Attempting to trick a picky fish

[Scrappy71113]

I have an adult male red devil.
I don't know too much about his history. I do know he came from Dallas, was a breeder, and he was kept in a 30 or 40 gallon tank.

He's super playful and sweet and super picky. He literally will only eat frozen krill. I tried feeding him live foods and he wanted nothing to do with it, so now he lives with some long fin danios. I don't really like the "wait him out, he'll eat when he's hungry" method, but understand that it might be my only option. So my current plan is to thaw out all of his krill in the fridge, stuff some vitamin soaked pellets in it, and refreeze it.

I'll keep everyone updated on how well this goes.

Pic of the sweetest devil I've ever seen

 

[jjohnwm]

Congrats to your fish...he has you well and truly trained.

Who's a good boy?

You need to use the same training method my mother used on me when I was a child. At every meal, I was offered two choices: take it...or leave it.

 

[Scrappy71113]

Congrats to your fish...he has you well and truly trained.

Who's a good boy?

You need to use the same training method my mother used on me when I was a child. At every meal, I was offered two choices: take it...or leave it.

He really does have me trained
He's spoiled rotten and he knows it.

 

[FINWIN]

My Oscar had me trained as well until I came up with a solid strategy. Raised on pellets but suddenly refused them once he passed 1 year of age. That was 3 years ago and he still refuses pellets...they just rain over his head. He decided he wanted worms and/or insects. So I went through combinations of food while Sir Gourmet acted like I was running a restaurant. He wanted this, then that, then something else...depending on mood and day of the week. He went on a mealworm only kick for 6 months supplemented with reptile nutrient powder (ate about 5lbs of the stuff). So my strategy changed. I let him eat mealworms until he got sick of them. It worked!

Now he gets 2 different foods together so it eliminates the pickiness. Soaked blackworm/spirulina cubes first, then soldier fly larvae. The pellets inside other food trick only worked briefly. Brick would grab the food and carefully sift out the pellets. No fish I have can resist freeze dried blackworm cubes though, Brick included.

I would just let your Devil eat what he will until he gets bored with it. Supplemented of course. I used this to dust Brick's mealworms. He would grab them quickly so some of the powder would still get ingested.

 

[jjohnwm]

Okay I was kidding before...sort of...but I also wasn't. What is with this obsession to kiss the butts of fish that decide to get picky about food? I will put considerable effort into weaning a live-foods-only fish onto a non-living substitute; wild-caught fish in particular may need coaxing and strategic feeding strategies to teach them that non-living items are edible. But once they are eating pellets or gels or frozen or whatever...the coddling ends. You may think that you are treating your fish like kings by catering to their whims, but what you are actually doing is encouraging them to eat a diet that is not nutritionally complete...plus creating an even bigger issue if something happens that interrupts that food source for whatever reason.

Fish won't starve in a day, or a week, or even a month without food. They won't. And they won't starve themselves to death when presented with food that they have eaten before. If it takes that long to get them back onto a food that they have already accepted in the past, it's no big deal...although they usually cave much more quickly than that and start eating again. You are not doing the fish any favours by humouring its whims, and you certainly aren't doing yourself any in the long run either.

Most of my fish get a large variety of different foods...dried, freeze-dried, frozen, gel, flake, pellets, etc...and almost never get two meals of the same in a row. I don't want them to get the upper hand in the battle of wills when it comes to feeding; I want them to think they are lucky every day that I actually offer them something.

 

[Scrappy71113]

Okay I was kidding before...sort of...but I also wasn't. What is with this obsession to kiss the butts of fish that decide to get picky about food? I will put considerable effort into weaning a live-foods-only fish onto a non-living substitute; wild-caught fish in particular may need coaxing and strategic feeding strategies to teach them that non-living items are edible. But once they are eating pellets or gels or frozen or whatever...the coddling ends. You may think that you are treating your fish like kings by catering to their whims, but what you are actually doing is encouraging them to eat a diet that is not nutritionally complete...plus creating an even bigger issue if something happens that interrupts that food source for whatever reason.

