Fire Eel

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M

McFall

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 24, 2010
414
0
0
Youngstown, Ohio
My LFS just got in a fire eel id say prolly 4"-5" and i am very interested in him, even asked the owner to put him on hold. I have a few questions though. I know they get HUGE and thats not a problem. I have quite a few tanks to put him in and my brother has a indoor heated pond that he could eventually get into. My first question is, what do they eat at that young of age? I heard they eat black worms( none sold around me ), frozen bloodworms(heard some dont take them), earthworms( do you cut them up?), market shrimp( i heard they dont eat this at that young of age), and i know they truly are escape artists, but what about decorations would a few fake plants and maybe a PVC pipe work?

Thank you for reading!
any other info would be great!
 
Most of them will eat worms without problem. Quite a few will eat prawn. Few will come up for krill. My large fire eel does take crayfish. It really goes after them but finding smaller crayfishes are hard. They will not eat feeder fish or pellets 99.9% of the time. If you have other fishes that eat fast that may be a problem for the eel. It will not be able to eat. You should make sure the eel eat before buying it. Sometimes they have a problem with that because they are all wild caught. The larger ones are fished with a hook and line. Sometimes the hook is left inside the eel. Overall the fire is a nice fish but too picky in term of food when you have it with other fast eating fishes. I personally prefer the tire track eel. They will eat just about anything except pellets. Buying worms and nightcrawler can get a bit expensive over time for the fire eel. Good Luck.
 
i will definitely make sure he is eating before i decide to buy him, and he would be by himself so he would get all the food
 
I think he would be a good tankmate i just love fire eels from my past experiments mines mostly ate worms then he got caught something and stared to twitch then die
 
They can be very sensitive to water quality. so make sure the tank is cycled first. they are delicate fish particulalry when small. and def watch it eat at the LFS before takeing it home, finicky eaters. I dearly miss my 3 ( which I lost to a poor choice in substrate, make sure what you use is stingray safe and you should be fine.) They can jump but I never had issues with any of my spiney eels and this as long as they had plenty of hide spots, PVC is great, as is driftwood. Once tamed they are very intelligent and bond with their owner more then any other fish I've owned. They do well with other large tank-mates that are docile in nature.
 
hi I have kept a few fires and find them very good eaters I have two one over 15 inches the other is 17 inches.I feed them cod ,prawns,worms which they take from my fingertips .When they were young I fed them blood worm and small bits of cod but I kept them in a 3 foot tank until they put some weight on and were about 7 or 8 inches I hope this help you they are really great fish
 
Pyro, my fire eel will not eat anything but nightcrawlers. I've tried other foods but he is a very stubborn eel. They are an awesome addition to the home aquarium :D. Mine begs for food and I can hand feed him. Very friendly and has never tried to escape. Pvc works great for a hiding spot. Mine has graduated to a piece of 6" pvc :grinno:.


----Chris

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