Flowerhorn not eating

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R

rharvey1

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Jul 22, 2010
12
0
0
Calgary, AB
I have a 6" red dragon flowerhorn who hasn't eaten in two weeks. He is not acting strange, water is good and the other three FH eat most readily. how long can they go without food?

I have tried different foods from pellets to thawed shrimp, he has no signs of sickness that i can tell and has always been a good eater before. My Jaguar female sometimes goes without eating for a while but usually starts up again after a week, this one is going on three weeks soon and has me concerned. Any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
 
Well it's certainly never a good sign when an aggressive cichlid such as FH stops eating for any length of time. It's possible that it has a low grade infestation of hexamita/spironucleus. If he carries on much longer I would suggest manually treating him with a 3% epsom salt solution via a syringe. You can read more about that in the link below.

http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?339362-Treating-Hexamita-aka-Spironucleus

Bud recently brought a female back that was refusing to eat using this method.

Here is one of my females she has been very sick did not eat for 3 months.I finally got her better with soaking her food in .03% Epson salt water and injecting the food in to her belly.She has been eating frozen food for a week now and just yesterday eat some pellet.
Click to expand...


Just curious, did you buy this fish at one of the LFS in cow town, and if so how long ago? Same with your other FH?
 
I picked up the fish from a breeder here in Calgary last summer [they were about an inch then], I actually have four of them; I have two 55 gal tanks split into two half sections and one fish in each section. The one 55 has a male and female which are starting to pair off but I still keep them seperated as he tends to get a little rough with her. the other tank has two males, I think, and it is one of them that is not eating.

I will try the salt water treatment this weekend and see how it goes. I am not sure but i think i saw some white/clear mucus floating in the water during my last water change earlier this week.

Phobull, There hasn't been any changes to the tank in quite a while except for water changes
 
it has now been two more weeks and the salt water treatment doesn't seem to be doing much. His condition hasn't changed, still looks fine but just not eating. Hoping someone might have an idea.
 
Well he went six weeks without any food but has now started eating again. And he is a she and has mated with her tank buddy, I have removed the partition and they get along swimmingly [excuse the pun] no eggs yet but she is only 8" so probably not mature enough. The male is quite large [12"] with gorgeous fins.
 
Good news.

FYI an 8" female is typically plenty large enough to be sexually mature.
 
Also experience this , I bought King Kamfa yesterday . Is it normal that it will not that active yet and not eating and always stay on top of the water.
 
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