So far I’ve tried tricking him into eating pellets by soaking his pellets in blood worm and shrimp juices and letting it dry into the pellets, still won’t eat them, I think as long as he has the blood worms as an option he’ll never accept the pellets, as for worms hard to get some where I am it’s the beginning of winter here so the earth is pretty cold already lol I agree that starving the bass will stunt the growth temporarily but he’ll pick up the size later in life, with most of my other bass I tried to be patient and trick them into eating pellets by mixing there food with all kinds of stuff from shrimp to tilapia to bloodworms but in the end starving is usually the only way to go , by the end of the week they usually give in ( well my experience at least from raising a batch of kelberi bass a few years ago)Let him get settled in more and some more meat on him. Try live earth worms .Rence them off in a net then chop up to bite size and rence again to get rid of the dirt and slime the little pieces of worm will wiggle and they should eat them.
My go to food for small bass . Then you finger feed him the worms after he's eating them like it's his last meal. And after he's eating from your hand drop in a pellet . Read the sticky on pellet training. Starving small fish stunts them. . Good luck
The 5 gallon quarantine tank was set up with the water from another established tank I have, I was too afraid to start fresh with new waterBe sure to use plenty of cycled media setting up that qt tank. If you have a stalled cycle it could do more damage then whatever your trying treat and do your fish in. Monitor your parameters closely over the next week.