go after the feeders unless the trigger gets to all of them first! Maybe try 5 or 6 guppies and see what happens. I'll talk to you later about some other ideas.

 

Adam is right try getting them to eat live feeders first. it will be easier to start off that way. I had pretty much the same fish, and I feed them live feeders for a little while at first to make sure they were eating. Just don't over do it. Try the raw shrimp now and again, cause feeding live is very dirty on the tank with alot of Nitrates. Not that raw shrimp is much better, but is better for the fish health.

Troy

 

Yes use the live feeders to get them eating and do everything possible to change over to frozen/dried. The main problem with live feeders is we can only get freshwater feeders around here and they don't have the correct nutrients for our sea life. So you definitely don't want to do it long term. You can even got to walmart or petco and get minnows for .10 each. Another thing to try is freeze dried krill as it is like fish crack. BUT VERY Important, do not feed only freeze dried krill long term. It also does not have the correct nutrients and has a very negative effect that can kill you fish especially Lions and Puffers. I have personal experience with this issue. Its hard to do though because they love Krill!
Your tank is a snapshot of my agressive tank. I have all four of those fish.

 

Hey Brandon, when you stop over tonight, I have some dried krill you can have. You can give that a try.

Also, I don't know if you can handle something like this or not, but freshwater guppies and mollies can be slowly acclimated to saltwater. They will breed regularly, but not as fast as they would if they were in freshwater. You could setup another tank to hold them and feed the babies to the fish! It's no short term solution, but it's something to think about in the long run...

I was thinking about starting up a frag tank and putting a couple mollies in there to see if I could get them to breed, but I think I'll wait til I move to the new place in December when I have more room.

 

I agree with jtesdall? Ive had all of these fish before and another thing ive found they really like are freshwater ghost shrimp. You dont want to feed just feeders because they dont have the correct nutrients. If your going to feed say goldfish or guppies i would go with guppies because they dont have as much fat content as goldfish which can be bad to. The same goes for ghost shrimp as their not as fatty. If your feeding feeders another thing you can do to get them more of the correct nutrients is to gut load the feeders. What i mean by that is to give your feeders or shrimp a good marine food right before feeding your lion or pufffer. This way it helps get your fish more of the correct nutrients. These are great fish to keep. Ive had several over the years and always really enjoyed them! Ive been thinking of setting up a prdatory tank as i really miss haveing these fish especially the lions and puffers.

Hope this helps Brian

 

Good advise all. Keep trying different stuff and you will end up with a nice healthy variety. Once they start eating I would think the hardest to feed would be the eel. You might need a feeding stick to use for it. A small dowel and a pencil sharpener will work. They are all a bunch of pigs. I had a similar tank and once in a while I would even feed thawed out frozen squid from the grocery store until they were all stuffed pretty well. It is cheap food. My lionfish at the most. It is very messy though.

 

I have used a piece of fishing line, tied it around prepared foods, and "jigged" it for the fish. I have coaxed a couple less aggressive fish to feed this way.

 

zoo med does make 10" stainless steel feeding prongs, which i have always had good luck with. when you switch to prepared food start with freeze dried krill in beging as they look a little like roseys and they float. Then you tap em with the feeding prongs causing a bobbing action. Best part about the prongs is that most eels almost need to be hand fed as the other fish wont let them get any food.

 

i would try some arcti pods by reef nutrition and if not that. Hate to say it so dont get mad. Find a frag of a known coral or something to that matter that they are known to eat..

 

good to hear it is eating. Are you still having luck with the little guy?