Lionfish eating habbits.

[Lionfish Lair]

Did you get any guppies?

 

[Marinevrablic]

Yea was on guppies but their to small now.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

A healthy dwarf will never outgrow being interested in a live guppy. Especially after only 2 months of growing.

You have to train them and that often involves more than just straight up offering them frozen food. What have you tried? What kind of stick are you using?

 

[Marinevrablic]

Frozen. Krill. Sardine tails on ghost sticks. Pollock shrimp all on ghost stick and net feeding. He stopped eating guppies and wants the roseys cause their bigger. Very temperamental haha.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

Then you have to not give him Roseys, until he goes for guppies.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

What is a ghost stick? A clear acrylic stick? Can you get 50lb fishing line?

 

[Marinevrablic]

I thought roseys were better then guppies. No?

 

[Marinevrablic]

Yea I used fishing line too.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

No, Rosies are not better than guppies, but this isn't about what is better for him nutritionally, put what is better for him for training purposes. Neither is good long term and guppies are easier to train with. If your lion isn't interested in guppies, than they are too small.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

Was the fishing line around 50lb?

 

[Lionfish Lair]

This would be my plan if I were in your shoes.

Don't feed him until he accepts live guppies. He needs to be hungry to train. If he's being that selective, he's not hungry enough to be motivated. The guppies are important on a couple of points in that they are not too big and their silver bodies make for an easier transition to something like silversides. You can't train him by using a large meal. Liken it to when you train a dog using small treats for reinforcement.

The 50lb fishing line allows for enough control that it is like a more flexible, invisible extension of the stick and not a flimsy thread on the end. Sometimes I was there holding food until my arm when numb and jiggled from exhaustion. It can be a lot of work and take upward of 30 minutes a session to get them to go over. I'll get you videos or pictures or whatever you need when you get to that point, to demonstrate some techniques.

First things first, I would hand pick out some of the larger guppies at the LFS and withhold food until he's hungry enough to forget about Roseys.

 

[Marinevrablic]

Ok no problem. How can you put a silversides on a 50lb test? And silversides are huge!

 

[Lionfish Lair]

A whole silverside may be too large, but it's tail is the perfect size and an awesome transition from the guppy. There are other steps in between here, however, but we have to get him off the Roseys first.

 

[Marinevrablic]

I got guppies and he ate 3 out of 12 guppies. My other fish and eel ate the others

 

[Lionfish Lair]

OK.... the next step..... you gotta freeze a few guppies.

 

[Marinevrablic]

Ok. Why? I'm curious as to what that will do.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

It's all about trickery. They become familiar with live guppies as food and will more easily make the jump to dead if they at least recognize the food item. Then they get used to the taste and feel of frozen guppies and you can move onto silverside tails and then onto other frozen food. Sometimes you don't have to do all the steps, sometimes you have to add some.

 

[Marinevrablic]

Ok cool. So the silversides are huge right? Or do they come in different sizes. I don't think my LFS has smaller ones that look like guppy tails.

 

[Lionfish Lair]

You have to cut the tails off. They are indeed huge.

 

[Marinevrablic]

What do I do with the heads?