What do cleaner wrasses eat?
- Thread starter portugee
- Start date
musipilot
Member
Most of them will adapt and eat very small particles of almost any prepared food. One VERY important thing with this species is to have a rock with holes in it for them to sleep. Many of them will die from stress if they dont' have a 'safehouse' to sleep in. As soon as the lights go out they will shoot head first into a hole, and spend the night.
If you are not sure if there is enough parasitic food for them, they will take very small (and I mean really, really small, like pinhead size) pieces of clam, squid, and shrimp. We have had one for over 18 months, and he's doing great. The common cleaner wrasse (the most common one found in LFS) will change color at about a year of age, they become a milky white with a black stripe, and lose their blue. Still beautiful!
If you are not sure if there is enough parasitic food for them, they will take very small (and I mean really, really small, like pinhead size) pieces of clam, squid, and shrimp. We have had one for over 18 months, and he's doing great. The common cleaner wrasse (the most common one found in LFS) will change color at about a year of age, they become a milky white with a black stripe, and lose their blue. Still beautiful!
ophiura
Active Member
When I worked at an LFS, it was clear that the overwhelming majority died within the first week, and do not readily take to any sort of prepared foods. Some do, and do pretty well. I agree with the post above that they are best left in the wild.
I hope you have one that decides to eat, and that the triggers do not mess with it. The store has a cleaner wrasse in a very large tank with a big grouper, eels, jacks, small trigger, puffers and even some nasty remoras. While the remoras hunted down some larger fish, no one messes with the cleaner wrasse.
I hope you have one that decides to eat, and that the triggers do not mess with it. The store has a cleaner wrasse in a very large tank with a big grouper, eels, jacks, small trigger, puffers and even some nasty remoras. While the remoras hunted down some larger fish, no one messes with the cleaner wrasse.
j21kickster
Active Member
i have one in my 30 for 8 months now, at my work, almost everyone is eating right from the start. especially meaty foods, i've heard the are hard to feed but i havent seen it in real life yet. they will even got for the flake food. when i fee frozen VHP they go nuts with it. we have a few die but most dont. ask to see the fish fed before you consider buying one.