new to board, dovii question

[pcfriedrich]

I was gonna say you just need to spend time with him, and try to keep unneccessary traffic around the tank to a minimum. You got it, though. I bet if you take him off flakes for a while, he'll go buck wild on live feeders.

 

[michaeljames]

ya the flake was an experiment/accident actually. I was feeding mysis flakes to the africans and convicts he was SUPPOSED to be eating and he started eating it. I'l be damned if I have a flake eating dovii though lol I'l continue to stuff the tank with cons, rosies and africans and he can sort it out. I know he wont starve to death from being stubborn. I've had some very hard headed fish, some wild some just well fed and I've never had a fish die from starvation, they all learn the routine in a couple weeks

 

[scubasteve06]

actually being on pellets at a young age will make it much easier for him to stay on them as he gets older I'd just start adding some meatier foods in there after feeding the pellets so he gets a taste for it...trust me I had one for almost 2 weeks and in 2 days he went from shy to hating anything and everything...also went from a timid eater to only eating small small pieces to stuffing his whole mouth which even on a 5" dovii is pretty impressive if you wanna see some teeth.

 

[WildCAught]

Your boy sounds like a little monster. If you are really planning on keeping your Dovii Long term you need to keep him on flakes (while he still eats it) and pellets. It's gonna be expensive feeding an 18-22 inch monster live food. Aside from that, feeders have almost no nutritional value when compared side by side with some good cichlid food. You'll get way better color/growth out of him and reduce the risk of disease.

I doubt he's wildcaught but the fact that he eats flakes doesn't indicate he isn't. Many cichlids are collected at Fry size and raised on flake and frozen food.

Good luck!