fattening up rays... for those with experience

[omojena]

when a ray is in quarantine and is finally eating well (which means that her belly is full and you can see the hump and its there everday, i.e. not digesting 100% of all the contents of the belly before the next meal is given) how long should one keep "fattening" her up before introducing her into general population in the main tank?

FYI:
my ray in question is a flower ray female going into a general tank with 1 male flower and 3 female motoros and 1 male motoro. the male was in quarentine with the female but he began to eat shrimp so i thre him into general population and he is FLOURISHING!!!! im not sure if i should keep fattening her up for a few more weeks or just throw her in and see what she does?

any educated and experienced advice would be MUCH appreciated.

thanks

 

[skynoch]

I would make sure she is eating what you are feeding in the main tank aggresively and not showing any hip bones or signs of malnutrition and then introduce her. During this introduction time I would overfeed a bit till everything looked good and you could see how the rays where dividing up the food. Also if your feeding shrimp cut it up and spread it over the tank to allow the flower to get some first.

 

[biggfish]

Sometimes, I feed the other fish first so they are less aggressive when I am feeding the newbies.

 

[omojena]

bump

 

[Nic]

break the ray till its on other foods... a good idea is to get that ray eagting something the other rays are not... gives it a advantage during the first few weeks...

 

[skynoch]

break the ray till its on other foods... a good idea is to get that ray eagting something the other rays are not... gives it a advantage during the first few weeks...

Works good with most rays but I think it would be a little tough with a flower. It's sometimes hard enough just getting them on shrimp.

 

[omojena]

very good idead but this damn ***** wont eat anything but live night crawlers/ghost shrimp/feeders/black worms. the male took some shrimp and i threw him into general population and he learned to eat 3 new foods in 5 days. i was thinking the female might follow his lead!>???

 

[Nic]

only one way to find out.... keep the other tank cycled incase she gets the crap beat out of her...

 

[omojena]

thats what i was thinking... i just have a gut feeling that she will just go on a hunger strike for worms!!

im going to give her 2 more weeks to fatten then im dumping her ass in!

 

[skylineiz]

yeh that sounds good! fatten her up 2 weeks is plenty!

what do u feed in your main tank? maybe try mixing half /half with main tank food and what she likes.

if she doenst eat in the other tank, starve her for a bit too , end of the day she has to get onto the maintank food type ,

is it pellets?

best of luck, mate(Y), she should be fine!