Lyretail anthias not eating.

[Spookyclemente]

So I made a recent post about my two Lyretail anthias not eating, male and female. But I tried multiple different ways of feeding and still no luck. I tried live brain shrimp. I tried a bunch of other recommended stuff and still absolutely nothing. One thing I noticed was that the fish kept going into my coral shrimps hands and just laying there so I bought a skunk shrimp And it just keeps going to the skunk trip to be cleaned the mail just lays on the bottom of the tank, not doing much I’m not sure if they’re even eating. I really haven’t seen them do a whole lot other than wanna be cleaned but only the female what do I do and what is the diagnosis?

 

[vetteguy53081]

So I made a recent post about my two Lyretail anthias not eating, male and female. But I tried multiple different ways of feeding and still no luck. I tried live brain shrimp. I tried a bunch of other recommended stuff and still absolutely nothing. One thing I noticed was that the fish kept going into my coral shrimps hands and just laying there so I bought a skunk shrimp And it just keeps going to the skunk trip to be cleaned the mail just lays on the bottom of the tank, not doing much I’m not sure if they’re even eating. I really haven’t seen them do a whole lot other than wanna be cleaned but only the female what do I do and what is the diagnosis?

I don’t see signs of aggression but these fish are easily intimidated and how is breathing rate?
Also what foods are you offering?

 

[Spookyclemente]

So I made a recent post about my two Lyretail anthias not eating, male and female. But I tried multiple different ways of feeding and still no luck. I tried live brain shrimp. I tried a bunch of other recommended stuff and still absolutely nothing. One thing I noticed was that the fish kept going into my coral shrimps hands and just laying there so I bought a skunk shrimp And it just keeps going to the skunk trip to be cleaned the mail just lays on the bottom of the tank, not doing much I’m not sure if they’re even eating. I really haven’t seen them do a whole lot other than wanna be cleaned but only the female what do I do and what is the diagnosis?

I don’t see signs of aggression but these fish are easily intimidated and how is breathing rate?
Also what foods are you offering?

Brine shrimp live and frozen, small pellets and this other stuff like a micro frozen food

 

[Spookyclemente]

So I made a recent post about my two Lyretail anthias not eating, male and female. But I tried multiple different ways of feeding and still no luck. I tried live brain shrimp. I tried a bunch of other recommended stuff and still absolutely nothing. One thing I noticed was that the fish kept going into my coral shrimps hands and just laying there so I bought a skunk shrimp And it just keeps going to the skunk trip to be cleaned the mail just lays on the bottom of the tank, not doing much I’m not sure if they’re even eating. I really haven’t seen them do a whole lot other than wanna be cleaned but only the female what do I do and what is the diagnosis?

I don’t see signs of aggression but these fish are easily intimidated and how is breathing rate?
Also what foods are you offering?

Brine shrimp live and frozen, small pellets and this other stuff like a micro frozen food

View attachment 20260413_132119_6DC7F76D-8101-4E4F-B278-E4B98E18BCCD.mov

 

[sgdnycct]

Following

 

[Spookyclemente]

@Jay Hemdal what do you think?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

@Jay Hemdal what do you think?

A fish that holds still that long for a cleaner shrimp almost always has some parasite on its skin, they can feel the parasites, so they try to get the shrimp to clean them. However, cleaner shrimp cannot cure these diseases, they just can’t get at all of the parasites.

However, flukes and ich, the two most common cause for fish to pose in front of cleaner shrimp, do NOT cause the fish to stop eating (until very late in the infection) so something else is also going on here.

Are you seeing any other fish posing in front of the shrimp, or scratching their skin? If so, there are probably flukes in the tank. Praziquantel can be used to treat those, but again, those aren’t why the anthias aren’t eating.

 

[Spookyclemente]

@Jay Hemdal what do you think?

A fish that holds still that long for a cleaner shrimp almost always has some parasite on its skin, they can feel the parasites, so they try to get the shrimp to clean them. However, cleaner shrimp cannot cure these diseases, they just can’t get at all of the parasites.

However, flukes and ich, the two most common cause for fish to pose in front of cleaner shrimp, do NOT cause the fish to stop eating (until very late in the infection) so something else is also going on here.

Are you seeing any other fish posing in front of the shrimp, or scratching their skin? If so, there are probably flukes in the tank. Praziquantel can be used to treat those, but again, those aren’t why the anthias aren’t eating.

No everyone is super healthy. No inching. I mean everyone has an itch time to time but nothing crazy. Everything is normal.
The other male Lyretail anthias just lays all day. Doesn’t like to swim around. Just lays down. They don’t eat either when I feed them

 

[Spookyclemente]

@Jay Hemdal what do you think?

A fish that holds still that long for a cleaner shrimp almost always has some parasite on its skin, they can feel the parasites, so they try to get the shrimp to clean them. However, cleaner shrimp cannot cure these diseases, they just can’t get at all of the parasites.

However, flukes and ich, the two most common cause for fish to pose in front of cleaner shrimp, do NOT cause the fish to stop eating (until very late in the infection) so something else is also going on here.

