Show us your eels

[Abbyreefer]

awsome vid delphinus

[fishoholic]

Originally Posted by Abbyreefer

awsome vid delphinus

+1

Is that the squid you're feeding him? How did you manage to keep the prongs so still? I try to feed mine with those type of prongs but the second I move the prongs (at all) my eel gets scared and goes back into his hole in the rock, and by then my other fish figure out what I'm up too and eat it. I keep putting food into one of the holes in the rock he stays in and I think he eats the food I put in there for him, but it would be cool to see him eat it off of the prongs.

[Delphinus]

In that video it was the squid, I sort of did a spur of the moment "Hey I should try filming him" after I had already fed him some mysis in the same manner. In fact I'm more feeding him mysis now, I cut up the sheets of it and keep it in an old margarine container in the freezer so I just grab two cubes (smallish, say 3/8" - 1/2" square), throw one in the tank for general consumption and then quickly put the other in the prongs before it's even thawed, this way it thaws in the tank and stays together long enough for the eel to come out (since after the first cube gets put in, he smells the food and starts coming out). But I also feed flake and nori at the same time, so the tank is almost overwhelmed with food. The others in the tank are so focused on chasing down the loose food they don't notice the prongs right away and by the time they do, I've got the end into that opening between the rock and clam and none of them can really get at it in there so they go for the easier pickings. I guess I must have gotten lucky in that the eel has associated the prongs with food because he's not the least bit scared of them?? He definitely doesn't get all the mysis, he spills a lot much to the merriment of his tankmates but he's definitely getting some.

I was thinking that an other idea might be to put a spin on the "nori PVC pipe" idea - take a piece of say 1/2" or maybe 3/4" PVC, say 3"-4" in length, cap it on one end, drill a hole and attach some fishing line (so it's easy to pull out), and jam some mysis or other food down the open end, and jam it to the other end, and then just put it in the tank in a low flow spot or near the favourite burrow opening ... theoretically the eel would be the only one capable of pulling food out of it. I haven't tried it yet but maybe that could work for you?

The previous eel I had, man, he didn't eat for like 2 months, or at least, I didn't *see* him eat. So they are capable of lasting a realllllly long time without evidence of eating. When he finally did start, it was either the cubed squid or a piece of oyster that finally convinced him. I see now though, now that I have this guy, that my choice of foods was probably a good part of the problem back then. He's just not interested in anything that's too "tough" to bite through, and even silversides are too tough (or at least, "not tender enough"). I'd offer mussels and oysters now but I know I will have a hard time getting that past the tang to him because he also looooooves the clam on the half shell.

Good luck!

[fishoholic]

Thanks Tony, I'm pretty sure I sort of saw my eel eat a silverside. What happened was I put the silverside into the hole he was hidding in, and a few minutes later I saw the silverside moving up and down and up and down. I'm guessing it was moving around because he was eating it. I usually thaw the mysis first, I'll try leaving it in a frozen chunk and see if it works better. I do feed the others first but they eat fast and are big pigs so hopefully the eel will get some before it all thaws and the others come around.

[globaldesigns]

K, I have to ask everyone here then:

1.) Do you have coral with them?
2.) Are your tanks covered?

Reason is that I would love to have one, but don't want it carpet surfing and I have alot of coral...

If I can have one, I want a smaller version, what would you recommend?

[muck]

Only smaller eel Id recommend would be a golden dwarf... which seems to be popular in this thread.
Don't have any first hand experience with them so I'll defer to Tony, Laurie and others that have kept them.

[Delphinus]

Corals would be totally fine with any eel - with the caveat that they're gonna poop lots so your tank needs to be able to handle the extra load. Other than that though, corals aren't at risk. What is at risk is any critter that can fit inside their mouth.

The golden dwarf eel is small though. They are the same size, more or less, as a pencil, and as such, there's not much that can fit inside their mouths. They max out at 12" long. Mine is around 7".

But eels are notorious for getting out as they are curious about anything they can stick their heads into. I had a golden dwarf in a 20g tank last year, I had that thing locked down with covers and he still managed to get out (and perished )

This guy I have in a 30" tall tank and the rockwork only extends up around 14" or so, so there is at least 15" of open water. So far, he is not interested in swimming out in the open, they know they are small and thus they are pretty shy. The only cover I have is eggcrate and I'm fairly certain it would not stop him if he wanted out. However I think the height of the water column in this case helps a bit.

The next smallest eel, IIRC, is the snowflake. I hear of many reefs keeping these. Although they are usually available in the 8" size, they do top out around 24" so I think they would be a little more adept at crawling out. And I would think they are big enough to take down things like cleaner shrimp and whatnot, although I'm not positive on that one.

A canopy should help, I would think. I don't think they jump per se as they slither out. It would be fairly difficult to slither UP a canopy wall though, so I think a canopy with the holes covered up (foam or whatever) is a good idea.

Usually the bigger eels seem to require FOWLR setups and I imagine it's really the poop issue and the "will eat anything that fits" issue that really drives that.

That about sums up my total knowledge on the topic though. Others out there may have "more better advices."