How do I feed my GSP?

[nx2ured]

I am still a bit confused about how I am supposed to feed my GSP. I have snails in other tanks, but when I drop them in, he ignores them and they end up dying because of the salt in his tank. I have tried krill...he nibbles on it and then ignores it as well. I know they like live food, but what in the world am I supposed to feed him? I am already freaking out trying to keep the SG where it should be in his tank. He is about 2". I have had him for about three weeks now. Any help is greatly appreciated!

Lisa

[Idontknow]

Initially when I fed my first snail to my GSP, I had to crush it and then wiggle it in front of his face so that he knows that it is food. Then drop them in. You may need to hold them with tweezers and let him take a few bites out first.

I highly recommended bloodworms. My puffers all go crazy for frozen bloodworms. Hikari puts out some that come in individual cube trays. Just pop them out as needed. I cut up a cube (its too much for them, they are still small) and defrost it in tank water and then drain the water. Then give it to them. Yesterday, I was teasing my F8 by holding the worms with a tweezer just above the water. He wanted so much that he jumped out of the water and grabbed them. I was so surprised.

I also had to hold ghost shrimp for my puffers because they were scared of them. But, now they know its food and go after them.

[Pufferpunk]

Please check out the feeding articles in our Library.

[MatthewLaw]

I use frozen mysis shrimp and ramshorn snails.

for the frozen shrimp, I defrost the shirmp and give most of it to my SAPs and the rest to my F8 in his brackish tank. I put the snails in a newspaper and crush them. 6 days a week, i feed the puffers the snails in the same area of the tank. the puffers actually start to pace up and down the tank when it is feeding time! the puffers gobble up the snails i think your issue is the snails are too large for the puffers and therefore they ignore it.

[nx2ured]

Thanks all. I bought some frozen bloodworms today and I will definately try the crushed snail thing! Again, I really appreciate the advice!
Lisa

[marksrush]

Like Pufferpunk says, there are some excellent articles in the Library that will help you a lot. The best thing any new puffer owner can do for themselves and their puffer is to get comfortable in front of the computer and spend several hours reading everything you can on this site.

One of my GSPs really loves fresh oysters and black mussels on the half shell, whereas my smaller one will only eat small bits of them. (You can freeze the leftovers.) They like fresh shrimp, too, so maybe you can try these out on your puffer. Seems weird that he's not going for the snails, that's supposed to be their favorite food in the wild.

[Pufferpunk]

Be sure to defrost the frozen worms in a cup & drain off the "juice" or pour thru a brine shrimp net.