help........lion fish cannot eat

[raylau]

Starting about 4 days ago, my lionfish cannot eat anything. He is willing to eat every time I feed him but he seems like he cannot open his mouse or something is stuck in his throat. I only feed my fishes once a day and I currently only have one damsel and one lionfish in the 45g tank. All readings are fine. My question is how can I help my lionfish? Is he infected by internal diease in his throat? Any info. is appreciated.

 

[gobylover]

Is he showing any other signs of disease?What are you feeding him?How is his color?My Lion would also not eat a couple days at a time,not 4 though.Hopefully hes just not hungry.

 

[fishinator]

What have you been feeding him? I can't say that I know a whole bunch about lion fish. I have a Radiatta that refused to eat anything but live food for a while. It took me three months to get him to take frozen. While researching this, I read an article by a guy who says he had done hundreds of postmortems and seen more lion fish die from having the "feeder fish" skull stuck in their digestive tract. He specifically mentioned the Goldfish feeders, but I assume anything with a bony structure too large for their gullet could cause this problem. I hope this is not the case for you as I can't imagine what could be done to help him. GL

 

[coralgyrl]

I have a dwarf lionfish and I feed him frozen brine shrimp, but to make him think that it is live, I put it into a shot glass and barely put water in it, just enough to get the shrimp to come apart and then put it into the tank. He eats hearty!! Hope this helps.

 

[beth]

I'm going to move this over to the Agressive Forum where you might get more help with this particular species of fish. One of our Moderators, Lionfish it so happens, can probably help you best with this problem.

 

[@knight]

are you noticing any other behavioral differences other that it's refusing food?
have you tried a different food?
are there any visible signs or otherwise that might indicate an infection?

 

[skirk]

It could be from a number of things but I'd say it sounds like he might have dislocated his jaw (a common problem with them volitan's). May happen with the dwarf's also but I never heard of such a case. Anyways, look to see if his jaw seems funny. If it goes on long enough then you will notice your lion become interested in eating but can't do so cuz of his problem. This once happened to me and the lion hadn't ate for 6weeks. It went on to where I eventually tried to put my hand in his mouth and fix it myself, but with no luck. Although I heard of this working before. Hopefully it is just a mood thing or a minor problem. I'm just letting you know of a worst case scenerio that almost surely ends up being fatal. So check it out. HTH and is not the case cuz it's an sad experience to go through. Just my 2cents.

 

[skirk]

Forgot to add...If it is dislocated or something then in my case the upper jaw hung a little bit and didn't quite fit up in place like it was suppose to. This happened to him while gulping down some food. Once again this may not be the case but it's what I thought of when I read your post. HTH