He's so cute

lion king · Jan 26, 2019

Yellow Spot Scorpionfish; He's turned out to be a very interesting, cute, and deadly pet. He's a chameleon, very good at camo, sometimes I'm looking for him and he's staring right at me. He's quick and deadly, so far I've just been feeding him live ghost shrimp, I may at some point see if he'll take dead, but I really don't concern myself with that, he'll always be getting live food for the bulk of his diet. He's is observation now and will be in a new tank with a blackfoot and fu manchu lion.

kichimark · Jan 26, 2019

I like his pattern and coloration. I wouldn't mind having one myself but the wife says no more tanks haha.

DSC reef · Jan 26, 2019

What a very cool fish! @Lovemyreef2015 check this out and no we can't get one

Lovemyreef2015 · Jan 26, 2019

DSC reef said:
What a very cool fish! @Lovemyreef2015 check this out and no we can't get one

So cute! You know I'm going to want one now

ZipAdeeZoa · Jan 28, 2019

They look so silly head on;Hilarious

Have you noticed any patterns with where in the tank it spends the most time? If you end up trying to see how difficult it would be to switch to prekilled/frozen foods I'd love to know how it goes!

lion king · Jan 28, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
They look so silly head on;Hilarious

Have you noticed any patterns with where in the tank it spends the most time? If you end up trying to see how difficult it would be to switch to prekilled/frozen foods I'd love to know how it goes!

Right now he is an observation tank which is in my bedroom, right next door there is an observation tank with the 2 lions that will be his room mates in a display I will putting together soon. All of his time is on the bottom of the tank and he seems to enjoy the rubble, he does not climb the rocks at all. He is all over the tank with alot of time in the front keeping an eye on me and alot of time to the side watching what's going in the lion's tank.

I don't really put any stress on my predators to eat dead food at all, not only do i enjoy watching them hunt, it adds to their enrichment being predators in captivity. I've found I have had success keeping my lions, scorps, and anglers much longer than anyone else I know by keeping them on a live diet. Having their tank as a hunting ground has also proved to keep them active, alert and observant; I can't say the same for the predators which have been stick trained or eat a dead only diet. At some point I will offer him a variety of dead food to see what he takes, if he does it will be a part of overall diet, live food still being his main diet.

mort · Jan 31, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
They look so silly head on;Hilarious

Have you noticed any patterns with where in the tank it spends the most time? If you end up trying to see how difficult it would be to switch to prekilled/frozen foods I'd love to know how it goes!

Just to add my experience as well with my yellow spot, I'd say lion King's observations above are very good. They are a sedentary fish which you don't see move much but they don't spend that long in the same place. I believe in nature they are commonly found in large coral heads, like stylophora, from where they unleash a very rapid attack.

I feed dead food exclusively. It can be hard to get live shrimp locally and it is illegal to feed feeder fish here. Switching was really easy. I do have experience weaning numerous predatory species and it was perhaps the easiest fish to convert. It now takes anything I offer with gusto and has done for the 3 years or so ive had it.
I do understand the live versus dead argument and as predatory species are more intelligent I feel you need to, for want of a better word "entertain" them, but I've found over the years that clever use of flow and a turkey baster can illicit a near natural hunt, not that a hunt for these little scorps lasts long (they have one of the fastest strikes I've seen, a real blink and you miss it).

ZipAdeeZoa · Feb 1, 2019

All good to know Mort! However such claims are rather bold without evidence... You know... The photographic kind... Please;Happy

I'm still looking for one but still haven't found anything, I'm starting to think Canada is the wrong place to live when your looking for scorpionfish. Has anyone noticed if these guys might be seasonal?

lion king · Feb 1, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
All good to know Mort! However such claims are rather bold without evidence... You know... The photographic kind... Please;Happy

I'm still looking for one but still haven't found anything, I'm starting to think Canada is the wrong place to live when your looking for scorpionfish. Has anyone noticed if these guys might be seasonal?

If seasonal then this must be the season, I don't see them offered very often, and where I got mine from had 3 in stock. The day after I ordered mine they were out of stock. I got him here; https://fishybusinessaquatics.com/fish/scorpionfish

ZipAdeeZoa · Feb 1, 2019

lion king said:
If seasonal then this must be the season, I don't see them offered very often, and where I got mine from had 3 in stock. The day after I ordered mine they were out of stock. I got him here; https://fishybusinessaquatics.com/fish/scorpionfish

Well then I guess I'm going to have to reach out beyond all my LFS's and go national, If theres one in the great white north I'm going to find it!

