inticing an angel to eat seaweed

[blazehok68]

so ive had my pygmy for about 10 months, maybe longer, and ive never fed him algae sheets. i usually just feed all of my fish a staple pellet. bio blend by marine land. and then i throw in a cube of mysis every now and again. i always see my angel picking at the rocks, but there sint really anything on the rocks for him to eat, so i have decided to start putting in algae sheets. i do realize that i should have been doing this from the get go, and i really dont know what took me so long to start doing it.
so i put an algae sheet in today on a clip. its been in the tank for about 2 hours and the angel hasnt even noticed it. i did put it on the area of the glass where i see him nipping at occasionally. how can i entice him to start eating it?
another question is how can i get him to grow quicker without overfeeding and polluting the tank? since ive had him my other 3 fish have grown a lot quicker and seem to have maxed out in size. i know my angel can get bigger, ive seen one in my lfs thats probably 2-3 inches bigger than mine and really fat.
just a side note; my angel is not starving to death. although it seems he is lacking the optimal nutrition that his diet requires, his stomach is nice and fat and his colors are very brilliant. he is also only about 2 inches long. when i got him he was only about 1-1.5 inches long.
55 gal reef
90lbs lr
75 lbs ls
220 watts pc
2 fale perc clowns
1 royal gramma
1 pygmy angel
all corals are softies
all water is ro/di water
water changes include 5 gal weekly
topoffs done everyother day about 3 gals.

 

[ryanhayes9]

i origionally bought a clip with mine and put it in. i only feed a 1inch by 1 inch cube piece every day..... it took him like a day to notice it. they only grow to like 2 inches

 

[scsinet]

Different fish grow at different rates. You really can't make a fish grow faster. If he's not malnourished, then he'll grow as fast as he should.
Also, you need to be feeding your angel a diet that consists of at least some sponges. Angel fish feed primarily if not exclusively on them in the wild. Ocean Nutrition Angel Formula is what I feed my big Pomacanthus Angels, and that works very well... it's cheap too, and your other fish will readily eat it as well.

 

[blazehok68]

Originally Posted by ryanhayes9
i origionally bought a clip with mine and put it in. i only feed a 1inch by 1 inch cube piece every day..... it took him like a day to notice it. they only grow to like 2 inches
if they only grow to 2 inches then the one in my lfs dt has got to be on steroids.

 

[aquageek]

Try placing some garlic additive on the seawed, let it absorb and dry, then place it in the tank. I have used this method to get several angels, including a regal to eat seaweed.

 

[a sea k]

Im a newbie and probably in no position to give advice but I would consider changing your top off routine. I would think a 3 gal addition of fresh water would have a impact on the salinity level in a 55 gal system.Possibly a more stable environment will boost your angels appetite.

 

[chrisarc]

Ive had an Eibli angel in my 55 for about 4 months now. He will not eat off the clip,but if I cut the sheets into very small pieces they'll stay in the water column for awhile and he will eat em. Give it a try.

 

[scsinet]

Originally Posted by A sea K
Im a newbie and probably in no position to give advice but I would consider changing your top off routine. I would think a 3 gal addition of fresh water would have a impact on the salinity level in a 55 gal system.Possibly a more stable environment will boost your angels appetite.
It largely depends on whether they are doing this all at once or over the course of a day. My 55 reef sucks up that much but it's introduced slowly by means of a float switch. Even if they portioned it out over 2 or 3 top offs of 1 gallon each, I don't believe this will cause a problem... at least not enough to make the fish stop eating. Dumping 3 gallons into a water colum of 55 gallons will only swing the sg by 0.0015. Regardless, good catch on that, you could very well be right.

 

[blazehok68]

the topoffs are done a little bit at a time throughout the night after work.
and i did change my food. i started using formula 2 which is meant for herbivorous fish.