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Underwater Monkey 
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 Topic: Long Nose Butterfly
Posted: February 04 2009 at 11:30pm |
So my longnose Buttefly looked happy and fine lastnight and my wife found him dead this morning
:(
I noticed he wouldn't eat much everytime I fed myces or brine shrimp, and he didn't pick on any of my coral...any ideas anyone?
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55 gl Reef
24 gl nano Reef
copying what Eva does:
" I would love to come. Just let me know when and where." Saltybuck
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Mark Peterson
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Posted: February 09 2009 at 1:14pm |
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Sorry for your loss. This is a loss for all of us. Please be a responsible hobbyist. This is what the WMAS is all about.
The only way I would ever try to keep a Butterflyfish, is if I had a problem with Aiptasia or Majano anemones. I don't like keeping a fish that is just going to die before it's time because I cannot provide the right kind of food.
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Reefkeeping Tips, & quick, easy setup tricks:www.utahreefs.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=9244 Pay it forward - become a paid WMAS member 
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Adam Blundell
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Posted: February 09 2009 at 1:39pm |
I disagree here. Butterfly fishes (in general) do very well in reef tanks. It is the reef tank that would suffer, not the fish. A longnose butterfly may not be the best of choices but I wouldn't quickly write it off as a no-no fish.
Adam
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Mark Peterson
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Posted: February 09 2009 at 2:11pm |
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"not be the best of choices" exactly.
Longnose Butterflyfishes are very specific eaters. The long nose is a giveaway.
Sometimes we like the look so much that we disregard other considerations. I've been there.
Looking at it from another angle, we might surmise that it was not eating anyway, even coral or worms in holes, so it died. It happens!
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Adam Blundell
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 9:08am |
Hayes, T., (2008) "Finicky Feeders", Freshwater and Marine Aquarium. November 2008.
"The copperband butterflyfish (Chelmon rostratus) and longnose butterflyfish (Forcipiger flavissimus) are two species that have an ill-deserved reputation as poor feeders in captivity."
"Either give these fish time to acclimate to aquarium foods on their own, away from competition, or start employing specialist feeding strategies of your own. A simple idea is to pack food, such as frozen Mysis, into an empty snail shell and then position the shell in an area of the tank frequented by the fish"
"I would also suggest only keeping these fish in a reef tank or an aquarium utilizing live rock."
Adam
Edited by Adam Blundell - February 10 2009 at 9:21am
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Mike Savage
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 9:10am |
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Mark Peterson
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 9:29am |
My point is that we need to be thoughtful. We need to know that kind of husbandry information before we bring it home, because asking the question after it has been in our tank for a week is irresponsible, IMO. I am not just speaking to one but to all of us. In September 1993 when I got into this hobby, I kept a list of the stuff I bought and the stuff that died in my 55. Eighteen months later I was a lot smarter but carried so much remorse that I stopped keeping the list. I had gone through almost $2000 of animals and what did I have left? Two clownfish, a Yellow Tang, a Six-line Wrasse, snails and hermits and an ugly green haired mermaid. http://www.garf.org/ugly.htmlThanks to the formation of the WMAS and LeRoy Headlee of GARF, my reef was saved, I stopped killing so many animals and started growing coral animals. My life has not been the same since. 
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Adam Blundell
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 9:50am |
Mark- I do agree with all of that.
Adam
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BobC63
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 7:49pm |
 Underwater Monkey wrote:
So my longnose Buttefly looked happy and fine lastnight and my wife found him dead this morning
:(
I noticed he wouldn't eat much everytime I fed myces or brine shrimp, and he didn't pick on any of my coral...any ideas anyone?
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Lots of ideas. 2 themes.
First "theme"... how long has your tank been set up, how large is it, and how many lbs of live rock are in it?
Fish like the Longnose or the Chelmon (Copper Band Butterfly) are more specialized eaters who do alot of foraging in the live rock for food (I think this is what Mark P. was getting at in his earlier posts)... they absolutely can be kept long-term in a reef tank; however, you need to accomodate their special needs. They require a largish tank (75g minimum, IMO) with a good amount of well-seasoned live rock where they can pick out various worms and other food tidbits.
Second "theme"...
In my 30+ years now keeping marine fish, I never ran into any fish that either
A) wasn't eating heartily by the 2nd day in my tanks; or
B) wanted to eat more but wanted different food(s) then I was offering; or
C) was "doomed" and would soon die
Luckily C) has been very, very few and far between...
My point here is this - if "...he wouldn't eat much everytime I fed mysis or brine shrimp", then you need to try something else. And please, not pellets or flake  There are so many other foods out there. Not trying to pick on you, Underwater Monkey, just a "pet peeve" of mine. Seems like everbody feeds ONLY flakes and/ or pellets, and usually one frozen item, usually mysis or brine. And that's it.
For a longnose, you could try (frozen):
- Bloodworms
- Blackworms
- Glassworms
- Reef Plankton
- Angel Formula
- Butterfly and Angel Diet
- Mussels
- Squid
- Spirulina Brine
- Marine Cuisine
Here's what I feed my Mixed Reef:
(Actually, there are 2 or 3 frozen foods missing from that picture. But you get the idea...)
Now you don't have to feed 20+ different foods - like I do - but how about rotating 5 or 6..?
