Reef Discussion

[daniel borja]

hey guys my scooter blenny isnt doing well. he was happy and eating ever since i got him but the past 3 or so days he has been very inactive and isnt feeding. i did a test on params and everything seems to be fine. i did a water change today just incase but still no activity. ive put him in a breeder trap with frozen mysis and he wont touch it and he usually takes to it in an instant! can anyone give me advice on what is happening to him? all the other fish are happy and healthy! its just him who isnt doing great :( hope he is okay. he was my first fish and also my favourite

 

[Ian G]

I would get him out of the breeder trap as it is likely to stress it further. Sometimes a little garlic encourages feeding and helps with general well being. I just buy minced garlic from the supermarket then take a bit of the juice out and soak the food in it for an hour.

Sometimes fish just die from causes beyond our control. A parallel in humans would be things like old age, cancer, tumours. etc.

Good luck.

 

[MagicJ]

How long has it been in your tank?

 

[chimaera]

What has it been eating?

 

[MagicJ]

What has it been eating?

This is sort of where I was heading :) Scooters are closely related to mandarins and both eat similar foods. If it is a relatively new fish then I suspect that it has been gradually starving to death.

 

[daniel borja]

it has been in my tank for almost 4 months. when i first put him in the tank he was always swimming around and picking at the rocks an substrate. id feed him frozen mysis and brine shrimp eggs every second day and he go straight for that. its only the past few days that he's been acting strange. i noticed that most of the mysis i put in the breeder trap has gone so he's eating again. the only worry i have of taking him out of the breeder trap is if he dies in the tank and i cant find him because he is burrowed in the sand

 

[daniel borja]

i might give the garlic thing a try. ill put him in the tank again and out of the breeder

 

[daniel borja]

scooter didn't make it :( starting to think he may have gotten stung by an aptasia. cant see what else would have killed him.

 

[Ian G]

:(

 

[daniel borja]

might get a mandarin but ill wait a couple of weeks and get rid of that aiptasia first. dont want to take the risk of buying it and then for that to get stung too.

 

[MagicJ]

I doubt that the scooter died through being stung by some aiptasia - whilst the sting from this pest anenome will damage corals I suspect that fish would be smart enough to stay away from them if it was going to do them some damage. Malnourishment is the most likely cause IMO.

Do you have a population of copepods, amphipods, worms etc in your tank - if not then I would leave the purchase of the mandarine for a while.

 

[daniel borja]

there's a healthy population of worms and live critters in the DSB as you can see worm tracks in the sand. i turned the lights on this morning to see little tiny silverfish looking things on the sand crawling back into the sand. as for copepods, im assuming thats what he was picking at on the rocks and in the sand for the past four months. maybe he ran out of food? i did introduce a peppermint shrimp a couple of weeks ago. maybe he was left to compete with the copepod population with the pep?

would a gold head goby be okay in my tank or should i sitkc to osmething more conventional and easy like a lawnmower blenny?

 

[MagicJ]

Gold Headed Sleeper Goby's can also be difficult to maintian successfully unless you have a large and heavily populated sand bed. They will often starve to death and can also be a pain by dropping sand over your corals.

I would suggest something that doesn't rely on live food to survive.

Cheers

 

[daniel borja]

what would you recommend that lives on the sand that doesn't need live food such as copepods etc?

 

[ethana123]

gold headed sleeper gobys are the worst after the initial ooooh thats cool its shuffling through the sand thing it gets annoy as they shuffle through sand and it gets everywhere haha plus they aren't known for living long lives in tanks (lack of food)

 

[daniel borja]

why cant they all just eat prepared foods like fresh water fish. it would make things so much easier haha. considering getting the lawnmower blenny.

 

[ethana123]

whoops i was a bit late lol but as far as a replacement have a look on liveaquaria for options than ask on here. personally i think orange stripeprawn gobys are cool and i think they can be paired with a pistol shrimp

 

[daniel borja]

are they expensive? and dont they also need food like copepods and stuff?

 

[ethana123]

pretty sure they eat frozen foods and what not but yeah i think they are expensive lol

 

[daniel borja]

haha lets stick to small scale :P you can give me those kinds of suggestions when i start up a bigger tank haha. i am a uni student after all. so money is definitely an issue haha