Struggling with Copperband Butterfly refusing to eat

[adam567890]

Hello all! I'm posting here because I am sort of at a loss. I have spent a good chunk of time over the past week that I have been acclimating my copperband butterfly combing over posts related to how finicky they are of eaters. I have gone down every rabbit hole I can find- from stray voltage to fish aggression, and I cannot seem to get this copperband to take a bite. I have tried blackworms, clams on the half shell, hatching brine shrimp, copepods and mussel. This fish seemed to be happy for the first two days in the tank, he was spending lots of time peering through my rockwork looking for food. I've even seen him mistake the 'whiskers' on my starry blenny for what I'm assuming was aiptasia and try to take a bite. I'm wondering if I need to supply him with aiptasia as the only source of food he will eat? I have not run into anything like this before. His behavior has changed from milling about slowly to running figure 8 laps along the back glass of the tank, which wouldn't be too concerning all by itself if it weren't for him becoming noticeably skinnier over the past 2 days that this behavior has occurred. I'm wondering if anyone has any ideas of anything else I can try to attempt to save this fish. I have freshwater dipped him within the past week as part of treatment for flukes for another fish recently added, the tank is also dosed with PraziPro. They are also being fed Metro + Focus with their daily frozen food, but that isn't added to the clams on the half shell or blackworms I try feeding daily.

 

[Lavey29]

Was it live blackworms? Was he eating at the LFS?

 

[DJF]

Masstick?

 

[Llyod276]

As a last ditch effort, try making a DIY feeder.
Take a 3/4 or 1" pvc about 1.5/2" long and drill a few holes in it say around 3/8"ish. Close off the bottom and glue a couple of magnets on it. Don't submerge completely, leave the top just at the waterline. Drop a 1/2cube of food in. Let it melt see what happens.
My copper, although he eats like a pig, does enjoy hunting nooks and crannies. I feed spirulina brine and mysis.

 

[Isaac Alves]

I used Masstick and mixed it with Selcon, garlic and Beta 1,3-Glucan Extract -- I put it into a Two Little Fishies Feeder pouch which seemed to work well. The other thing was to keep all pumps off and a block of mysis in the pouch as well.

 

[Llyod276]

Also i gotta say, that tank is looking new as hell. And did this attitude/eating habit change occur after the fresh water dip??? Cause man you might have fried the fishes comfort levels, and it just wants to go to the great reef in the sky...

 

[ninjamyst]

It's best to keep them in a tank all by themselves till you get them to eat. It will be hard to feed it if there are other fish competing for food.

 

[Isaac Alves]

It's best to keep them in a tank all by themselves till you get them to eat. It will be hard to feed it if there are other fish competing for food.

I second the above. Depending on the size of your tank you could use a large acclimation box with a large enough PVC section for a bed. I kept mine the acclimation box for a bit over a month while I watched him eat without competition.

 

[adam567890]

Was it live blackworms? Was he eating at the LFS?

They are live, they do seem to die within a few seconds of being in the water but they do twitch around quite a bit. I did not see him eat at the LFS, probably my first mistake

 

[adam567890]

As a last ditch effort, try making a DIY feeder.
Take a 3/4 or 1" pvc about 1.5/2" long and drill a few holes in it say around 3/8"ish. Close off the bottom and glue a couple of magnets on it. Don't submerge completely, leave the top just at the waterline. Drop a 1/2cube of food in. Let it melt see what happens.
My copper, although he eats like a pig, does enjoy hunting nooks and crannies. I feed spirulina brine and mysis.

I can give this a shot tonight!

 

[Stevorino]

I have only had success with copperbands when I put them in their own tank/QT and get them to eat first.

Of all the fish I have had in 10+ years, they are the most anxious at the start. Your tank is very new for a fish of this starting difficulty IMO. I've lost copperbands myself, so no judgment from me.

My special sauce has been live brine a couple days (in QT), then mix of live/frozen brine, then frozen brine. Once they are eating consistently for a couple weeks on frozen and fattening up, then I drop them in the display.

If it were me, I'd try to source live brine tomorrow. If not available, try to catch and return to LFS.

If it is available and doesn't eat in display, then try to remove and get to a separate tank. If separate tank is unavailable, return to LFS.

 

[Doctorgori]

shot in the dark, but maybe try worms again ... not sure a terrestrial worm has the right nutritional profile but anything is better than starvation

there is a very small earthworm, but not sure its in your area, there are also whiteworms. They can be often found sandwiched between fall leaves, usually maple ...might be too early/too cold for any decomposition in this years leaves to attract them this late in the fall

sometimes Aquabid or Ebay has cultures for sale

 

[adam567890]

Also i gotta say, that tank is looking new as hell. And did this attitude/eating habit change occur after the fresh water dip??? Cause man you might have fried the fishes comfort levels, and it just wants to go to the great reef in the sky...