Are you seeing any other fish posing in front of the shrimp, or scratching their skin? If so, there are probably flukes in the tank. Praziquantel can be used to treat those, but again, those aren’t why the anthias aren’t eating.

Also should I get the Lyretail anthias that wants to get cleaned ir both in a tank with copper or metroplex? I don’t have prazi currently.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

Also should I get the Lyretail anthias that wants to get cleaned ir both in a tank with copper or metroplex? I don’t have prazi currently.

Of those three meds, I think Metroplex might be the most useful, as I mentioned, not eating isn’t really a symptom of external parasites, but metro targets internal protozoans. You can’t dose it in a tank with vitals or invertebrates though.

 

[Spookyclemente]

Also should I get the Lyretail anthias that wants to get cleaned ir both in a tank with copper or metroplex? I don’t have prazi currently.

Of those three meds, I think Metroplex might be the most useful, as I mentioned, not eating isn’t really a symptom of external parasites, but metro targets internal protozoans. You can’t dose it in a tank with vitals or invertebrates though.

So set up a 5 gal and put the make and female in there and treat?
I have a LTA so I’ll have to get the 5 gal out

 

[Jay Hemdal]

So set up a 5 gal and put the make and female in there and treat?
I have a LTA so I’ll have to get the 5 gal out

Well, I don’t see things changing for these fish unless you try something.

setting up a small tank like that on the fly is pretty tricky. Do you have any biomedia that you can transfer over to the new tank?

 

[Spookyclemente]

So set up a 5 gal and put the make and female in there and treat?
I have a LTA so I’ll have to get the 5 gal out

Well, I don’t see things changing for these fish unless you try something.

setting up a small tank like that on the fly is pretty tricky. Do you have any biomedia that you can transfer over to the new tank?

I was just gonna put them in the tank with a small hang on filter with just sponges so I can have some kinda filter. No good?
Never had to do this before.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

I was just gonna put them in the tank with a small hang on filter with just sponges so I can have some kinda filter. No good?
Never had to do this before.

You need done source of beneficial bacteria to keep the ammonia level down. Some established tanks use filter fiber, you can transfer some of that to the small tank. If you have some small pieces of live rock, that has beneficial bacteria on it as well.

 

[Spookyclemente]

I was just gonna put them in the tank with a small hang on filter with just sponges so I can have some kinda filter. No good?
Never had to do this before.

You need done source of beneficial bacteria to keep the ammonia level down. Some established tanks use filter fiber, you can transfer some of that to the small tank. If you have some small pieces of live rock, that has beneficial bacteria on it as well.

So use sponge to filter the water and throw a rock and some sand in there too?

 

[hatfielj]

So you're going to take a fish that's not eating out of the display and put it into a treatment/QT tank? I don't think that will end well. They won't eat there either.
I'm assuming these are new fish? If so, you gotta try some different foods to get them eating first. Have you tried Rod's food? I recently got a trio of Lyretails and, after a couple of days, they started going after small bits of food. Now they go nuts for anything I put in the tank. I initially got them eating using Rod's Food, the coral feed version, which has smaller bits. I think having a lot of other active fish that eat very aggressively helps. There's a sense of competition among the fish and that feeding frenzy/excitement helps entice the slower eaters to go for it too.

 

[Jay Hemdal]

So use sponge to filter the water and throw a rock and some sand in there too?

Yes. But this is a “Hail Mary” sort of thing. As I said, if you do nothing, they aren’t going to just start feeding on their own, something is suppressing their feeding response. However, we don’t have a clear diagnosis as to why they aren’t feeding, so this is just something to try.

 

[Spookyclemente]

So you're going to take a fish that's not eating out of the display and put it into a treatment/QT tank? I don't think that will end well. They won't eat there either.
I'm assuming these are new fish? If so, you gotta try some different foods to get them eating first. Have you tried Rod's food? I recently got a trio of Lyretails and, after a couple of days, they started going after small bits of food. Now they go nuts for anything I put in the tank. I initially got them eating using Rod's Food, the coral feed version, which has smaller bits. I think having a lot of other active fish that eat very aggressively helps. There's a sense of competition among the fish and that feeding frenzy/excitement helps entice the slower eaters to go for it too.

Well the fish also is non stop wanted to be cleaned so I would rather treat for something then wait for it to kill my whole tank if it’s anything. I have tried so many different foods. I have the garlic stuff too but no luck

 

[Spookyclemente]

So use sponge to filter the water and throw a rock and some sand in there too?

Yes. But this is a “Hail Mary” sort of thing. As I said, if you do nothing, they aren’t going to just start feeding on their own, something is suppressing their feeding response. However, we don’t have a clear diagnosis as to why they aren’t feeding, so this is just something to try.

What else can I do?

 

[Jay Hemdal]

What else can I do?

You could try treating for flukes in the display tank with praziquantel. As I said, not eating generally isn’t a symptom of flukes, but the cleaning symptoms do line up with that.