Rehomed watchman goby not eating

[OscarHaglund]

Hi everyone. I took over another reefers tank 12 days ago and his 5 fish have just finished tank transfer method and are in their own holding tank.
The clowns and damsell are active and I have seen them eating but during the entire process I have not seen the firefish and the ywg eat anything. They both seem lethargic and are constantly hiding. Catching them this last transfer was significantly easier which I see as a bad sign of exhaustion.

These are my first fish so I am a bit of at a loss of what to do here.
I have been feeding ocean nutrition small pellets and a home made mix if freze dried mysis, clams (boiled unfortunately), raw shrimp and tuna. In the ttm buckets i have been feeding heavily and using prime to get rid of ammonia inbetween transfers.

Any idea of what I should try? In general the feeding response has been very muted.

 

[Sharkbait19]

Is everyone else eating?
You mentioned ammonia levels - do you know what the exact numbers are?
It’s possible they have some disease (ttm doesn’t cure everything), or they may be stressed from all the moves.
Both watchmans and firefish can be finicky after being introduced to a new tank and it may be a while before they take to prepared foods. Naturally they eat microorganisms like pods.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Allow it to settle in
Was it acclimated to your tank and salinity match verified?
How is its breathing rate… rapid or normal?

 

[SlugSnorter]

Params? Other Symptoms? Places for fish to hide? Sand for the YWG? that bucket isn't good, YWG need more space than that, the rock could fall, and all that sand sitting their not getting turned over will lead to issues.

 

[OscarHaglund]

I did not test ammonia since i changed the entire 40l water volume every 3 days and dosed prime every day.
I imagine its the stress of the tank transfer, im just worried it would starve before feeling more at home.

I have seen the clowns and the springers damsell eating and they are active.

if ywg eat pods, maybe I could lift some of my chaeto from the coral QT tank, it should have a bunch of pods.

temp and salinity was matched to within 1 ppm fir each transfer to allow me to quickly dump them

 

[OscarHaglund]

Params? Other Symptoms? Places for fish to hide? Sand for the YWG? that bucket isn't good, YWG need more space than that, the rock could fall, and all that sand sitting their not getting turned over will lead to issues.

They are in a fresh tank now (as of a few hours), so params are that of the new salt mix. I was hoping of having to avoid putting sand in the whole tank since this is a temporary holding tank for a few weeks of observation. Do you think i need to? There is a cerith and nassarius snail in there as well to help with the sand and it has to be vacced.

 

[SlugSnorter]

They are in a fresh tank now (as of a few hours), so params are that of the new salt mix. I was hoping of having to avoid putting sand in the whole tank since this is a temporary holding tank for a few weeks of observation. Do you think i need to? There is a cerith and nassarius snail in there as well to help with the sand and it has to be vacced.

ohh, holding tank. there should be no rocks, sand or CUC. That is not enough stirring for the sand, its super deep too. Did you make sure to cycle the tank?

 

[OscarHaglund]

ohh, holding tank. there should be no rocks, sand or CUC. That is not enough stirring for the sand, its super deep too. Did you make sure to cycle the tank?

Why no rock or sand? Its not medicated so there is no copper.
The cuc have been QTd for 50 days at 27C so should be clean.
Half the rock is from an existing system and the other half has been cycling in a barrel with ammonia for several months.

The sand bed is deep, your right. I might want to do something about that. I was thinking that it wouldnt matter since its only a short time

 

[dale347]

They are stressed!! But I agree with the other posters about the sand. The goby especially likes to dig. It needs sand and a place to hide. Get rid of the dish, put the sand on the bottom and get more rocks. My goby will eat Mysis and rods food. I have heard others will not. Worth a try.

 

[OscarHaglund]

I followed the suggestions and poured out the sand and then added a bit more as well as some more cycled rubble rock i had laying around.

 

[OscarHaglund]

Update. The sand seems to have made the ywg happier and today I saw that his paired pistol who was in another QT tank had molted so he could be moved over. It was a but touching to see the ywg stick his head out from under a rock and see the pistol and then wuthin a few second bravely swim out to him and hover over him.

he seems to be eating now as well as I saw him sneak out and snack something when i was out of the room

 

[SlugSnorter]

Update. The sand seems to have made the ywg happier and today I saw that his paired pistol who was in another QT tank had molted so he could be moved over. It was a but touching to see the ywg stick his head out from under a rock and see the pistol and then wuthin a few second bravely swim out to him and hover over him.

he seems to be eating now as well as I saw him sneak out and snack something when i was out of the room

nice!