Help with Moorish Idol feeding please.

[picasso]

A while back I acquired a Moorish Idol. I'm having a feeding issue and am looking for some advice.

Over the last few weeks I've noticed the Idol getting a bit on the thin side. I'm not having any problems at all with the fish accepting foods. He will readily eat anything I offer. When I first got him he stayed away from pretty much anything but Formula One flakes. Not wanting flakes to be a dietary staple, I quickly got him eating Formula One & Two pellets, New Life Spectrum pellets, and eventually with a bit more effort he began to eat frozen bits of whatever I'm feeding everything else. I think at this point he would chase down and gobble up sliced hot dogs if I offered them! He isn't timid about feeding at all. If I kill the pumps and toss in pellets he can usually eat 10-12 before the first one even hits a piece of rock! He is quick and out competes any other fish in the tank when it comes to food.

With him eating just about anything I toss in, I'm assuming it could be an internal parasite of some sort or more likely because of his high metabolism, he is not eating enough, not eating often enough, or I'm not feeding the correct food type/ mixture to keep his weight normal. Aside from being a bit on the thin side he seems perfectly healthy. His eyes are clear, he is active, swims fine, fins look normal, no sign of any external parasites or disease.

Any ideas advice?

Right now I'm feeding the Formula one pellets once or twice a day and in the evening I feed a cube or two of frozen mysis or some sort of cubed frozen mixture.


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[dnov99]

Try PE Mysis, it has a much higher protein content then other mysis and should be good for "fattening" up. Also try the NLS Thera A pellets. Good luck.

 

[downbeach]

Look through this:

http://www.chucksaddiction.com/disease.html

 

[mnat]

Moorish idols have always been a tough fish to keep because of their diet. I agree with the pe mysis and I would also look for a fish food that contains a lot of sponge (there are frozen angel diets that have this).

 

[JRWOHLER]

I know one person who would go out to local tidal pools find sponges and make a paste for these fish. It is a lot of effort but these fish really eat a diet of live sponges...frozen appears to work. You will need to google it, might have been PaulB or a guy from Europe on Manhattan reefers...also I think maybe there was an article in their magazine about it.

 

[Paul B]

That was me but I would feed him more clams and less pellets. I designed a feeder for Idols that was a dish that sat on the bottom. A tube went to the surface and had a little funnel on it. An auto feeder was above that and maybe 5 times a day it would dispense pellets that I first soaked in fish oil into the funnel. There was a small stream of water also going into the funnel and the moorish Idol would watch the pellets fall and gobble them up as soon as they hit the dish. On every trek around the tank he would always stop at the dish to see if any pellets were coming his way. Once a day I fed him clam and a sponge I collected and froze. I had him about 5 years and killed him in an accident wth some 18 year old fish. Moorish Idols do better with plenty of feedings. I have followed them on reefs in Tahiti and all I saw them eat was a lime green sticky sponge, but they ate a lot of it. Whatever is in that sponge may be something that fish needs for long term survival. 5 or even ten years is not a good record for a fish that size.