As they say, "Variety is the Spice of Life". And that goes for your fish, too 
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- My Current Tank: 65g Starfire (sitting empty for 2+ years) -
* Marine & Reef tanks since 1977 *
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Mark Peterson
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 8:29pm |
Well said Bob - 
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Mike Savage
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 8:38pm |
I think Bob was hungry when he went to the LFS!
He speaks words of wisdom though.
Mike
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BobC63
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 8:50pm |
One of these days I will give a try at making my own frozen food mix, as those little cube packs can get expensive when you purchase 15 of them at a time 
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- My Current Tank: 65g Starfire (sitting empty for 2+ years) -
* Marine & Reef tanks since 1977 *
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Underwater Monkey
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Posted: February 10 2009 at 11:54pm |
Thanks to everyone's input! I'm greatful for the shared knowledge. I tried bloodworms as well. my tank is a 55 gl with 80+ lbs of liverock. it lived 3 weeks, not 1...
I will further research my future friends, I never buy ANY fish with the intentions of killing them.
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55 gl Reef
24 gl nano Reef
copying what Eva does:
" I would love to come. Just let me know when and where." Saltybuck
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BobC63
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Posted: February 11 2009 at 12:19am |
Underwater -
One other piece of advice... when you go to a LFS and see a fish you want to buy, ask to see it eat first as a condition of the sale. And DON'T accept the answer that "it already ate today", because that is basically baloney... healthy fish can and will eat over and over again (that's one of the reasons we warn against overfeeding, fish will always act "hungry")... the LFS should be willing to drop in at least a little bit of food to tempt the fish with. This is especially true for fish that are expensive or considered "delicate"; you don't want to throw your $$$ on a fish that is not eating...
If the LFS gives you a hard time on that, then don't buy the fish... if the fish eats (even a little bit) in the store then the chances of your success at home are much greater than if the food floats right by a fish that has that "spooked" look. It could be that the LFS just got the fish in that day and it is still acclimating; but it could also be that the fish is not eating at all.
Note: If the fish in the LFS is poking through the substrate looking for or picking at stuff, that is usually a good sign - it means it has an appetite. In those cases you probably don't need to ask for it to be fed.
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- My Current Tank: 65g Starfire (sitting empty for 2+ years) -
* Marine & Reef tanks since 1977 *
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Underwater Monkey
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Posted: February 11 2009 at 10:56am |
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That's great advice. Thanks
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55 gl Reef
24 gl nano Reef
copying what Eva does:
" I would love to come. Just let me know when and where." Saltybuck
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jeffm
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Posted: February 12 2009 at 12:23am |
This is a timely post because I was thinking about giving Bob a call. My daughter fell in love with Bob's CopperBand when we went to his house. I did some research and knew they were picky eaters. I got one as part of an online buy through the club. He was very active and was constantly picking at my rocks for about a week. In that time period I tried just about everything that Bob just listed (except for Blackworms, glassworms and plankton - although some of those might be in Rod's Food) I even tried live clams, live oysters, and live mussels - I work next to a fish market downtown. And I tried stuffing things in the rocks. He was never interested. He slowly stopped picking at the rocks. He disappeared a couple days ago.  So he lasted about 10 days. Maybe he would have made it if my 90G was more mature (only 4 months). I'm questioning whether I should try again later. I definitely think I'd go through the LFS (even though it costs twice as much) and make sure I see it eat. But it's depressing to know that a fair amount of these fish are dying at the LFS. I also read during my week of searching that a lot of Copperbands die at about 3-6 months because they are captured with cyanide. So even if you can get them to eat they up and die of liver failure or something like that and it's out of your control. None of this changes the fact that my daughter still loves them.
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Jeff Martin
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BobC63
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Posted: February 12 2009 at 12:44am |
I'm sorry to hear about that, Jeff...
The truth is that they are just difficult fish sometimes... they are slow eaters (compared to fish like tangs or angels) and of course they are still wild-caught. They don't always acclimate well to life in an aquarium. I'm not sure about the cyanide thing - I hope it is not true, but it could be.
And tank size and tank maturity do play a role, I'm sure. I've know people with 75s / 90s / 120s who have kept these fish, but I also believe that the smaller the tank size the more difficult it must be. Even in my 225, which is only 9 months old, I only got one because half of the rock was over 2.5 years old - having come from my previous 125 setup that ran for almost 2 years...
In my case I found that to ensure my CBB gets enough to eat, I feed the rest of the fish 'first' with some larger foods like chopped krill, squid, plankton, etc... then I put up a sheet of Nori to keep them all busy... then I add in a melted cube of smaller sized foods like bloodworms or the reef plankton and the bigger, faster fish are usually to busy fighting over the Nori so my CBB has time to "browse" over the smaller-sized foods...
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- My Current Tank: 65g Starfire (sitting empty for 2+ years) -
* Marine & Reef tanks since 1977 *
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jeffm
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Posted: February 13 2009 at 5:25pm |
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thanks for the info Bob. I'm sure at some point I'll be thinking about trying again.
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Jeff Martin
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IdahoReef
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Posted: February 23 2009 at 5:36pm |
Mark Peterson wrote:
The only way I would ever try to keep a Butterflyfish, is if I had a problem with Aiptasia or Majano anemones. |
To this I would add that not all butterflys (or peppermint shrimp!) will eat those "pests". Also, what do you do once they are all gone? You are then in the same, or worse, position. Since the fish is not conditioned to eat those items won't it be even more difficult to get it on regular feed?
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