New Dottyback not eating, any suggestions?

[Westside Guy]

I added a Electric Indigo Dottyback along with a Canary Blenny to my tank on Wednesday afternoon. There were 2 Gladiator clowns already in residence in this 3.5 month old tank. I normally feed mysis shrimp which the clowns love and since Thursday when I started feeding again the Dottyback has not eaten a bite but the Blenny has started to eat. Last night I added some Cobalt Marine dry ultra pellet sword prawns to see if the Dottyback would eat those and he ignored them also. The Dottyback is hanging out in the caves and arches of the rocks and rarely ventures out in the open areas of the tank. I realize that this is pretty normal behavior for Dottybacks but he still needs to consume food.

I would appreciate any suggestions to get him to eat. Thanks!!!

 

[elic173]

I had a orchid dottyback in my QT. They take time to settle and require a familiar cave.

Mine also would not eat. I started him on pods. After a few days he started to eat crushed flake which was injected in front of his cave.
HTH

 

[amazongb]

I've had an Orchid for two and a half years.. he's a picky eater. That said, it only likes small flakes. Try taking a pinch of flakes, squeeze between your fingers to reduce the size of the flakes to very small pieces, then submerge into the tank water (mine won't eat flakes from the surface). The tiny flakes give him a chance to eat, and the clowns may ignore the flakes because they're too small.. try to feed near his hang out location.. good luck!

 

[Westside Guy]

I've had an Orchid for two and a half years.. he's a picky eater. That said, it only likes small flakes. Try taking a pinch of flakes, squeeze between your fingers to reduce the size of the flakes to very small pieces, then submerge into the tank water (mine won't eat flakes from the surface). The tiny flakes give him a chance to eat, and the clowns may ignore the flakes because they're too small.. try to feed near his hang out location.. good luck!

I will try this tonight when I feed the mysis shrimp to the Gladiators and to the Blenny. The clowns are aggressive eaters and the dottyback just hangs out under the rocks on the opposite side of the tank from where I feed the shrimp. I was surprised that the dottyback didn’t even try to eat the shrimp as my research online said that it would.

 

[amazongb]

I will try this tonight when I feed the mysis shrimp to the Gladiators and to the Blenny. The clowns are aggressive eaters and the dottyback just hangs out under the rocks on the opposite side of the tank from where I feed the shrimp. I was surprised that the dottyback didn’t even try to eat the shrimp as my research online said that it would.

I have a maroon clown in the same tank as my dottyback, and he's super aggressive. I try to feed the maroon on one side of the tank, and I feed him first (get him busy), then feed the orchid the small flakes on the other side of the tank...it's a hectic process, but works..

 

[Pbh-reef]

I agree with above posters that it may just take time to settle in and feed. If you want to entice feeding you can try Hatching baby brine shrimp isn’t hard and doesn’t take any special equipment. If a local LFS sells black worms then those are great for enticing feeding, they must smell so strong in the water because whenever I offer them to my tank everything goes crazy!

 

[Paul Sands]

Live baby brine, frozen baby brine, or decapsulated brine shrimp eggs should always be on hand for finicky eaters like this. I’d start there.

 

[mort]

If the tank has been setup for a few months then it probably is eating but on the natural live food that's in the tank. I've not known a dottyback that didn't take flake, frozen or pellets eventually but they will happily spend all day hunting for pods or worms as it's what they naturally do. If it's captive bred then it will have been raised on a captive diet so it's should eat it in time after the natural food gets harder to find.

 

[Westside Guy]

Update: I added a garlic additive to the mysis last night and he came out from the rocks and ate a little. Hopefully I turned a corner here and he will continue to eat.

 

[amazongb]

Update: I added a garlic additive to the mysis last night and he came out from the rocks and ate a little. Hopefully I turned a corner here and he will continue to eat.

Good to hear, congrats!

 

[Westside Guy]

Good to hear, congrats!

The garlic additive made a huge difference!