Brachyplatystoma juruense : need advice to feed a baby one

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

Hi you all,

I received last Friday a (yet) tiny cat of 3 inches : Brachyplatystoma juruense

the goal is to drop it into my 10'000 liters in a few months, when it'll be a bit more able to survive against Cichla, Potamotrygon, Myleus and Arowana's... At the moment, it's in my 720 liters, safe from all eventual predators...

I've tried a lot of foods, unsuccesfully till now...

shrimps, mussels, anchoirs, octopus (in tiny bites), brine shrimps, red mosquito larvae, flakes, Sera Diskus pellets (in tiny bites too)... I'm a bit out of good ideas to feed this baby one...

No sign of stress, a normal way of swimming, a natural static posture on hardscape into the current, sometimes, it goes around the tank, like in search for food... but I've been unable to see it eating anything... and its belly is not alarming, yet... but, I'd be glad to see it swallow something...

I will try tonight to feed it at night, when altum angels will be sleeping...

any tip to help ? Thanks in advance...

[Bas Pels, posts: 1920]

I'd suggest something living

The fish are predators, and predators will chase and eat - even involuntarily - anything what tries to escape them

only later will they be able to learn to eat dead, unfrozen or even dried food

[Richard B, posts: 6307]

An appropriately sized earthworm is generally hard to ignore for fish like this. Was it eating where you got it from & if so what?

I used to feed ours on small pieces of white fish (even when small) which i used to wave in front of it held by small tweezers. You could see it sense the food and twitch a few times, then a lightning fast lurch and the food was gone

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

thanks for the tips...

I'm going to try the earth worms bites, tonight... I should easily find some in my garden.

yesterday, I tried mealworms... a success for the angels... less for the Brachyplatystoma... let's see this morning, when lights will start up, if it hunted this night

[Richard B, posts: 6307]

I didn't have much success with Brachyplatystoma and mealworms.

The only thing i've kept that was crazy for mealworms was paratilapia polleni and oxydoras niger (who used to vacuum up whole bags worth and deprived all his/her tankmats lol)

[Redtailrob, posts: 293]

Don't worry too much Eitof.
These fish can go several weeks without food.
They tend to take a while to settle down before they start feeding in the aquaria.
Make sure that nothing is chasing or stressing out your new purchase.
A happy Jurense will start sitting up on his/her fins in the flow & will then be "on alert" for food items.
Again dont worry too much if you dont see this for a while as they will become very active @ Lights out like most cats.
As mentioned on here try small live foods just before(a few minutes)lights out with such items as small Earthworm, chopped worm, Small Rivershrimp, Live Bloodworm etc & then check again in the morning
Let us know how you get on

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

Thanks for sharing your informations Redtailrob (and the others, of course). I'm quite confident about an adult to stay without feeding several days (weeks ?). But I tend to worry about a 2-3 inches baby, which seems very fragile...

What conforts me, is when you write

A happy Jurense will start sitting up on his/her fins in the flow & will then be "on alert" for food items.

I can see this behaviour from the start... even if there is no suitable food in the flow for the moment.

So I'll try bites of earthworms tonight... and a friend of mine can provide me guppies fry... let's test it asap... I'll keep in touch

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

I didn't have much success with Brachyplatystoma and mealworms.

The only thing i've kept that was crazy for mealworms was paratilapia polleni and oxydoras niger (who used to vacuum up whole bags worth and deprived all his/her tankmats lol)

Cichlas and Arows like it very much... But Cichlas like anything that hits the surface... always funny to see the Arows trying to catch the floating mealworms... they kind of twist their "neck" to catch the worm... most of the time, the worm goes back to the surface, floating... they go mad ! At last, they swallow it from under, with a huge mouth opening !

[Viktor Jarikov, posts: 2280]

I am with Rob. Even for a small (but healthy and in good shape) baby, give it at least a week to adjust. 2 weeks is not unheard of. 3... then I'd be a bit worried.

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

thanks... I'll do that... let's wait and see...

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

the beast had eaten... 7 frog tadpoles (safely caught in my own pond) in about 12 hours... and a bit of brine shrimps too...

I isolated it in a pending box... it's much easier for it to find food...

let's wait and see. I'll keep in touch.

[Richard B, posts: 6307]

the beast had eaten... 7 frog tadpoles (safely caught in my own pond) .

Great that the 'lil' fella has eaten

Were the tadpoles safe? - i think frogs often contain internal parasites, like tapeworms (over here in the wild anyway). Maybe tadpoles are too small or are from an unaffected source?

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

I'm quite confident, I feed my fishes every spring from 2009 with this kind of "free" food and I never had a problem... they are raised from eggs in my "personnal" pond, right in the front of house... clean water, poor other insect or bugs or whatever in the pond... It's not 100% safe, but still, I'm confident based on background of 3-4 years with several fishes...

[Viktor Jarikov, posts: 2280]

Were the tadpoles safe? - i think frogs often contain internal parasites, like tapeworms (over here in the wild anyway). Maybe tadpoles are too small or are from an unaffected source?

Richard, what symptoms would you expect? How does one tell if their fish has just contracted a tapeworm, or has a worm, or has had it for a long time?

[Richard B, posts: 6307]

TBH i haven't a clue how it would manifest itself from any personal experience. I expect some bloat/swelling to be visible after time & if it was a tapeworm,segments can be seen in the poo i think. I remember someone quoting that 70%+ of wild frogs in the UK suffered from internal parasites, so it was never a good idea to use these as live food (apart from it being illegal over here anyway). Tadpoles themselves might not harbour any nasties until they develop considerably? and it depends on the source i suspect.

[MatsP]

If you use live food of "larger kinds" frequently, it's probably a good idea to medicate the tank with some antiworming medication - Flubendazole, Praziquantel and such like - they aren't hard on the fish, but do kill internal parasites.

--
Mats

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

If I'm confident on the quality of the tadpoles, I'm more worried about the Brachyplatystoma's health... He ate the tadpoles on Sunday, but nothing from then... and he's very very thin and more and more weak... on Sunday, after eating, it was quite active, even in daylight, and it was swimming around in its box... now, it's static and at the same place from yesterday, hardly move when I put something new into the box... I'm not so confident on its future...

I was told it's not that easy to feed a baby Brachyplatystoma... but I didn't get it would be such a mess... I'm not sure I'll be able to safe it

[Richard B, posts: 6307]

Juruense are not an active species IME, but i've never had one so small. Any luck with a piece of earthworm?

Edit: is the water quality in the box ok? Enough aeration, low nitrates etc

[ElTofi, posts: 500]

yes, water quality is fine... my altum, in the same water, are just thriving

I forgot to test the living earthworm bites ... I'll try this tonight for sure... Based on the fact that it didn't give a damn to the mealworms, I didn't even think of trying something else... And I was so released to see it eat the tadpoles... I wonder if it's not already too late...

it ate on Sunday, was very well "rounded belly" with the tadpoles but this morning, on the dawn light, it looks miserable and very weak... I'm not even sure to find it safe tonight when I'm back from job

[Viktor Jarikov, posts: 2280]

pics may help spot something you may be missing

at this point, I'd offer anything you can to him - try guppies too or whatever small feeders you got over there; worms are good, of course.

mine were 4"-5" TL when I got them but from I read and saw at LFSs, I would not say 3" brachies are hard to rear or very fussy.