Feeding Copperband butterflyfish

[i cant think]

Ive owned my CBB for 1.5 years, as long as it gets eating properly (The leopard wrasse should help it with that) then passes the 6 month mark in captivity you should have a good specimen that will work longterm, although they can get to 8” in the wild (I’ve not seen one that was above 3”) As long as the pod population remains stable (Mines been fluctuating recently because my LFS never has any pods in stock) and your CBB remains looking ‘fat’ you should be alright when he’s on mysis

 

[ReefRusty]

Copperband butterflyfish eating Nori

youtube.com

Got mine eating Nori after a week in the tank

 

[Lasse]

Even if he is eating mysis. Mysis is mostly shell and this is not a recommended long term solution.

Mysis is the staple food for many, many young marine fishes in the wild. I have only feed my 80 gallon reef with frozen mysis, brine shrimp and freshwater cyclops for + 5 years now. I have a lot of picky fish according to food

Clams are a downside because clams on a half shell will often have them nip at clams you want such as Crocea/Maxima/Squamosa/hippopus
Similar thing with feather dusters although since you have a leopard wrasse you probably won’t have either of those inverts in your tank.

I have never feed with clams - the result - you can see in the video below - showing a copperband eating mainly freshwater cyclops and some that it is not eating



Sincerely Lasse

 

[Paul B]

Fotget pods, they will not keep a copperband alive for 10 minutes. Worms and clams are all you need. This one was 10 years old and the one I have now eats just as well. If it doesn't eat those foods,, it won't eat anything. In the sea they eat worms and small crustaceans along with fish fry

 

[i cant think]

Fotget pods, they will not keep a copperband alive for 10 minutes. Worms and clams are all you need. This one was 10 years old and the one I have now eats just as well. If it doesn't eat those foods,, it won't eat anything. In the sea they eat worms and small crustaceans along with fish fry

Mine eats pods (Happily) along with once a day Mysis & Brine (It attacks all of the food that goes in the tank but that’s just the daily feeding)

 

[Paul B]

Mine eats pods (Happily) along with once a day Mysis & Brine (

He would have to eat millions of them. Maybe he does, What do I know?

 

[Tamberav]

Mysis is the staple food for many, many young marine fishes in the wild. I have only feed my 80 gallon reef with frozen mysis, brine shrimp and freshwater cyclops for + 5 years now. I have a lot of picky fish according to food


I have never feed with clams - the result - you can see in the video below - showing a copperband eating mainly freshwater cyclops and some that it is not eating



Sincerely Lasse

Was a thread on here not long ago of a Copperband starving but it ate mysis great. They swapped to meatier foods and it recovered well. Most people do not have your tank and if they feed small foods, I would question if they feed enough.

This mine fed clams and worms and LRS. It came to me already eating mysis and was skinny.

Found some old pics of it. It was eating mysis like a champ from previous place and it looked skinny as heck.

 

[Lasse]

It is a huge difference between what we see as an well feed fish in nature and a well feed in Aquarium. I have not seen any of the fish you describe - but there is one difference between dry food and frozen natural food that you need to be aware of. All nutrients is up to 5-7 times more concentrated in dry food (lesser water) compared with frozen fresh food. They need to eat around 5-7 times more food in order to get the same nutrients as they get in dry food. This is one of the reasons why it is profitable with fish farms and high quality processed dry food- the fish eat the amount they are used of - but get more than 5 times more nutrients and grow very fast. When we feed with dry food - fish seems to be hungry all the time and we normally overfeed our fish.

IMO - it is not a matter of "mostly shells" - it is matter of the amount we feed our fish with. If you use fresh or frozen natural food - you need to feed a larger amount compared with dry food. It is not either worthless to eat shells - many shells contain important micronutrients, vitamins and anti radicals. Freshwater cyclops as an example normally have an high content of axtansanthine in their shells and also a lot of omega 3. The well known cyclopeeze is the best example.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[i cant think]

He would have to eat millions of them. Maybe he does, What do I know?

He probably does- I see him scavenging everywhere with my two Halichoeres wrasse searching for pods and inverts- and to my surprise he constantly finds more

 

[Paul B]

Fish farms feed dry foods because it is cheap. But they also give the fish antibiotics because those fish are in horrible shape. But fat which is what they are looking for. Farmed fish also taste differently.

In my family, we don't eat any farmed fish. But we also don't eat any fish that comes from Viet Nam, China, the Philippians, Sri Lanka, Mexico, Arizona etc.

 

[Paul B]

He probably does- I see him scavenging everywhere with my two Halichoeres wrasse searching for pods and inverts- and to my surprise he constantly finds more

Copperbands are very large eaters and should be fed meaty foods as their mouth isn't exactly like a Grouper, whaleshark or Lionfish.

 

[i cant think]

Copperbands are very large eaters and should be fed meaty foods as their mouth isn't exactly like a Grouper, whaleshark or Lionfish.

I don’t think any fish ‘designed’ to eat pests have mouths like groupers, whale sharks, lionfish ect..

 

[Lasse]

In this case I do not agree with you Paul. They are large eaters but IMO - it is because they in nature do not eat especially "meaty" food. Their snout is used for catching very small prey hiding deep in the rockwork - they need to eat a lot because their pray is not as meaty as other fish food (scavengers and predators) Mine is seeking food all the time.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Paul B]

I don’t think any fish ‘designed’ to eat pests have mouths like groupers, whale sharks, lionfish ect..

