how to train your dat to eat anything but live food?

[djaalix]

I've had good luck with IT's getting on massivore ..... my NGT, NTT's and AT's still refuse .... very frustrating cause the IT's all grew so fast while the others are not growing very quickly, proof that pellets are the way to go if the stubborn things will eat them!

Sent from my DROID RAZR using MonsterAquariaNetwork App

 

[skyliner]

got 4 dats a little over 3 weeks ago.. they only eat live food!! i have had trouble with feeding dats before on previous purchases and they ended up dying on me but with the recent pick up, i quarantined them in a 40g planted with over 50 platys big and small... a week later there were only 4 platys... i moved them into a 50g by themselves and dumped 10 zebra danios in there..those were gone within 2 days... the guy at the lfs told me he starved his for 3 weeks before they started eating MP. should i starve them? and if so can they not eat for 3 weeks?

correct me if I'm wrong, from what I read you're trying to convert dats to eat pellets and not eat the live food at all so you can put them with small fish in 1 aquarium, right? If you're trying to do that, you will never make it because they are naturally predator.

however, I have a little trick to train your dats eat pellets. But dats will eat smaller fish, so don't mix them with smaller fish.

here is the trick. First step stuff pellets in the frozen shrimp. At first they will eat the shrimp and spit out the pellets. That's ok, keep on doing that. For a week or two weeks. They will recognize the smell of the pellets. Second step remove the shrimp. they will ignore the pellets at first. try it for 3 or 4 days, if they still ignore the pellets, Do the first step again. Then the second step. I did this and half of my dats accepted the pellets. You have to be patient and get your hands smell because of the shrimp. Remember to pick up the pellets because it will foul the wAter. If possible try to move them to smaller aquarium because it's easy to change the water if the water is cloudy.
I did not do this again because I move all of my dats to bigger aquarium and mixed them with arowana and silver dollar.

hopefully this helps. Maybe others have easier method. Please share if you have one. Thanks.
and remember, every fish has different character. So one accepts the pellets faster than others and I don't believe dats will teach other dats to eat pellets. Each fish has to taste the pellets form them to accept pellets. And don't starve the fish for more than 4 days. They are one of the most beautiful fih and one of my favorite, got to love them.

 

[Africantigerfish]

mine doesnt want to eat shrimp and im anxious that if they will die if i continue....do you think i should gave them what theu want: blood worms?

 

[Africantigerfish]

sorry : they dont eat since four weeks...one try to eat a chunk of shrimp and spitted it...and thats it

 

[monsterkeeper87]

Mine will only eat small dead fish and sometimes fresh market prawns


Sent from my iPhone using MonsterAquariaNetwork app

 

[SickSauce]

My method. hold Frozen Bloodworms in the output of your filter sytsem, dat will associate the current with food source. Fatty up to 2" or bigger if you like, starve them while introducing dried krill same way in the current. You will have some "smart dat" take the krill or at least hit them out of reaction. Eventually they will take krill. Next step once they all smash krill introduce Hakari Food Sticks mix with krill til eventually its all food sticks. Now you can try Massivore or any sinking pellet, some dats prefer sinking pellet to floating. you will have some stubborn dats no matter what you do so be patient. I've done this with 3 batchs some baby Dats and Almost all of them are on Pellet. The ones that didnt are dead. Side note this works with pbass too. my take on MP its good stuff as treat or color enhancement but for any baby fish i have loss them to eating MP. I think some times it just didnt digest right or become a blockage. GoodLuck

 

[Pbass265]

I got my 2 on shrimp the first try and tilapia the following and now anything meaty. I still can’t get them on pellets but hoping to change that soon. My grandmother passed a few months ago and I have some peace lilies in my living room I like to look at. While watering them I noticed the 3 prong plastic thing the card was in. I got to thinking and sharpened it a bit to make the 2 outer prongs narrower then made it dull so as not to stab the fish. I put the shrimp onto the 2 outer points and wiggled it in front of their faces until they took them which didn’t take too long. Now whenever they see me they just come up to the glass to eat but I still prefer the feeder so I can make sure they both get some food. If I didn’t do this at first my acara would be the only thing eating. Hope this helps, I have lost a few fish to not getting them feeding but I don’t think I will lose one again as long as I stick to this method.

 

[NixMix]

I've got my IT eating shrimp and tilapia out of my hand. He ONLY eats out of my hand. He won't eat anything sinking in the water. Lol

The food my guy eats is dipped in pellets, nls and xtreme. He hasn't spit any of the pellets out at all.

When I first got him he was starved and neglected. Now that I have him on the MS,.tilapia, and pellets, he's improved so much! No more sunken belly and extremely outgoing!

Sent from my fishy world.

 

[NixMix]

So there I was..... two days of not feeding the fish in my 180g. I was feeding my fish some food this morning while I was having breakfast myself. My IT was pretty hungry and was begging away like he always does. I always feed him last and he knows that, too. However, this one particular instance, HE STARTED EATING PELLETS! I didn't do anything and I wasn't trying to starve him or force him onto pellets. He just took it upon himself to eat the stinkin pellets! I was totally shocked by that. He kept going to the top and was eating the floating pellets.

Hmm... that was serendipitous! He's one smart cookie! lol

 

[5am]

I currently got them eating frozen silversides that I cut into smaller pieces.. Gonna try mp tomorrow.. I hope they take it right away because they eat shrimp in the wild. Then I'll try stuffing the shrimp with pellets.. Oh I just picked up 3 thinbar Siamese tigers. They're smaller than the 4 microlepis so theyre in a guppy breeding tank to bulk up before joining the others