Severum Problem

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ElectricBlueSeanBurch

ElectricBlueSeanBurch

Piranha
MFK Member
Nov 24, 2010
2,987
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Panaque Paradise
So a few months ago my 220 got tired of holding all the water weight and decided to take a break. Well I lost most of my fish, but managed to save my pride and joy of a male green severum. It was the 1st fish I bought after me and my wife got together, so it has "sentimental value." Anyways he was in rough shape for a week or two. Lost most of his slime coat. His fins rotted off to the base portion. He didnt eat for a few days after the disaster, and all I could get him to eat was frozen bloodworms. The problem is now all he will eat is the bloodworms. He is almost back to 100% but he just wont eat pellets anymore. He sucks them up, chews on them for a few seconds, then spits them out. Im using hikari cichlid sinking pellets. Anyone know of a pellet I should try? Or something else to try? I even tried starving him for 3 weeks, but he still wouldnt eat the pellets. Any advise would be greatly appreciated.
Josh
 
Oh! I've seen you before. Glad your pride severum is doing okay. Hope you too and your family are doing okay. They say that it is easiest to teach an old fish this trick is if he can copy it from another fish. He did it before, he will do it again.
 
Naos1984 said:
Oh! I've seen you before. Glad your pride severum is doing okay. Hope you too and your family are doing okay. They say that it is easiest to teach an old fish this trick is if he can copy it from another fish. He did it before, he will do it again.
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Thanks for the kind words. And yes my family is all happy again. I currently have the sev in with a baby festae in a 36bowfront. The festae eats pellets, and the big sev will chase the festae off and steals his pellets, but then spit them back out.
 
Glad to hear hes all healed up. You could try the NLS therma +a. They are pellets with garlic. Garlic acts as an appitite stimulant. Or even soak your current pellets in garlic water.

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I find Tetra Prima to be the most appetising of pellets for hard-to-tempt cichlids. Usually "gets" them in the end. Certainly use a small pellet so that ther isn't any real "chewing" needed for your sev. IMO, the smaller the pellet the more likely he would be to just swallow them down.
 
hamfist said:
I find Tetra Prima to be the most appetising of pellets for hard-to-tempt cichlids. Usually "gets" them in the end. Certainly use a small pellet so that ther isn't any real "chewing" needed for your sev. IMO, the smaller the pellet the more likely he would be to just swallow them down.
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Ive been using the small pellets. And he is a very large severum.
 
If he's healthy, starve him for a week, then try pellets exclusively. You can also stimulate his appetite by raising the temp in the tank. Make sure to increase aeration if you do this.
 
When you feed him bloodworms, are you seeing normal dark feces? Is it possible the stress from the ordeal brought on a case of hexamita? This happens a lot with stressed discus and causes them to not eat or spit out food. If that's the case, you could always wait until he's 100% then run him through a week-long treatment of metronidazole. Until then, feed him whatever he likes so that he heals up completely. You can try the NLS Thera but my experience is that my severums actually like it less than regular Hikari pellets. They tend to be finicky about it.
 
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