only eating snails.... (w/pics)

[luna1580]

so i've had my f8 for over a month and s/he seems happy/healthy -good color, not too thin, not much pacing, explores whole tank, etc.

the LPS had several f8s including this one for about a month and a half before i bought her. they were housed with many ghost shrimp of all sizes and were being fed frozen brine shrimp daily and pond snails from the plant holding tank weekly...

so i bought some brine shrimp in case i needed a "transitional food" as she adjusted to her new home (but i now know they are a nutritionally poor food), and about a dozen of the ghost shrimp.

she lives in a 20g long and current salinity is about 1.003 with live plants and 4 neon tetras (which i wouldn't mind if were eaten, i just ran out of tanks for them during some rebuilds). she hasn't yet touched or chased the tetras or a male guppy that was in the tank until yesterday (i fed it to my RES turtle), and has never appeared to chase or eat the ghost shrimp. none of the shrimp have "gone missing" and 2 of them are now well berried -and they can't feel too much like prey if they're breeding!

the thing is, she seems to only want to eat snails lately. i have a dedicated ten gallon for pond snails and cherry shrimp (3 of them are now berried too, i hope to try feeding them to puff after the numbers increase), and i have just added some red ramshorns to breed in there as well for feeders. that tank gets (as needed) hikari algae wafers, some tropical flake, things like blanched napa cabbage, and they nibble on any algae or damaged plant leaves in there. does this diet mean the snails/shrimp count as gut-loaded?

and those snails are all my puff wants lately. she also took 2 little bites out the foot of a large apple snail i put in her tank for a trial, and appeared very excited about it. it did take her about 4 days to attempt to eat the golden apple snail (BTW, it's nearly as big as her!) but then i removed the snail right away -it was far too big for her to kill, just nip and maim which seemed very cruel... i quickly put the apple back in the breeder tank (it will recover, eyes and tentacles all intact and the mantle will regenerate quickly..). but that made me wonder -do they have a "learning curve" to discover that a new live food is in fact a food?

and she used to eat frozen and thawed head-n-shell on shrimp about an inch long but now ignores them. she has also ignored other frozen and thawed shellfish (mussels, clam, etc.). she won't touch anything freeze-dried and rehydrated (even w/garlic soak). i plan to try some blackworms, bloodworms, or occasional earthworms asap, but can't find any in my area just now (may need to drive to the city or something).

should i be worried that the puff isn't getting appropriate nutrition right now?

[J-P]

snails are excellent nutrition. I'd be more worried that they will consume more snails than you can breed

[Pufferpunk]

I believe RTR fed a 90% snail diet to his F8s.

[luna1580]

very happy to hear s/he'll be okay on this "sweet snail diet" for now! i think i'm breeding enough for her needs currently, and the ramshorns haven't yet started breeding, and if i need still more i will add a female apple snail to the now recovering male and hatch the egg clutches on a bit of anchored floating styrofoam right in the puff tank (i used to breed these, so i think i can make that work), i'm sure that the hatchling-maybe 2+ month olds would be perfect f8 eating size......

here is the current tank lay-out(sorry, night-time shot). she seems to enjoy all the plants and i threw in a few ramshorns to see if they breed in tank/get eaten

[luna1580]

and the puff, hopefully. i'm having a devil of a time getting my jpegs under 256kbs.... i thought one of these was now shrunk to 'round 120, but it still came back "file too big"....

[JRC3]

Good looking F8 and it looks like he has plenty of room.

If you don't want the neon tetras then ask a local pet store if they will take them. Some stores will even give you a little credit for them.

Good luck.

[luna1580]

thanks for the idea on the tetras. i know that the puff tank is not the best for them simply because it is now light brackish and has the opposite of the more acidic and soft water they ideally enjoy....let alone if the f8 decides to hunt them down for dinner!

it's not that i want to get rid of them exactly, they add a very nice splash of color to the puff tank and do seem ok for now -they cruise all around the tank solo in addition to hanging out together, so they're not doing that "stressed tight, protective schooling" thingy. i just wanted to be clear that i know they could one day be eaten w/out warning.

but i don't want them to be cruelly terrorized by puff or the water conditions either. how about if i remove them as soon as they show stress signs or puff tries to nip them? i want to be ethical towards them of course, but if i did give/trade/sell them to a LPS they'd likely be resold with the whole "they only live a year or two" concept of their care anyway. i say LPS as i have yet to find any local shops that specialize in fish. anybody know of some in the western chicago suburbs (i'm in naperville)?

[JRC3]

thanks for the idea on the tetras. i know that the puff tank is not the best for them simply because it is now light brackish and has the opposite of the more acidic and soft water they ideally enjoy....let alone if the f8 decides to hunt them down for dinner!

it's not that i want to get rid of them exactly, they add a very nice splash of color to the puff tank and do seem ok for now -they cruise all around the tank solo in addition to hanging out together, so they're not doing that "stressed tight, protective schooling" thingy. i just wanted to be clear that i know they could one day be eaten w/out warning.

but i don't want them to be cruelly terrorized by puff or the water conditions either. how about if i remove them as soon as they show stress signs or puff tries to nip them? i want to be ethical towards them of course, but if i did give/trade/sell them to a LPS they'd likely be resold with the whole "they only live a year or two" concept of their care anyway. i say LPS as i have yet to find any local shops that specialize in fish. anybody know of some in the western chicago suburbs (i'm in naperville)?

But this may apply in that salinity too...Probably less time, IDK.


I would just call around to stores to see who could take them. Also, you could place an ad on Craigslist. I traded some fish on there once and I see ads on all the time for people that want to buy fish. I would offer to take them if we lived close. As it is I have a large shoal of 12 with an additional 10 cardinals.

[Pufferpunk]

I'd love some for my discus tank. I'm right in Franklin Park, near Ohare.

[luna1580]

I'd love some for my discus tank. I'm right in Franklin Park, near Ohare.

hey PP, i'd certainly like to give you mine, granted it's just 4 -they'd like a bigger school of course- but they all now seem very healthy, even in the f8 tank (they've been in there just over a month w/very very slowly increasing tank salinity now about 1.003 or less).

i think you are 30-40 minutes from me (assuming no new blizzards!). can you PM or email me w/some details to get to you/contact you?

-laura