What do Lyretail Anthias eat?

[jasonrusso]

I have 3 new Lyretail Anthias. They are in their own tank at the moment. What do they normally eat? They spit out several different expensive pellets. They suck in and spit out PE Mysis (I think they do eat it from time to time. Maybe they are spitting out the shells?)

They were into Hikari Mega Marine for a couple of days, now not so much. I have Ocean Nutrition cyclops I am going to try later, but it's so small.

 

[Lavey29]

Mine eat any Hikari frozen or ROE fish eggs

 

[Jekyl]

Any time I have a picky eater my go to food is Rods brand fish eggs.

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Mine eat everything. I started them on frozen cyclops and live baby brine shrimp, then got them onto reef frenzy, then onto frozen mysis and frozen brine, and finally onto pellets and flakes.

 

[Cthulukelele]

Echoing everyone else things like pe calanus, live baby brine, and frozen cyclops can get them started but once acclimated they eat everything and their stomachs get quite a bit larger. Mine gobble down full chunks of clam and large mysis nowadays

 

[mtraylor]

They will eat anything. They love nori. You can break some in your hands or get nori pellets

 

[ninjamyst]

Pellets is not a good choice to start them with. PE mysis is too big for them. Get some Larry's frozen food or Hikari mysis which is much smaller.

Keep in mind lyretail anthias CAN be difficult to get eating but once they are eating, they are usually hardy.

I have 10+ in my 200g tank.

 

[jasonrusso]

Pellets is not a good choice to start them with. PE mysis is too big for them. Get some Larry's frozen food or Hikari mysis which is much smaller.

Keep in mind lyretail anthias CAN be difficult to get eating but once they are eating, they are usually hardy.

I have 10+ in my 200g tank.

Which Larry's? I have chunky for my fowler (I imagine that's not good) and nano.

 

[Cthulukelele]

Nano would be good to start lyretails on since they're planktivores with small stomachs

Which Larry's? I have chunky for my fowler (I imagine that's not good) and nano.

 

[mtraylor]

The nori pellets in which i'm referring too are like crack and irresistible to all my fish and anthias love them. Jumping around to get them. Its actually called Hikari seeweed extreme. They are about half the size of the end of a ball point pin, very tiny round balls that sicnk...so you can call them what you may. Highly recommend if you have never tried them.

Good luck

 

[Tcook]

You can also try PE calanus

 

[Cthulukelele]

You can also try PE calanus

This is the thing my lyretails liked most when acclimating to tank life

 

[jasonrusso]

I tried the cyclops and they seem to like it. The transitioning female (can I say that?) started chasing the other 2 as usual, but they all seemed to be knocking them off. The pieces just seem so small

 

[Cthulukelele]

I tried the cyclops and they seem to like it. The transitioning female (can I say that?) started chasing the other 2 as usual, but they all seemed to be knocking them off. The pieces just seem so small

Their natural diet is planktonic organisms you can barely see with the naked eye. They take some time to realize the larger offerings are actually food sometimes

 

[littlefoxx]

Artic pods is what I fed my anthias in between meals (I gave the tank a whole mix of foods) and they went nuts for that

 

[Labridaedicted]

Anthias prefer very frequent feedings of small foods. Mine will eat everything including pellets at this point, but by in large, your best bets are smaller partical foods. I reccomend cyclopeeze, ROE, mini mysis, or similar. Eventually they will branch out, but the biggie is for their optimal health, they really should be fed 3+ times a day. Mine I fees my tank appx 12 times daily to ensure optimal health of them and my Fairy/flasher wrasses.

 

[jasonrusso]

Their natural diet is planktonic organisms you can barely see with the naked eye. They take some time to realize the larger offerings are actually food sometimes

So the cyclops is probably a good meal. I feel like I would have to feed many times a day. Are they more pod based eaters?

 

[Cthulukelele]

So the cyclops is probably a good meal. I feel like I would have to feed many times a day. Are they more pod based eaters?

A little, but they mainly feed in the water column. I'd start off feeding them at least 2 or 3x a day, then as they get used to tank life they take bigger foods and do fine fed less times a day

 

[jasonrusso]

So they made it to the DT (had a bacterial outbreak that I took care of with API GC).

I started with Cyclops, then I went to PE Mysis, not they are eating whatever is small. I still plan on throwing a scoop of PE/cyclops in just to make sure they are getting something. They are eating all the scraps from the LRS.

 

[Miami Reef]

My favorite food for anthias is LRS fish frenzy. It’s very calorie dense and it’s a frozen food, so the fish are very attracted to it. It’s super nutritious for carnivores.