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View Full Version : Feeder Fish For Hawkfish


SCRAWNY
04/15/2002, 11:52 PM
Hi just wondering i have a long nosed hawkfish and i was curious what kind of feeder fish would be appropriate for him as i want to see him eat as he would in the wild as i find it quite facinating.
COULD ANYONE PLEASE OFFER ME SOME ADVICE!!!!
THANKS

SCRAWNY
04/16/2002, 12:41 AM
Also i forgot to mention that i had an arceye hawkfish previoulsy that i used to feed baby mullet to as they are easy to catch around where i live but unfortunately he got lice through the mullet and passed on thats why i am wondering if thre is somethinglike guppies that i could soak in enrichment formulae or slowly converth thses fish to saltwater as i have dont it with gambusia before
thnkas hope this helps

billsreef
04/16/2002, 11:04 PM
Your best bet would be small fish and shrimp collected from marine waters. They will certainly eat small feeder guppys, but the nutritional quality will not be correct for feeding marine fish.

SCRAWNY
04/17/2002, 02:26 AM
is there any other option as i fed my last one before live fish from the ocean and he got lice
what other preventative measures can i take to ensure that he does not contract this disease again or can i soak the guppies in a marine solution of enrichment of some sort thanks

exodus
04/18/2002, 03:35 PM
OK, here's the deal. You can feed it guppies and/or ghost shrimp, but here's the catch: You can't do it very often... maybe once a month. The reason is that, well, saltwater fish were made to eat saltwater things, not freshwater. More specifically, fresh water animals do not contain the right kinds of fats that saltwater fish need. So, what happens is that fat deposits from the freshwater fish build up inside the fish, which leads to an early demise... usually liver failure.

Out of the two, I think ghost shrimp are the 'best' nutritionally speaking and have a lower risk of adversely affecting your hawkfish. If you want to add nutritional value to the shrimp/guppies be sure to feed them a quality Marine flake food before feeding them to the hawkfish.

SCRAWNY
04/18/2002, 10:19 PM
well feeding the guppies with marine flake is not a problem they eat it quite happily um i am also trying to slowly and i mean really slowly raise the slainity in the tank and see how that goes maybe over a period of time with the feeding of marine flakes they may develop some good vitamins for the hawk......
also i can try a tropic pest which was introduced to australia some time ago
they are known as "Gambusia" or a type of mosquito fish
they can tolerate nearlly pure salinity up to 1.055 ppm so maybe they might be another trial feed, as they are easy to catch and eat....
what u reckon

exodus
04/19/2002, 12:23 PM
Raising the salinity won't make them 'saltwater' fish. They still have the wrong kinds of fatty lipids in them. If you feed them to your hawk on a regular basis, he will die within 2 years.

Trying out the brackish fish you mention may not be as bad as guppies, but they still will not provide the right nutrition for your hawkfish.

SCRAWNY
04/21/2002, 11:11 PM
oh ok then thanks heaps for ya help will let u know what goes on ok

Tamani
04/26/2002, 12:22 AM
Raising salinity won't give the freshwater fish the nutritional profile you're looking for BUT won't feeding it marine foods? After all, the HUFAs which are so important to marine fish come from phytoplankton which zooplankton eats which bigger zooplankton eats which, etc etc etc. I suppose it might be possible they can't store the fat and therefore it won't make a difference. However, some freshwater mysis can and do, and I believe that is only because its available to them, not because of some special mechanism.

Also, while you wouldn't want to feed freshwater food as an exclusive foodsource, I seem to recall much hoopla about feeding freshwater fish is derived from feeding goldfish to lionfish. And while part of the problem is feeding them the freshwater fish, the bigger problem that gave feeding freshwater fish a bad name is the overfeeding/exclusive feeding of feeder goldfish to lion fish.

Just some food observations. You may (and probably) want to check on my hypothesis.