i got my fuzzy dwarf lion

The friendliest place on the web for anyone with an interest in aquariums or fish keeping!
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

hemmer

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Dec 25, 2005
Messages
144
Location
Polk City, Ia
went to the lfs and bought a reddish brown one and 3-31/2 inches long. does anybody keep their shrimp with them?? my shrimp is basically as big as my lion so i know the lion cant fit him in his mouth yet. but eventually ill get the shrimp out aand give him to my friend.

i also bought freeze dried krill. im gonna pick up some ghost shrimp tomorrow. i probably need a feeding stick too. do they sell them at petsmart? cause thats where i will get the ghost shrimp {much cheaper than lfs}.
 
I had a Lion Many years ago without knowing what goes with what. Well my Lion ended up trying to eat my Lemon Peel Angel fish while I happened to be in front of the tank. Pretty intersting, seeing a fish trying to swallow another thats too big. Your shrimp is toast. You need to feed it salt water fare wether its alive or not. Gold fish and ghost shrimp can cause adverse health effects as they are fresh water creatures (or so I've heard). Good Luck. :D
 
You will be surprised at the size of things a lionfish can suck down it's mouth. I have seen even dwarfs eat whole silversides that are about as long as they are. My guess is that in the next few days you won't be seeing your shrimp anymore :(. I agree with unda, feeding anything freshwater to saltwater fish isn't a good idea due to nutrition and disease issues. For the feeding sticks, I haven't seen them at any PetSmarts near where I live, however you can get a piece of rigid airline tubing to do the same thing, which I believe they do sell at PetSmart.
 
well the shrimp is still in there so ill net him and bring him to my friends house. the lfs said they were feeding him guppys. so im going to petsmart today to find something i can feed him until i can get him to eat krill and other frozen foods.
 
If he absolutely won't eat frozen foods, and you need to use ghost shrimp to get him onto frozen, then that is better than starvation :). However, some lions refuse to eat for a week or more before the finally give up and eat frozen.
 
Try Garlic Guard or some other garlic extract. I also use Selcon and VitaChem. My lion was a bit stubborn at first, but I soaked the krill and other food with that, and he accepted it. After about 2 weeks, he was eating it without the garlic extract. Now, its a trick and a half to get my trigger, porky puffer and lion to eat fair shares - the Lion tries to eat it all!!!
Good luck!
 
If I remember correctly, freeze dried krill has major adverse effects on lionfish. I avoid krill w/lionfish altogether. You are better off with vitamin injected shrimp, silversides, squid, etc. I agree with rigid airline tubing as a feeding stick...the marvels of simplicity ;) If the lionfish will not eat, I also agree in feeding enriched ghost shrimp until weened on prepared. They can be enriched with bloodworms, cyclop-eze, etc.
 
how exactly do you guys make the feeding stick out of tubing? wouldnt the lionfish see it and want nothing to do with it?
 
The Official Guide To Feeding Sticks: Skewer food onto end of clear rigid tubing. The end. Also available in hardcover :)

Although the clear tubing can be seen underwater, it has less contrast than that of a colored tubing, which allows the fish to concentrate on the actual food item than what it's attached to. Most likely you will have to convince the lionfish the food is alive (be inventive), but over time you may not need any tubing and the lionfish will just gravitate towards you when feeding.
 
It is also hit or miss with the feeding stick. For example, my snowflake eel wants NOTHING to do with anything on the end of the feeding stick. However, if I drop a silverside in the tank he will swim the whole 6 feet just to grab it. Most fish don't really care, but you will see some that will be scared of this stick. And as innovator said, with it being clear, their focus is usually on the food wiggling around instead of the stick.
 
alright cool. thanks a lot. so far everything is going good with the lionfish so im happy.
 
Back
Top Bottom