New Pics of The Lion's Den

The Gnome

New member
:bum: Hello everyone ! :bum:

I have been eagerly awaiting my time to be able to post pictures of my aquarium at home, and this is it.

It's a 125 Oceanic with Dual Durso Overflows that I call " The Lion's Den".

I hope you enjoy the pics !
 
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This is Sugar, my 7" Red & White Volation Lionfish. I raised him from a tiny baby, so he's my pride & joy !
 
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This is Tiger and he's my other Volation Lionfish. He is a full grown Dwarf Volation Lion - Look at that mouth !
 
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This is the newest addition to the aquarium. I adopted him from Ball not too long ago, and he's just starting to come out of his cave & feed regularly. I haven't actually measured him, but I would guess he's around 2 1/2 feet long. AND HE CAN BITE ! :mad2:
 
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This is a nearly full shot of the aquarium. I couldn't get any further back, due to the wall. It's a huge tank in a small room, that's for sure !
 
Sweet looking tank man! What do you feed your lions?

I 'm going to be setting up a 125 here in a month or two. Its going to be a FOWLR tank. I'm for sure going to have a lion in my tank. Those fish are so kick a$$.

Was that a porcupine puffer in the last pic?
 
Looking good ray man! You should try adjusting the white balance of your camera a little, it will make you pics less blue....
 
Great looking tank! Pretty much the same inhabitants I have in my agressive tank. Volitan Lion, Snowflake moray and Porcupine Puffer. The puffer is our favorite. They have so much personality.

Have you gotten your lions to eat anything but live food. I am having a terrible time getting him to eat anything but live minnows. I know in the long run this will kill him, so I have been trying for months to get him to take frozen krill, dried Krill or frozen Silver Sides. He just will not do it. Have you had any luck?
 
looking good Ray im realy surprised that hawk is still alive. looks like the snowflake is doing pretty good in the aquarium.

sweet tank man
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11088729#post11088729 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ReefFreak3652
beautiful fish! So you are saying you have been bitten by the eel???

I did. Im the one that sold it to Ray. The eel jumped out of the bucket and onto the floor when we were taking it out of the tank. My first instinct was to pick it up real fast and throw it in the bucket. After watching the Croc Hunter for a few years, I should have know better to pick a snake like animal up by the middle of its body. I think I tried that twice before it dawned on me to pick it up by the head, and use a towel for protection. Needles to say, I have a permanant scar on my pinky finger now. He bit me so hard, the entire area around the cut was bruised.

I now have a whole new respect for the snowflake eel. They are very peaceful, but can pack a punch when they want to. Awesome animal.
 
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=11085437#post11085437 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by jtesdall
Have you gotten your lions to eat anything but live food. I am having a terrible time getting him to eat anything but live minnows. I know in the long run this will kill him, so I have been trying for months to get him to take frozen krill, dried Krill or frozen Silver Sides. He just will not do it. Have you had any luck?



Well, I read online somewhere that if you feed your saltwater predators, freshwater prey, it shortens their life drastically. It's due to the high amounts of magnesium and even small amounts of mercury in the fish's blood. These lions aren't adapted to digest those poisons.

I didn't give up when I was rearing mine from live foods.

I attached a thawed silverside to a chopstick with around 3" of fishing line. I would loop one end around the fish, VERY LOOSELY, and I would tie the other to the chopstick. This gives the dead fish an illusion of life when you move it through the water, while maintaining it's distance from you. If you put the tip of the chopstick right in front of a pump, then it blows the fish and the line away from it. I found that works well, so you don't have to move your hand at all. At first, Sugar didn't go for it, but after a couple of days of not eating he hit it just like a bass.

You have to be careful using this method though, you dont want the line to be too tight on the bait ... just enough to keep it attached. That's the trick. You want the fish to come loose when the lion tries to suck it in.

After about 2 - 3 weeks of that, I was able to just put it on tweezers and shake it and he would go for it. Now they eat just about anything that I put on the end of the tweezers. I fed them thawed lobster yesterday ... my pufferfish loved it especially !
They just swim up to it, and eat like performing elephants in an aquatic display.

I'm going to post a movie that I made with my new camera tonight. I couldn't get a decent picture of my puffer, he never stops moving ! So I made a small video so that I could show everyone how beautiful he is !
 
Great idea Ray. I will try it. I have been trying with a feeding stick for a long time.

Hmmmm, but wait ....... no way will the puffer leave it alone. I guess I have a problem.
 
I didn't have a pufferfish when I used the ' chopstick strategy '.

If you feed the puffer to the gills so to speak, he'll probably leave it alone. Maybe not though.

Good luck!
 
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