Those things are only pests because we named them that. In the sea they are normal fauna.

Lasse, I agree with you. They would eat constantly if we had the capacity to feed them. In the sea they constantly stick that snout in holes for worms and tiny creatures.

In a tank they can eat just about anything small and if it is live, they like it better.

 

[Tamberav]

General people in this hobby don't feed their fish a constant supply of food nor do they have mature tanks for a copperband to forage. I think long term sucess would go up if they fed more than mysis or brine. Keep in mind that there are many brands of mysis and I very much doubt they are all equal. They are certainly not equal in price.

 

[Lasse]

@Tamberav You state that a CB could starve from feeding mysis - and I do not contradict you - but your explanation - not enough of nutrients - is only one of two possible explanation and IMO not the most plausible. My explanation was/is; if the fish is adapted to low nutrient food (or food there it is difficult to get the nutrients from - like macroalgae) - it will eat constantly (not like a pike - once a week) and if you risk to starve this fish with giving them low nutrient food - you should give them more food per time unit, they will not starve and their stomach will work better because they are adapted to this type of food. An example - if I need x gramme protein a day - I can get that with a steak, If I chose to get it through a plant based protein source - I will probably need to eat much more food compared with the steak if I need x gramme of protein.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Tamberav]

@Tamberav You state that a CB could starve from feeding mysis - and I do not contradict you - but your explanation - not enough of nutrients - is only one of two possible explanation and IMO not the most plausible. My explanation was/is; if the fish is adapted to low nutrient food (or food there it is difficult to get the nutrients from - like macroalgae) - it will eat constantly (not like a pike - once a week) and if you risk to starve this fish with giving them low nutrient food - you should give them more food per time unit, they will not starve and their stomach will work better because they are adapted to this type of food. An example - if I need x gramme protein a day - I can get that with a steak, If I chose to get it through a plant based protein source - I will probably need to eat much more food compared with the steak if I need x gramme of protein.

Sincerely Lasse

I think there are better foods then mysis that are readily available to the average hobbiest who may feed twice a day and have a tank only a few years old.

Like I said... someone here had a thread recently about their copperband slowly starving feeding mysis. I told them to swap to LRS and they came back and thanked me saying the copperband recovered. Yes, perhaps if they had fed more mysis more often, it would have been fine too.

I am not saying it can't live on mysis. But the average hobbiest will probably find better sucess using something closer to Paul's feeding which can clearly keep copperbands alive for 10 years or what not.

In my case, I just put LRS in a mesh pouch and the fish feed from that since LRS can be broken off in a block. For the second feeding I use black worms I just syringe them in and the fish chase those around. Clam is a treat on days I am off work. I slice it in strips and toss in it.

 

[jaganshi066]

Fotget pods, they will not keep a copperband alive for 10 minutes. Worms and clams are all you need. This one was 10 years old and the one I have now eats just as well. If it doesn't eat those foods,, it won't eat anything. In the sea they eat worms and small crustaceans along with fish fry

Paul so I purchased mine a month ago and it was eating mysis and brine voraciously at the store but didn’t eat anything, not even live worms or brine when I brought it back. I tried the same spirulina brine the store used, mysis, clams on the shell, and the live brine and live worms but no luck. Two weeks later, now he eats everything but I think his favorite is blood worms.

 

[Goaway]

Took my cbb 8 days before it started eating frozen. For those 8 days. She watched the other fish eat 4 to 5 times daily. Eventually day 7, she caught on, took to frozen mysis and 8th day started to eat everything I offered. Which is a mix of shrimp, muscle, nori, scallop all chopped up together. Mysis as a side dish.

Keep trying. Hopefully yours is eating now.

Feeding clams and oysters to copperband?

Hi there,ive read about feeding fish and inparticular copperband butterflies, So i read about buying fresh clams and then freezing them,i live in big city in england but cant for life off me find a fishmongers lol. So found a fishmonger section in a not so local supermarket,so i bought these raw...

www.reef2reef.com

Look this thread i started asking about clams/oysters as some good articles/videos and good information from a few people

I followed as much advice from this thread as I could. Very helpful.

 

[Ryan Doolittle]

I learned the hard way the secret to getting copperbands eating is clams. Every CBB I've had for over 2 years has started on claims. The first was a blue squamosa clam, after that I learned freshwater clams work just as well.

The local super store carries trays of live clams. I would freeze the clams, then Crack them in half and elastic them to a tile. The clam/ tile was then put where the CBB was hanging out. It takes a few days but after seeing the fish eating the clam the CBB would as well. You may need a couple clams in a couple spots to make sure the CBB gets a chance to try the clams.

Now I use the clams mixed into my home made frozen preparation and the fish love it.

My current CBB was the same size as the OP's CBB when I purchased the fish. We are right about a year and it's doubled in size and actually fights the tangs for its fare share.

I have tried this with 4 CBB and have gotten the same result. I have yet to loose one. That being said IMO 50% is making sure the fish is fed and 50% the quality of fish I am getting. I always start with golf ball size fish. Never any larger.