Matted file fish question

[Crawdawg]

What will the aptasia eating file fish eat, besides aptasia and zoas and such? Is there regular food that can be offered? I think they are cool fish, but was told by LFS that it would starve to death once the aptasia ran out. I don't really have aptasia, as I guess that's why ppl buy them, I just think they are neat.

 

[96gts]

I had one that ate mysis, and also acans, chalice, and probably other lps.

 

[prop-frags]

I cannot imagine a Matted (Tomentosus) Filefish starving, LOL!

Ours is an Aiptasia Assasin and has done a fantastic job keeping our DT free of the pest. He is close to 3" in length now and we have had him for over a year in our SPS dominant mixed reef. He will eat any food we put into the tank including frozen mysis, brine, bloodworms, frozen algae blends, pellets, flakes, algae sheets and Romaine lettuce.

Ours has a taste for zoanthids (as does our Regal Angel) so we keep the zoa's in another tank. He does not bother other corals unless they are already damaged or are dying which is what our Regal does as well. We have acans, favia and chalice colonies in our DT which are doing well and are a few years old.

Our filefish also browses for pods and will eat small snails as do our Bipartitus Leopard wrasses.

Here's a pic of ours:
<a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/terryl93/5804894289/" title="DSC_6809 by terryl93, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2698/5804894289_1504a81669_z.jpg" width="640" height="425" alt="DSC_6809"></a>

 

[Kahuna Tuna]

Mine also eats everyting I put in the tank; mysis, fortified brine, form. 1 & 2, nsl pellets.

 

[Crawdawg]

Awesome thx. I'm just fascinated by those cute little buggers.