That "lol" stuff tightens my jaws. I'm here to help folks who have problems I've overcome and get advice from folks that can help me. Ahem...
I haven't had trouble "keeping them alive," so much as they have had a tendency to live a year (or about two years in one case) and suddenly begin to go downhill. So cycling with them initially seems unlikely to me. I have a 6 year old tank that is currently at an ex-gf's of mine that I could switch out some bio-ball media with if you think it could make or break the deal. My thinking for the lack of longevity was that feeder fish and grocery store shrimp/scallops didn't hit all the nutrient requirements. Formula One & Two seems retarded to buy for a fish that eats four cubes a day and wants more.
I fed the last one (which lasted the longest) every urchin, small coral, and sickly small s/w fish the LFS was losing to suppliment the seafood and feeder fish. I may well have underfed, the bastards are always hungry, so I fed an amount that would make the belly unpinch twice daily. You can't raise enough things in a clownT tank to let them graze all day. So any of you with long term triggers... I'd love to know their diet. Or any critique of my husbandry. I've kept Moorish Idols for years at a time in a display tank at the LFS I worked for and have a track record of losing freakin' triggers!!!! Go figure.
are you sure the triggers werent cyanide caught? It's so hard to kill them through water quality. I've cycled a few salt water tanks with triggers. It could also be a diet factor. I find as long as they are arune 4inches they are hardier. the real small juviniles are more sensitive. Ive never used a clown trigger to cycle, i hae used humas , rectangle , bursa, and undulates.
I really have no idea how they were caught. Still it would seem to me that once they had lived for several months in the aquarium they would be out of the woods. Maybe cyanide can catch up with them much later, for all I know. Just seemed most likely to be dietary to me.