Has anyone noticed roughly how often they seem to shed their cuticle? Also do either of you keep yours with hermit crabs? I'm a little worried about getting one and it dying by trying to swallow a crab shell and all.

Geebs19 · Feb 1, 2019

Such a cool looking fish!

lion king · Feb 1, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
Well then I guess I'm going to have to reach out beyond all my LFS's and go national, If theres one in the great white north I'm going to find it!

Has anyone noticed roughly how often they seem to shed their cuticle? Also do either of you keep yours with hermit crabs? I'm a little worried about getting one and it dying by trying to swallow a crab shell and all.

Shedding of the cuticle is determined by many factors; the more stable, maintained, and stress free your system, you'll likely never even notice it. It will happen quickly and very infrequently. I'll occasionally see pieces around the tank from my lions but never see it happening.

Obviously in captivity weird unnatural things can happen, but it's not in their nature to eat hard bodied inverts. This is the 1st yellow spot I've kept, but I've kept emeralds and hermits with leaf fish and lions and have never seen one even look at one.

mort · Feb 2, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
Has anyone noticed roughly how often they seem to shed their cuticle? Also do either of you keep yours with hermit crabs? I'm a little worried about getting one and it dying by trying to swallow a crab shell and all.

I've not seen mine shed it's cuticle layer either. Had mine with small hermits (blue leg and red leg) as well as a pistol shrimp and not noticed any problems.

My new tank is still coming together so I don't have pics yet but will do a little thread when i start to build it.

ZipAdeeZoa · Feb 2, 2019

Awesome, Thank you both!

@mort Can’t wait to see it!

lion king · Feb 5, 2019

While he seems to work the substrate and ground rubble mostly, he starts to climb around and perch at higher elevations when he gets hungry and is hunting and stalking. When I fed the other day he jumped up on the rocks for an added vantage point, waiting for a ghosty to come cruising by. I had been feeding every 2 days, decided to skip a day, now on the 3rd day he is high up, scouting for food. Notice his camo...

ZipAdeeZoa · Feb 5, 2019

lion king said:
While he seems to work the substrate and ground rubble mostly, he starts to climb around and perch at higher elevations when he gets hungry and is hunting and stalking. When I fed the other day he jumped up on the rocks for an added vantage point, waiting for a ghosty to come cruising by. I had been feeding every 2 days, decided to skip a day, now on the 3rd day he is high up, scouting for food. Notice his camo...

I knew the could change their colour a fair bit but he looks like fresh bin of Neapolitan icecream;Hilarious

Interesting that yours seems to spend more time in the rubble zone, everything I've read suggest that like to stay in coral heads and so I figured they would feel better higher up. The only evidence I saw of one in a rubble zone was of a cuttle fish grabbing one off the bottom in a youtube video as it bolted for cover. My tank has a piece of Caribsea life rock branch that resembles a very simple coral head, If I do find one of these guys I'll be very interested to see how he responds to it. Are you planning on keeping any sps in his permanent tank? It would be interesting to see how that might affect his behaviour.

Glad he's doing well for you!

lion king · Feb 6, 2019

ZipAdeeZoa said:
I knew the could change their colour a fair bit but he looks like fresh bin of Neapolitan icecream;Hilarious

Interesting that yours seems to spend more time in the rubble zone, everything I've read suggest that like to stay in coral heads and so I figured they would feel better higher up. The only evidence I saw of one in a rubble zone was of a cuttle fish grabbing one off the bottom in a youtube video as it bolted for cover. My tank has a piece of Caribsea life rock branch that resembles a very simple coral head, If I do find one of these guys I'll be very interested to see how he responds to it. Are you planning on keeping any sps in his permanent tank? It would be interesting to see how that might affect his behaviour.

Glad he's doing well for you!

He's perched in a coral skeleton in the shot above, I have a few of these I'll have in his dt. I put one in the observation thinking he would like it. I;ll also have some spots of chunky rubble around, it's going to be a fowlr.

mort · Feb 6, 2019

Simply a proof of life picture. Its in a temporary tank at the moment but I just picked up the glass for its new tank. First pick is through dirty glass plus a scratched breeding trap. the other two are from above. Will get better pics when its all setup.