New ocellaris : finicky eaters

[pheel]

Hi all,

I'm back into the hobby after a 7 year hiatus. I had previously a reef tank from 2004 to 2008.

I bought a pair of juvenile clown 2 weeks ago. They are currently in the quarantine tank. They seem to be doing well. I had a pair of clown from 2004 to 2008 and they were, from my memory, quite easy to care of.

This time I'm a little puzzled. They refuse to eat frozen brine shrimp, frozen mysis, frozen formula 2, new life spectrum flakes. In fact the only thing they eat is live baby brine shrimp. I don't see myself preparing live brine shrimp forever!!

Any thought? Any other food I can try?

Thanks

pheel

 

[Dkuhlmann]

NLS pellets are hard for many fish to not eat. I don't have any fish that eat flakes, all of my fish eat frozen brine shrimp and frozen mysis. All fish love LRS frozen reef food.

Brine shrimp alone will not sustain your clowns they will slowly starve. Look at it like eating potato chips as your only food. Try the NLS pellets and depending on the size of your clowns which pellet to get. There is a 1mm and a .5mm so if your clowns are very young get the .5mm

You can also get Selcon or garlic to add to the other food you have. It may get them to eat it

 

[ginpang]

Maybe frozen Rotifers or cyclops!?

 

[leemosh]

Are you treating them with anything in the qt tank? Some treatments may cause them to lose their appetites.

My ocellaris pair are such pigs, they eat just about anything. A bit of Selcon with some frozen food is usually enough to get my more finicky eaters to eat, I would try that first. Do you soak your pellets before feeding them?

 

[pheel]

No treatment yet in the quarantine, don't need so far. They go crazy when i put food in the tank they just ignore anything but baby brine shrimp. I'm just bored of hatching those.

I tought about cyclop, need to find a lfs that stock them.

Any other trick is welcome

Thanks

 

[pheel]

Also I tried garlic and Selcon

 

[pheel]

Cyclops worked

Now I have another issue. The smallest one was the most active, but now he is bullied by the biggest one (both are quite small tough) and got very shy.

I'm tempted to put the biggest one in the DT...I was to leave them another 2 weeks in quarantine (which is a 10G tank)