The tank is relatively new; a few months at this point, I did fully cycle it and I keep tabs on every water parameter daily especially when something is stressed out like this; Ammonia is near zero, nitrates are high for my liking in the low .20s but i suspect its from the amount of food I've been trying in an effort to get the butterfly to eat. (I also test ph/alk/mag/calcium for my coral. Salinity is 1.025. I try and leave a half clam on the rockwork for him and spray some of the mussel/Rod's original mixture that i feed everyone into some nooks on the rock near what was his chosen archway. The freshwater dip was recent, 3 days maybe? His behavior change is what had me looking for ick/flukes on everyone, so i know it was before. I found some flukes on my coral beauty angel. Its a 75 with a 40 breeder sump with an Octo essence 130 skimmer, ive also got a fluval canister hooked up to the system.

 

[Llyod276]

Also remember this scenario, if you try for oh idk, moonish idol etc

 

[adam567890]

I have only had success with copperbands when I put them in their own tank/QT and get them to eat first.

Of all the fish I have had in 10+ years, they are the most anxious at the start. Your tank is very new for a fish of this starting difficulty IMO. I've lost copperbands myself, so no judgment from me.

My special sauce has been live brine a couple days (in QT), then mix of live/frozen brine, then frozen brine. Once they are eating consistently for a couple weeks on frozen and fattening up, then I drop them in the display.

If it were me, I'd try to source live brine tomorrow. If not available, try to catch and return to LFS.

If it is available and doesn't eat in display, then try to remove and get to a separate tank. If separate tank is unavailable, return to LFS.

I have a 10 gallon QT i use for coral but I didn't feel right quarantining a fish of his size in it. There is a local shop that has live brine on and off, last time I was there they were all out but I can try again tomorrow. I do have a completely empty 55 I could use in a pinch, but its bone dry with no rock or sand (or water...). I think these options would probably stress him more?

 

[adam567890]

I second the above. Depending on the size of your tank you could use a large acclimation box with a large enough PVC section for a bed. I kept mine the acclimation box for a bit over a month while I watched him eat without competition.

I was looking for acclimation boxes a few weeks ago, but I couldnt seem to find one that was acrylic and would house a fish of this size for any meaningful amount of time. Should I just grab some acrylic sheets and make one myself? Any good reccomendations?

 

[adam567890]

Also remember this scenario, if you try for oh idk, moonish idol etc

To be honest i've been keeping corals for years as well as some nano reef sized fish, I've got years of freshwater fish experience under my belt from when I was younger but as far as salt I've not gone with anything that gets bigger than about 4 inches until I set this tank up. I had a 55 that had clowns and wrasses for a number of years, but I heard it was not the ideal shape/size for any really meaningful fish and I was more focused on coral. I don't think i'm quite ready for any Idols; not only do I not have the space at the moment but I'm learning that these fish can be just as finicky if not moreso than some of the SPS/Acros i've kept

 

[Llyod276]

Hol' up bruh.
There's a coupla thangs i wanna get straight dawg.
1. Are you actively treating for some kinda disease???
2. What's this about flukes???
3. Get that fish rabbi/priest on standby???

I mean yeah you got problems bro, and death is the answer most likely. Strange behavior from these fish a norm. Like mine after dinner time, chases is reflection until bed time, about 2 hours later. He spends 2 hours in the am, playing with the clown fish. He went from peaceful, to thug life thanks to my other fish.

 

[Tamberav]

Always have live white worms on hand before trying a copperband. They are even better than the black. If they won’t eat those, they probably won’t eat at all.

You can order them online but I assume they won’t ship till Monday since we are getting near the end of the week.

 

[exnisstech]

I did not read all of the posts.

This is from a thread where I describe what works for me with CBB. Dropping them into a DT even if they ate at the lfs is a crap shoot IMO

IMO the only thing better than a CBB for aiptasia is two

IME they are not a fish to be dropped in a display and assume they will compete for food even if they were eating at a lfs. Mine are kept in observation QT with live rock with corals along with some aiptasia if I have a rock with some on hand. This is my observation QT

After a month or two of observing the fish and making sure it's eating well and fat I introduce it to the DT using a modified reptile carrier as an acclimation box. I add some rock from the QT to the box so it feels more like home for the fish. I feed the acclimation box which has holes in the sides that food can fall through. This makes sure the CBB gets food and all the other fish come up to get food but the CBB always gets food but it gives the fish the illusion it's competing for the food. If these fish are not willing to compete for food in the water column they will perish.

The acclimation box in the DT

And after removing the lid so the female can go introduce herself. I left the box on for 9 days before removing the lid.

My CBBs will not touch pellets or flake food, only frozen or live with PE mysis being a favorite of the frozen.
It takes time and work to be succesful with these fish but its worth the effort for me. I've not seen them touch a coral. The female was in my acro tank for several months prior with no known coral nipping there either.
Sorry for the rambling, maybe someone will find something usefull in all the noise.

PS I keep peppermint shrimp in two other tanks that keep the DT aiptasia free. I've not seen them bother coral but I don't keep them with fleshy lps.

This is the box I use

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