longnose butterfly not eating...please help!

[Delphinus]

FWIW, as an occasional treat, I feed my CBB clam-on-the-half-shell and he leaves my ornamental clams alone. I'm pretty sure it's not just the smell of clam meat that is attractive to the fish, it's the smell of clam blood (or whatever you would call it in a gastropod). I'm not sure I totally subscribe to the idea that feeding them clams or mussels or oysters or whatever, gives them the idea that clams are OK to eat - I think they more or less already know.

So that might be an option. What I do is buy live shellfish (mussels, oysters, etc., whatever I feel like that day), from the supermarket (T&T in my case) - 5 or 6 at a time, it costs about $1, then I freeze them when I get home. I've tried just buying 1 and feeding it right away, but you look like an idiot when you ask for 1 mussel or 1 oyster. I've tried buying 5-6 and keeping them live in the sump, but usually the tropical reef temps kill them within a day or two and it's pretty gross. But freezing them keeps them from fouling on you, and it's easier to crack them open. I feel a little bad about it but the flip side is, if it wasn't my fish it'd be someone else eating them.. their fate was sealed long before I ever came into their picture. I do it because my CBB only otherwise eats mysis, and I worry about such a monotypic diet. Every fish I've ever had that would only eat mysis, rarely lived longer than a year or two, pretty much all of them having succumbed to some kind of obvious intestinal malady. It could also be that mysis itself might get fouled ... in any case I don't like it when I can't offer a variety of things so the clam-on-the-half-shell it is.

Actually all my fish seem to enjoy mussels in particular, a mussel shell is cleaned up pretty much within an hour or so.

I think it's more of an exception than the rule when a butterfly takes to dried foods (flakes or pellets). In time he may take to those, since longnosed butterflies are often regarded as less fussy than CBB's, but it still probably takes some time to get used to the idea that this strange stuff floating around is acceptable food.

[seanoman]

thanks for the replies guys. Delphinius, when you give your CBB the clam/mussel, do you just place it one the sandbed and let them go to town? That sounds like an interesting idea and I am willing to try anything to get the little guy eating. I'll try the cyclopeeze first when I get home today and if it's not willing to go for that, I just may head out and get some clams for it.

[seanoman]

michika- no luck with the nori yet... I'm not sure if it's really even noticed it either though, as it's on the opposite side of that tank from where it usually swims.

[Delphinus]

Pretty much. I just get it cracked open enough that he can get his proboscis (or whatever it's called - his "snout" ) into the shell and he goes to town. Now that I freeze them they pretty much open all the way though.

I'm not 100% convinced Cyclops-eeze will do the trick. It might, most fish love the smell of it. I know my CBB goes berserk when I feed it to my tank but it seems to me that among my fish, it's mostly just my tang and my rabbitfish who are able to vacuum it down. My butterfly seems to need to strike at something to be able to eat it. I don't know if that holds for all butterflies. I guess the thing to do though is try Cyclops, if he eats it then great. If he seems to react to it but can't eat it - then try soaking some cyclops and mysis together to see if the taste transfers. Likely, what has to happen is he has to eat some mysis by accident and then discover that he actually really likes it.

Good luck!

[seanoman]

cool that sounds good. I will give it a try when I get home and see if it goes for it. If not, I'll be off to the grocery store in search of some clams. I'll post later tonight on it's progress