arowana wont eat pellets

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Bluebarry

Exodon
MFK Member
Jan 19, 2011
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China
been straving my 25cm red arowana for nearly 2 weeks now. trying to force her to eat pellets but it doesn't even phase her every time i put them in. The only thing she ever took without issue is meal worms/ king worms. she never touched any sort of shrimps or prawns. So that takes me soaking the pellets in some sort of garlic paste or shrimp paste out of the question. I have tried to soak king worms in mashed up pellet paste but that didn't seem helpful as the pellets paste wash right off the moment they hit the water. Wondering if anyone has any other suggestions for a Aro that has only eaten king/meal worms her whole life to change her to pellets.

Thanks
 
i have a arowana that got cloudy eye from undernourishment because i was only feeding it bloodworms and my tank was not very taken care of at that time...

So i decided i would make him eat pellets unless i feel like giving him a cube of bloodworms

so i did not feed him for about a month... i would put in the pellets and he would not even notice them... i put them in once a week... then he was getting super skinny and i was worried about him starving but then i decided "you know what i will let him keep starving till he eats the pellets"

i kept at it and now every morning as soon as he see me holding the pellet container he races to the left side of the tank cause that is where the BGK is not...

(i did the same thing with the BGK and it now eats the pellets also it eats on the right side)

Sadly the arowana still has cloudy eye but i think it is slowly going away thanks to the pellets and the 50% WC every other day...
 
If your fish never ever eats anything but super worms, you are kind of screwed. In the past I had such a fish and I came up with a "plan B". I started buying 2000 live super worms at a time (cheaper price due to being in bulk), then gut loaded them on carrots for 48 hours (to get the carotene nutrient into the worm, should contribute toward a richer orange/red color in the fish), and then froze the worms in plastic bags. Then I fed the aro 10-20 of these frozen worms each day (after thawing them out). It kind of made the best of a bad situation. I kept this up for a year or two with that fish before selling it to someone else.

If your fish is under 9-10 inches you have to be very careful about feeding super worms. It can lead to internal damage to the fish stomach if the worm is swallowed whole. Many people recommend cutting the heads off the worms first. This is a real hassle to deal with.

Also, super worms can sometimes lead to a condition called protruding anus in which the fish' anus ends up stretching out and hanging out. It looks gross and is a real defect if it happens. There is no cure for the condition

Good luck with the fish. With luck you can get it to accept shrimp and pellets.
 
stratos said:
If your fish never ever eats anything but super worms, you are kind of screwed. In the past I had such a fish and I came up with a "plan B". I started buying 2000 live super worms at a time (cheaper price due to being in bulk), then gut loaded them on carrots for 48 hours (to get the carotene nutrient into the worm, should contribute toward a richer orange/red color in the fish), and then froze the worms in plastic bags. Then I fed the aro 10-20 of these frozen worms each day (after thawing them out). It kind of made the best of a bad situation. I kept this up for a year or two with that fish before selling it to someone else.

If your fish is under 9-10 inches you have to be very careful about feeding super worms. It can lead to internal damage to the fish stomach if the worm is swallowed whole. Many people recommend cutting the heads off the worms first. This is a real hassle to deal with.

Also, super worms can sometimes lead to a condition called protruding anus in which the fish' anus ends up stretching out and hanging out. It looks gross and is a real defect if it happens. There is no cure for the condition

Good luck with the fish. With luck you can get it to accept shrimp and pellets.
Click to expand...
What about stuffed feeder guppies? Those always do the trick with the picky eaters at the shop.
 
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thanks for all the idea guys, i found out he is willing to take blood worms. so im trying to now mix in pellet mash with the blood worms. then freeze them up again and cut them in to little cubes when im feeding. but some how he still kinda spits back up the pellets :( also curious on if only blood worm diet will give the aro cloudy eyes? i never heard of that

I have considered the straving method. i think i straved him around 3 weeks but even then he still wouldn't budge on the pellets.

fish right now is approx 25-30 cms .
 
my aro usually more aggressive at night. during the day he/she acts as if he wants to eat though seems shy towards attacking staple foods: freeze dried crickets, meal worms, krill, variety. won't even touch pellets till dark.

when i introduce pellets to the diet i don't starve the fish as another post mentioned aros will start to look for food on the bottom of the tank which could cause drop eye..so just decrease feeding little at a time. once aro begins to "follow you" and is trained to eat immediately that's the best time to start giving pellets - i used hikari cichlid gold sinking pellets first so he would attack it, just a half dozen or so 1 by 1. switched it then to aro floating pellets by introducing it a little at a time with the staple freeze dried food w/some hikari carnivore. keep feeding pellet amounts to a minimum until aro knows it's OK to eat..

only way other than starving your fish is just mixing it up with food he's already eating. no reason to just give pellets only anyway, better for aro to get a la carte every time! i also don't have the main inner tank lights on during feeding at night, just the corner light i dim up or down/change color etc.. at night i prefer ambient lighting from other tanks, different light strips placed in the fish room, etc that gives plenty of light in the evening w/out disturbing or making fish feel anxious or shy. it's 14"+ so only feeding it really little snack bites during the day then good eats at night before water change.
 
Try feeding crickets or something else that floats for a couple of weeks then try hikari floating predator sticks and starve him until he gives in, done this with loads of fish in the past and it’s always worked for me. Good luck, keep us posted

Just realised this thread is a few months old, hope you got it sorted
 
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