Fish won't starve in a day, or a week, or even a month without food. They won't. And they won't starve themselves to death when presented with food that they have eaten before. If it takes that long to get them back onto a food that they have already accepted in the past, it's no big deal...although they usually cave much more quickly than that and start eating again. You are not doing the fish any favours by humouring its whims, and you certainly aren't doing yourself any in the long run either.

Most of my fish get a large variety of different foods...dried, freeze-dried, frozen, gel, flake, pellets, etc...and almost never get two meals of the same in a row. I don't want them to get the upper hand in the battle of wills when it comes to feeding; I want them to think they are lucky every day that I actually offer them something.

I completely understand what you're saying. I understood your joke, I laughed pretty hard at it, and I get that I'm not doing him favors when it comes to nutrition. That being said, I weened my rocket gar off of live food by tricking him into eating thawed frozen foods. It was a process, but it worked.
In the long run, I'm hoping to get this guy into eating regular pellets and not just frozen krill. I do understand that it will probably come to "you eat what you get or you don't eat" but it definitely isn't what I like to go to immediately. Especially after dealing with a jack Dempsey that just would NOT EAT and was literally starving herself to the point of visible weight loss. I ended up having to re-home her to someone who knows more about jacks and she's living her best life now.
I wish I could have gotten him as a baby. I have my Oscars, parrot cichlid, random hybrids, gourami, and goldfish eating fruit, veggies, live bugs, freeze dried bugs, frozen foods, and pellets with no complaints and I had them all since they were tiny babies. If I had gotten him as a baby, a proper diet wouldn't be an issue.
The only other fish I have that are on a more restricted diet is my gar and my Jaguar, both of which have been weened off of live food. Even when they were on live foods, I made sure to feed the food a good cichlid flake immediately before serving the poor things to my monsters.

So basically, the short of it is, i don't default to the eat or don't eat method, but I do get I might have to do it, and I understand the importance of proper diet.

 

[jjohnwm]

Sounds good to me! Please understand that I am not saying that a live-food-only fish...or even a fish that somebody has spoiled rotten on some single "gourmet" prepared food...should be trained or weaned off its limited diet by suddenly just starving it. Most of the threads on this topic refer to people taking a live-food-only fish, and starving it for awhile before dropping in a couple of pellets. This can sometimes work...maybe even often!...but there are plenty of fish that require a bit more finesse to train. It's not that they are picky or stubborn, but rather that many predators simply do not recognize non-living prey as food.

They must first (if wild-caught) be accustomed to eating at all in captivity. Once they are feeding regularly, on whatever gets them going initially, the owner may then need to try a few tricks like scenting the new food with the juices of the old, or tossing the new food into the tank during a "feeding frenzy", or mixing it with the readily-accepted food, or utilizing the outlet of a pump or filter to impart motion, or employing other fish in the tank to demonstrate the edibility of the food and spur the newcomer on...or all of the above. This is part and parcel of fishkeeping; people who think that starvation for a couple days will automatically entice any and all species of fish, especially predators, to just start showing down on pellets out of a bag are delusional.

The "take it or leave it" approach that I was half-kidding about was specifically in relation to fish that have been eating prepared foods just fine for awhile, but then get into a snit and "demand" something special. If you know they don't need live food, if they have been eating prepared stuff for awhile but now decide they want to have their vents smooched...that's a shame, but it ain't happening in my fishroom, and shouldn't be tolerated in anybody else's either. If my fish don't eat...a rare occurrence...or for that matter if their reaction to the food is in any way reduced or lessened, it's time to remove the stuff immediately and not offer more until at least tomorrow, maybe the next day. A varied diet with different foods offered at each meal reduces the chances of this ever being required.

