Carpinitis will not eat, any suggestions?

[Aquanero]

Wow he looks nice and healthy. If he pooped brown then he ate something. Just not for you to see.

Agreed, Modest_Mans Midas Shamu was on a humger strike for months and he didn't "see" him eat much of anything, obvously he did but not enough to see much growth. Long story short it wasn't until a summer heat wave got the water temp up to about 85 that the switch turned on and he started eating like he should. It may take time for him to fully acclamate but he looks good. Get the tank temp to about 82 or so and see what happens.

 

[rich_one]

Can he see you looking at him, waiting for him to eat? I have had fish that were shy for a while after being added to my tanks, and would not move so long as they could see me watching them... food or no food. But when I drop out of their line of sight, they'd go ahead and eat. Just a thought.

Couple other things... I never seen a live shrimp or small cray that a large cichlid didn't like. You can get these fairly reasonable, breed them easily, and elimimate your risk of diseased live foods. The self cloning crays are perfect for this, as they can reproduce at an alarming rate... LOL...

Another trick, odd as it may sound, is try mixing a little garlic with their foods. No clue why this seems to work, but it does.

All of that said, looks like it is probably eating... just not while your looking at it.

-Rich

 

[Danny Cannon]

not sure

 

[dlp40]

thanks everyone.

He is nice and healthy but as for the eating when i'm not looking thing i highly doubt it because i remove the food after it's been in the tank a while.

He can see me when i put in the food, and now he doesn't run for cover when i look at him(a good sign) Although he has never eating anything that i can see, pellets wise or frozen either, even when he can't see me. He does however act normal when i'm in front of he tank now, even trys to charge every once in a while.

I have tried the garlic enriched foods and i've also enfused some pellets with it, no luck there either.

I have not tried the live grass shrimp yet, but tommorrow i will. thank you( the one thing i forgot to try,LOL)
Where can i get these crayfish that reproduce so fast?

I just checked the temp and it's holding at 80*F, i'll bump it up again tommorrow and i'll try to feed him after lunch some time.

honestly i think he's eating the pleco poo. that's the only thing in there when i'm not looking. Or he could be sifting the gravel after i remove the big stuff. i've noticed him doing a lot of digging through out the tank. As he moves the gravel, he nuzzels down in the piles and does a little shimmy and shake routine. it causes the biggest cloud of debris and slit. Maybe he's stiring up some small bits of food this way. I haven't seen him snap up anything but it could be happening right?

any thoughts?

 

[dlp40]

Success, Rich-One, your idea with the grss shrimp worked. the carp ate about 7 today so far. I don't want him to only eat these but it's a good start. thanks.

I also added 6 giant danios today, the carp doesn't seem to care one way or the other so far. I guess i'll see tonight when the lights go out.

If some one could point me in the direction of a good place to get these self coloning crayfish or a good supplier of ghost shrimp, i would appreciate it very much.

thanks again,
David

 

[rich_one]

Some are for sale in this thread over at AC... I don't know this person though:

http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2570135#post2570135

You may want to pm MsJinkzd of this site. She sells all types of inverts. I don't know all of what she has, but I do know she usually has red cherry shrimp. Very easy shrimp to start with, and once you get a colony going, they breed like roaches! I don't know if she carries any ghost shrimp or self-cloning crays, but if she doesn't, and those are what you want, she can probably point you in the right direction.

Glad the big guy is eating now... awesome!

-Rich