Lyretail Anthias?

[DuganBolt]

Hey all have taken part in this forum in the past under a defferent name but I forgot the password and and the screen name. Any way I recently bought four lyretail anthias from a local fish store. Luckily for me he IDed them as some type of basslett and sold them to me at $6.50 a pop, four females. I had some lyre tails four years ago and I remember that they take some work and some time to induce them to eat. I used Zooplankten, several times a day, in the past and that seemed to work fairly well. I was wondering if you all had any other suggestions or ideas to help get them to eat. A little info they are in a 92 gallon tank with 2 percula clowns, a diamond watchman goby and at this point a all soft coral reef. Water conditoins are perfect and they have been in the tank now for 32 hours. I tried feeding them some live ghost shrimp tonight, which they showed no interest in at all. Thank you in advance for your help and your time.

 

[SkiFletch]

The guys at my LFS that have a display tank full of various anthias feed them frozen brine, mysis, and roe (fish eggs from an asian market). Things GOBBLE it up

 

[DuganBolt]

Thanks for the tip , I am a chef and I have some Salmon roe at the restaraunt I will try that tommorow.

 

[Chac]

My Lyretils used to eat just about anything I added to the tank from Flake to Frozon, of you are having feeding problems try Mysis

Remember that Anthias need fed every 3 - 4 Hours & that one of your Females will become a Male soon - make sure to get soem pics of the color/body shape change

 

[DuganBolt]

Thanks all for all of your help. It has been two weeks since I introduced them. The numbers have been reduced to three . One commited suicide by ramming the glass several times and my girlfirend had no clue what to due. The other just didn't acclimate. So to date I haven't seen any of my fish eat. I have tried Mysis shrimp, live brine, frozen brine, zooplankten and even fish roo. They have to be eating something even though I have not witnissed it. They aren't very active only to come out for about a half hour at a time a couple times a day. I assume they are eating some of the live brine but I am baffled with these fish. The only thing I can think is that since they are schooling fish they are not happy for several reasons. My first theroy is they are hidding all day because they don't have a male. I puchased five females because I wanted to witness the sex change and take a ton of pictures. They just have no direction till they get a strong buff MAN in there lives. My other theroy is that since there is only three of them that they are shy because of there numbers. I can't wait to hear your thoughts on this mystery? Because I am stumped

By the way in way did I mean to offend any one by the MAN comment I am just having a little fun

 

[SkiFletch]

Well, I'd be very concerned if I were you since as Chac mentioned, most anthias will eat anything that remotely resembles food. Something is not right in the tank if they're not eating. What are your water stats (pH, sg, temp, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate)? What other inhabitants do you have in the tank? How big is the tank?

 

[DuganBolt]

The tank is a 92 us gal bow front with 75 lbs of live rock, About six caves perfect for hiding. My water paremeters are right on the money with my SG 1.025 Ph 8.2 Alk 2.2 Ammonia nill and both Nitrate and Nitrate are close around 1. I preform a 5% water change once a week and every other week its a 10% change. The tank inhabitants are 1 Toadstool leather, a bunch a mushrooms, 1 kenya tree coral, and a condi anmone thats thrived in the tank for 3 months. As for fish I have a diamond watchmen, 2 black percula clowns, and the three Lyrtail Anthias in question now. There is also a cleaner shrimp which shares tha Anthias cave. I am very worried because in the past my previous Anthias ate like champs. I know these lovely ladies are feeding it is just a question of what and when. All three of them and look very healthy and well fed which is baffaling me. I am taking a smaple of my water down to the nearest LFS where I can get so more extensive testing done on the water.

 

[SkiFletch]

Huh, dunno what to tell ya then

 

[DuganBolt]

I appreciate the help this one definately has me scratching my head. Do you think they are passive because the school is small? Or perhaps because they don't have a male to lead them?

 

[DuganBolt]

Well all I just wanted to share some good news with you all. My three lovely ladies finely started to take some food in front of me. I ran a grilled swordfish with a honey orange teriaki sauteed baby bok choy and coconut basmatti rice. Any way while cleaning the fish I had the skin, blubber and a little meat left on it so I decided to shave it and take i thome. So I diced it really fine and I mixed it with some Sweetwater Zooplankton. The second the mixture hit the water all three of the Anthias came out of the rock and they went to town. I can't tell you how happy it was they finally ate. Now they are eating the Zooplankotn by itself and of course a little several times a day. The kicker of this whole scenario is that they ate the day before my next scheduled water change, they get their courage to eat when I have my worst water conditions during my month cleaning cycle. Thanks for all of your help.