Up until a few days ago, I've been trying to feed live BBS but with so few young to feed (~35) I decided to freeze small amounts in mini ice cube trays and go with that instead. I wasn't sure initially if the fry would take them, since baby fish love to hit moving targets (the thrill of the chase). But in the past, when raising young Paretroplus using live or frozen BBS, I was able to get them "excited" about their food by creating a stronger current in the tank, by turning the air flow up some. The young, of course get blown around somewhat, but it's amazing how they can focus on snapping up their prey. It actually looks as if they enjoy (there I go again ...anthropomorphizing fish behaviors) drifting with the current, and don't seem to differentiate between a 'jerking' live shrimp, or a drifting ,dead one. Movement is movement. Well it worked mightily with these little Green Chromides. It doesn't take long before their bellies are full. They have gotten past that fragile, 'will they take it or will they not' stage, and with partial water changes (still brackish) every couple of days, things seem to be coming along. They still aren't schooling much (understandable with the current being what it is) and do tend to stay in the upper third of the water column, but are getting bigger and stronger daily. I noticed, even just after they hatched that there were a few deformed ones. Even these have been able to feed, although, understandably, they are falling behind their bretheren in terms of growth and vigor. They will be culled soon. I'm going to try within the next week or so to introduce them to finely powdered vegetable based dry food, since this species is highly vegetarian. And they still get micro worms every once in a while.
