Blue Spot Jawfish diet

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Enyo

New member
So I've had my BSJF for about 3 months now @77.5F and he shows NO signs of BSJFDisease or stress. The problem lies in the fact that he is an extremely picky eater! I've found that he only eats Ocean Nutrition brand foods (RDF Formula one, Spirulina formula, and Angel Formula).

PEMysis - Hates it, tries to fight it.
Spectrum pellets - invisible to him
Flakes - Hates it
Fresh sea food - Hates it
Every other frozen food - Hates it

Is my jawfish going to slowly die from malnutrition if he only eats crappy frozen foods?

If anyone that has kept one long term could chime in on diet / health related advice in giving BSJF the optimal environment it would be greatly appreciated as information online is inconsistent and unfounded. By no means am I abusing this animal, just wanting 100% opposed to 98%.
 
Congrats on your success so far. I've read that you should chop their food up into tiny bits, but I watched mine eat a yellow clown goby whole, though he did spit him back out. YCG's supposedly have a bad taste, so I assumed it was that. There are lots of other foods you can feed to give a wide range of nutrients. Most fish can't resist frozen cyclopeeze or reef caviar.
 
It's frozen unprocessed Icelandic capelin roe from a company called H2O. I assume unprocessed means it wasn't dyed orange (?). It's sold in cubes as fish food instead of big chunks like at the Asian market.
 
I feed mine PE Mysis, Mini Mysis, Spirulina Brine Shrimp, all soaked in Zoe. What I have heard is the collection of Blue spots is getting better, so the survival has gotten better.
 
We have had our guy for about 6 months now and feed Rods Reef, he takes what he likes out of that. So far so good, we adopted him from another local reefer and had to treat him for skin problems. After the treatment he perked right up and has been doing very well, behavior has been perfect.
 
Thanks everyone for the input. In the future I may try to feed Rod's if I can get my hands on some locally.

Has anyone noticed "sleep drifting"? I saw in another post after searching google that someone described their jawfish sleep swimming/drifting in the early morning and acting "lost" when the lights came on. I woke up to mine doing this a week ago and thought he was acting strange. Simply guided him to his hole and he was fine.

I'm uploading a video on Youtube and will post it when It is done, for those of you curious to see mine!

EDIT- here is the link to another reefcentral thread mentioning sleep drifting half way down the page (post 42).
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=12162703
 
Just wanted to add, I assume you've made sure your tank is well covered, if not make sure your tank is well covered :)
 
Angel*Fish said:
It's frozen unprocessed Icelandic capelin roe from a company called H2O. I assume unprocessed means it wasn't dyed orange (?). It's sold in cubes as fish food instead of big chunks like at the Asian market.
Click to expand...

thanks Marie. I feed capelin roe, just never have seen it in that form.
 
Angel*Fish said:
Just wanted to add, I assume you've made sure your tank is well covered, if not make sure your tank is well covered :)
Click to expand...

Haha, yes it's covered well with a DIY 1/4" clear mesh from BRS. I have a Helfrichi firefish and Mystery wrasse as well so I took no chances.
 
Enyo said:
Thanks everyone for the input. In the future I may try to feed Rod's if I can get my hands on some locally.

Has anyone noticed "sleep drifting"? I saw in another post after searching google that someone described their jawfish sleep swimming/drifting in the early morning and acting "lost" when the lights came on. I woke up to mine doing this a week ago and thought he was acting strange. Simply guided him to his hole and he was fine.

I'm uploading a video on Youtube and will post it when It is done, for those of you curious to see mine!

EDIT- here is the link to another reefcentral thread mentioning sleep drifting half way down the page (post 42).
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=12162703
Click to expand...