 

[FINWIN]

Sounds good to me! Please understand that I am not saying that a live-food-only fish...or even a fish that somebody has spoiled rotten on some single "gourmet" prepared food...should be trained or weaned off its limited diet by suddenly just starving it. Most of the threads on this topic refer to people taking a live-food-only fish, and starving it for awhile before dropping in a couple of pellets. This can sometimes work...maybe even often!...but there are plenty of fish that require a bit more finesse to train. It's not that they are picky or stubborn, but rather that many predators simply do not recognize non-living prey as food.

They must first (if wild-caught) be accustomed to eating at all in captivity. Once they are feeding regularly, on whatever gets them going initially, the owner may then need to try a few tricks like scenting the new food with the juices of the old, or tossing the new food into the tank during a "feeding frenzy", or mixing it with the readily-accepted food, or utilizing the outlet of a pump or filter to impart motion, or employing other fish in the tank to demonstrate the edibility of the food and spur the newcomer on...or all of the above. This is part and parcel of fishkeeping; people who think that starvation for a couple days will automatically entice any and all species of fish, especially predators, to just start showing down on pellets out of a bag are delusional.

The "take it or leave it" approach that I was half-kidding about was specifically in relation to fish that have been eating prepared foods just fine for awhile, but then get into a snit and "demand" something special. If you know they don't need live food, if they have been eating prepared stuff for awhile but now decide they want to have their vents smooched...that's a shame, but it ain't happening in my fishroom, and shouldn't be tolerated in anybody else's either. If my fish don't eat...a rare occurrence...or for that matter if their reaction to the food is in any way reduced or lessened, it's time to remove the stuff immediately and not offer more until at least tomorrow, maybe the next day. A varied diet with different foods offered at each meal reduces the chances of this ever being required.

LOL you should have a discussion with my oscar, man to fish...none of that 'tough love' stuff works at all with him. He'll swim up and stubbornly just let pellets rain over his head. But the good thing is I'm not as easily swayed as I was at first. Pretty much now it's 'anything but pellets' so its worms/insects. My job is now easy...he gets the spirulina/blackworm cubes, then the larvae. It's all good now. On days he doesn't want anything I just come back again with the same stuff.

Of course Brick is still an oscar, which means I have to put up with some nonsense. Some days he wants to be hand fed, others not. He'll only eat on one side of the tank regardless of where I put food. In the last 3 months he refuses to eat if I'm watching. If I do he'll swim up like he's gonna eat, cock an eye at me then swim away. I can be in the room, just not looking. So I can sweep the floor or clean up in front of the tank and he'll eat. Some days I have to leave the room completely then I hear him immediately slurping at the surface. Fool fish and his goofball moods.

 

[jjohnwm]

LOL you should have a discussion with my oscar, man to fish...none of that 'tough love' stuff works at all with him.

If you say so. I really do hope you are kidding.

If he and I were to ever butt heads, I know for a fact that my approach would work for me. It's up to the fish to decide if it is going to work for him. If he is even half as smart as you think he is...do you really believe that he will cause himself harm by being stubborn? Not going to happen.

I took over the feeding duties for my dog Duke when I retired last year. We've had him for just over 4 years now, and for most of that time he has been a picky eater and considerably overweight...my wife handled most of his feeding duties, catering to his whims. Duke is now almost 15 pounds lighter and looks absolutely perfect; a blind man can see that he is trimmer, more active and more healthy than ever before.

He tried the "guilt trip" thing for a couple of weeks before relenting. Now, at feeding time he acts like he is the star in a TV dog-food commercial; eager and excited to eat his meal, every time.

Duke is a dog. Brick is a fish.

 

[FINWIN]

Oh trust me, I've got the 911 on Brick now. He gets the same food regardless of whether he eats or not. So I guess he's tired of the game too! Brick does show some excitement a mealtime especially if I wait until late (which is deliberate on my part). This allows his hunger to spike a bit, so no pickiness. And he's surrounded by greedy fish so that's been a benefit.

If I'm too late with food I get puffed at every time. But since people work and fish don't, that's just gonna happen sometimes.