Angelfish and Sponges?

[Blue Ring Sting]

Hi All

Recently there has been discussions about the need for an angelfish to have sponge in its diet or not. As sponge does form a large part of certain angels diet, is this a must once the angelfish has been added to your aquarium and is accepting other foods?

If an angelfish is not accepting food will it be more likely to accept sponge if it ignores mysis, brine and any other prepared foods?

Does sponge not provide the angel with any essential nutrients and vitamins?

Any other input you may have, please include it in this post.

 

[telamont]

I take care of an emperor angel and a flame angel. Neither are fed sponge and I doubt there is much for them to eat if that is what they like. It has been almost 2 years with them. They eat almost anything though. Not sure if this helps but they may be fine without sponge in their diet.

 

[Blue Ring Sting]

I also believe that they would be fine on a regular diet of prepared foods but want to know if sponge has any sort of bonus affect on them? Also if they would instinctively go for a sponge instead of any other food? Yeah flames and emperors can be pigs and have seen them eat everything from flakes to frozen foods.

 

[dnsfpl]

my bandit treats those natural sponges in my tank as snack

once awhile he will nip, but when i drop pellets he will rush

 

[Blue Ring Sting]

So if its available he will eat it? Im trying to entice a new Multibar to eat. Thought by having sponge in the tank it would make him more likely to start eating. What you think?

 

[dnsfpl]

i have poor experience with multibar as my previous specimen survived barely a month

they nip on rocks, so i assume they prefer live pods & algae than sponges

 

[pktech]

Not sure if this can help but I think it's the individual fish - I've successfully kept 2 juvi rock beauties - a fish notorious for carrying it's own death certificate in it's pocket because of it's need for sponge & all things sponge based. Loves mysis, rods, formula2 & a little nori here & there. I want to try a multibar (poor man's peppermint, lol) in the near future!

If that multibar is hungry it's gonna eat. I understand they are a shy species that don't fare as well singly as they do in harems. If I get one, I'll attempt 3. Conversely, I've killed (4) melanottus butterflies that simply would not eat & had no competition for food - all came from a high profile distributor. I think it's luck of the draw, myself.

 

[o2manyfish]

I've had success in establishing Multi-Bars, Venustus, Regal and Colini by them surviving off the rock work of the tank, including sponges, until they were ready to start taking prepared foods. My pair of Multi-bar went over 8 weeks before they finally accepted live brine.

Dave B

 

[msmith619]

I too am on my second Rock Beauty. I have never had a problem getting them to eat. They are little pigs. My first rock beauty lived for several years before I got out of salt water for a while. My second rock beauty has about doubled in size and I've had it for three months,no sponge in the diet.

 

[Ambition]

The sponge species that various fish eat have to have some sort of nutritional profile that is beneficial to the fish, otherwise they wouldn't have it has a large part of their diet in the wild. Now the question really is, for the specimens we bring into captivity, does the variety of foods I'm feeding adequately meet the fish's nutritional needs?

Usually for the answer to be yes you need a large variety of foods, not just mysis and brine shrimp. I highly recommend incorporating things like clam, mussel, scallop, oyster, and other fresh sea foods to what you normally feed. All can be fed separately, or fed as a blend of foods. Oyster or clam on the half shell works well for grazing fish like butterflies, angels, etc. if they aren't quite taking food out of the water column. With the variety of foods offered, the chances you are meeting the nutritional needs of your fish is pretty high. Does feeding sponge-based foods hurt, no. Does it help, I'm not exactly sure. This is parallel to the debate on whether orange spot filefish need to eat coral polyps to survive in captivity...