I'm at four years with mine, mine also attacks PE Mysis but then eats it. Its hillarious. He also eats flakes (formula 2, Spirulina, Some angelfish meaty flake... all are the same brand which is escaping my mind) brine, hikari mysis, and NLS pellets. Mine seemed to only eat the crappy food at first but now is eating everything. As for sleep drifting, I believe that is when the fish is uncomfortable with its current burrow or it feels threatened in that area. I think its simply looking for a new area. Mine did this for the first two weeks and slowly stopped. A deep sand bed can help is what i observed, my fish is burrowed in 7'' of sand. Lastly, offer your jawfish small shells about the diameter of their heads (you can find these on a beach or maybe you can by them) drop them close to the fishes burrow. The fish will use these to reinforce their burrows, one bigger shell will be used to cover the entrance to the burrow at night. Mine will literally shut itself in at night. After my fish got settled in, it ate healthier food.
 
Reppo13, what temp do you keep your tank at? I've been keeping mine at 77.5 mentioned above but I have a feeling it might get up to 79/80 on the hotter days to come. I have an in-window AC in the same room but I know my roommates will turn it off behind my back one of these days or I'll not be home to monitor.

Information on temps in the Sea of Cortez, more specifically where BSJF are collected, is very "he said she said" and inconsistent. From the information I've gathered, it's not just cooler water but the fact that the range is so wide. 60's in the winter to 80's in the summer months or something similar.
 
You can get a list on longitude/latitude sitings on fishbase.org and compare that to temperature maps. That may be what Robert Fenner based his recommendations on since he specifically refers to it when recommending cooler temps. They have varying temps through the year. Warm summer and cool winter. We know they are ok with hot temps for a while, but whether it is good for them long term is still the question.

Philter4 who personally collected them made it pretty clear that collection was the biggest factor in the initial period.

I think the difference we're seeing now is hobbyists stopped buying bsj's and the collectors responded by doing a better job. Everybody please remember to make your voice heard with your fish purchases. That means only buying fish with low success rates like bicolor angels from a trusted source. As long as we keep buying poisoned fish, they will keep poisoning them.
 
Enyo said:
Reppo13, what temp do you keep your tank at? I've been keeping mine at 77.5 mentioned above but I have a feeling it might get up to 79/80 on the hotter days to come. I have an in-window AC in the same room but I know my roommates will turn it off behind my back one of these days or I'll not be home to monitor.

Information on temps in the Sea of Cortez, more specifically where BSJF are collected, is very "he said she said" and inconsistent. From the information I've gathered, it's not just cooler water but the fact that the range is so wide. 60's in the winter to 80's in the summer months or something similar.
Click to expand...

Thats the exact temp that mine is at now, I will say that when I first got the fish it was the first in the tank and I started the temp pretty low at 74-75 then I slowly went up over a month of time. All this put together and this is where I'm at.

I will also add that I have had failures with this fish, Angel Fish is definately right, collection is important. I will also say the more peaceful your tank is the better. These fish are so sensitive and will jump relentlessly. My first BSJF manage to squeeze through centimeter hole by my overflow... the only hole in the cover. It took time before one of these fish pulled through the three month mark.
 
Another factor to consider is how you feed the fish. If I blow the food right at the fish it dives into its burrow and won't really eat it. Also if my other fish are diving at the food it will be out competed for it. What I like to do is baste out a cloud above the burrow and over so the flow can slowly take it over to the fish and allow it to pick the food out it wants. Basting some food in first so the other fish are well fed also helps out.
 
I was able to get my bsjf to eat from my hand. I would feed a cube of fozen mysis. I sadly lost mine after 3 years due to negligence on my part. I sure miss him, he had a lot of personality. My blue also had an intrictae tunnel system. He had 4 burrows all connected and would go in one and pop out of another.

I just placed an order for 1 through divers' den and looking forward to getting him.
 
basser1 said:
I was able to get my bsjf to eat from my hand. I would feed a cube of fozen mysis. I sadly lost mine after 3 years due to negligence on my part. I sure miss him, he had a lot of personality. My blue also had an intrictae tunnel system. He had 4 burrows all connected and would go in one and pop out of another.

I just placed an order for 1 through divers' den and looking forward to getting him.
Click to expand...
He sounds like a happy jawfish. If you don't mind, what type of sand did you use and what other tankmates did he have?
 
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