Pipe Fish
- Thread starter Cibo
- Start date
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
What type of pipefish do you have? What size is it? Do you have a picture?
Answer these questions and I can help you out some more.
Dom
Answer these questions and I can help you out some more.
Dom
- Location
- Flushing NY 11355
I cannot see the actual thing my pipe fish ate when they perk on the rocks and glass, but it grows bigger. Since I have pods in the tank, I assume it eats the babies of the pods.
- Location
- poughquag, ny
live brine shrimp and if you have alot of pods it will go after those also
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
Cool! The two things I would do is first, order live mysis from here ASAP:http://www.aquaculturestore.com/swinverts.html. This will give you live food to keep the pipefish alive just in case it does not eat frozen foods. Second, I would go buy Hikari Biopure frozen mysis. Hikari mysis is usually smaller than the San Francisco brand which will be easier for your yellow banded to eat. Try the frozen mysis and hopefully you get lucky.
Pipefish are very similar to seahorses in that they need to eat frequently through out the day because they can not hold a sufficient amount of food in their stomache to satisfy their nutritional needs. If your pipefish takes the frozen mysis (fingers crossed) it will need to be fed at least twice a day.
One other thing I would do is make sure you have several peppermint shrimp and cleaner shrimp in your tank (what size tank do you have?) so they will spawn and offer your pipefish an essential live treat every once in a while. You could also add locally collected grass shrimp which frequently contain eggs as well. I'm not sure where you are located but if you can not collect some on your own you can probably get some from the members here including me if you need a few.
Pipefish are very similar to seahorses in that they need to eat frequently through out the day because they can not hold a sufficient amount of food in their stomache to satisfy their nutritional needs. If your pipefish takes the frozen mysis (fingers crossed) it will need to be fed at least twice a day.
One other thing I would do is make sure you have several peppermint shrimp and cleaner shrimp in your tank (what size tank do you have?) so they will spawn and offer your pipefish an essential live treat every once in a while. You could also add locally collected grass shrimp which frequently contain eggs as well. I'm not sure where you are located but if you can not collect some on your own you can probably get some from the members here including me if you need a few.
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
Live brine shrimp will not keep your pipefish alive long term although he will eat them aggressively. Relying on adult live brine and pods will only result in the pipefish wasting away. You could also try omega-3 fortified frozen brine shrimp but they are real messy and can ruin your water params.
Free swimming pipefish like the multibanded will not eat small pods found in our tanks. They will be looking for mysis shrimp or similar sized foods. They would even eat tiny fish. Unfortunately they are not big time foragers like the Dragon Face Pipefish.
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
What have you tried to feed him at this point? It is pretty easy to tell whether the pipefish is eating or not. They make a quick aggressive move towards the food just like what you witnessed when it went after your peppermint shrimp.
everything Dom said is on the money.
I have a pair, they like the larger frozen PE MYSIS, I also feed them frozen Hakari MYSIS.
I do see them picking at the rocks and sides of glass during the day. I'm guessing they are hunting pods on their own, but they need to be fed twice a day minimum.
Like Dom said they have little room to store energy, this means you have a small amount of time to get them eating frozen foods before they starve.
If your in the city pm me, I just collected glass shrimp today and will give you some if you come over tonight.
I have a pair, they like the larger frozen PE MYSIS, I also feed them frozen Hakari MYSIS.
I do see them picking at the rocks and sides of glass during the day. I'm guessing they are hunting pods on their own, but they need to be fed twice a day minimum.
Like Dom said they have little room to store energy, this means you have a small amount of time to get them eating frozen foods before they starve.
If your in the city pm me, I just collected glass shrimp today and will give you some if you come over tonight.
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
Great! It is always best to have them on hand when you first purchase a pipefish and / or seahorse to give you some time to get them eating frozen foods if they are not already.
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
Any update?
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
After a week or two feeding live mysis, start mixing in frozen mysis and see if he goes for it. You may have to try a few times before he takes a shot.
- Location
- Montclair, NJ
How's your pipefish doing?
Last night my pepermint shrimp Spawned And the dinner bell rang the pipe fish stuffed it little face.... gona get one more order of mysis this week he seems to like when I put plankton( he goes to eat it) in as well frozen mysis he is taken intrest in...
Just a shrimp spawning tip, they can only mate when they molt. When I used to add trace elements to my tank they would molt every 2-3 weeks and thus, spawned more.I stopped adding trace because I grew algae like crazy but maybe you can give it a shot.
- Location
- Staten Island
Whats up Cibo Its Lenny Kevin MTI's partner . Sorry to hear about your loss.
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