6 line wrasse what to feed?

M

mrflint179

New member
I have a 30 gallon reef tank wet/dry filter, protein skimmer, 2 power heads PC 65 watt 50/50 lights, live rock, xneia, varios polyps including green star polyps, green striped mushroom and red mushroom. The only fish in the tank right now is a 6 line wrasse. It has been in there a couple weeks now and I feed it flakes and frozen brine shrimp. It doesn't seem to eat out in the open is it possible it is just waiting for the food to go behind the rocks before it eats it? I know they are very hardy fish but out of all the reef fish I have had in my tank over the past several years the 6 line wrasse has been the hardest for me to keep alive! Very strang given that a madarin dragonet I had no problem with along with other very sensistive fish? I want to keep this one alive. What do you guys feed yours and do you have any suggestions? All levels are where they should be, all corals are growing properly, tank has been setup without corals for a couple years and with corals for about the last 2 plus months. It had corals in it before but I got tired of taking care of them and sold them all. Could the 6 line just be eating all my Copepods and other things off live rock and once it has depleted the supply it will start eating what I feed it? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. By the way I am new to this forum and this is my first post. Sorry for being so long winded. Thanks!!!
 
Welcome to RC.

Brine shrimp (unless it's enriched- usually with spurilina) possesses very little nutritional value. So I would skip that as a regular food for your tank. Brine can be useful in training wild fish over to prepared foods, but that's about it.

I like PE mysis as a staple for my reef. It's not cheap. But you get what you pay for.. PE lasts and the results speak for themselves. It also has a great nutritional content. I struggle to think of a fish/LPS coral that I have seen reject it. Try to find some that appear clean, with a creamy/white color- not an oxidized brown/blackish hue. Often times, frozen reef foods are not kept at a low enough temperatures and they degrade noticeably. For that reason among others, I also like to feed human grade seafood weekly to two times a week.
(Foods that have a high HUFA, protein and fat content are typically better options.) I like to dice the food into pieces- appropriate to the size of the fishes mouth that I'm feeding.. Wrasses in general are renowned for being good eaters, so you shouldn't have much of an issue.

Fresh table shrimp (diced), or prompts an excellent feeding response.

Reef Nutrition has a new product using PE mysis. For those not interested in; messing with fresh- delicious seafood, or thawing and straining frozen mysis (PE is especially oily because of the lipids), this product could be a convenient option.

Whoa. Sorry for the lack of brevity.

Spectrum makes some excellent pellet products. Once you have your fish fat and happy, using a quality pellet such as theirs is a good way to keep your water clean and still provide sound nutrition for your fishes.

Whatever you feed- keep in mind that you are adding phosphate into your water column. So keep up with water changes and running carbon/ phosphate media etc.
 
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if you want him to come out put a couple drops in with the brine. now wen i come up to the fish tank he is at the top
 
You can use a fresh clove. I prefer fresh over some of the bottled products.. I like to score the clove without cutting all the way through.Then I drop the clove in with the food mixed w. saltwater. That way you release the oils without getting chunks of the garlic mixed with your food. You want to enrich the food outside of the tank. I highly doubt that putting garlic directly into the tank is going to do anything for you.

There is a ton of debate over whether or not garlic is beneficial for reef fishes. I personally believe that fresh garlic has some benefits and I have observed proper usage resulting in an increased feeding response with numerous species. Some public aquariums incorporate garlic and other fresh herbs into animal diets.

Enriching your food with a vitamin- such as Selco/Selcon or Vitachem is probably more worthwhile than garlic in my opinion.
 
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they sel liqiud garlic for salt water. you get a turkey baster and suck up some garlic with the mysis. i have been doin this for 27 years
 
Aren't sixlines one of the easiest fish to feed? Mine eats anything I put in my tank. Pellets, flakes, cyclopeeze, DIY food, chopped seafood. They are greedy bastards.. love them!
 
They are supposed to be real easy to feed and hardy just always had trouble with them when I have had no trouble with some of the hardest to feed and keep alive! I did watch him eat flakes so maybe he is just eating the brine when it goes behind the rocks and I can't see him eat it cause he has been alive for few weeks now.
 
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