Orange marked goby - help

[sydbarrett]

Hi guys, I purchased an orange marked goby (Amblygobius decussatus) about a week ago and he really is not doing good. The store I bought him from quarantined him for me with copper for three weeks but when i picked him up he was extremely skinny. The guy at the store told me he has not been eating but this is normal because of the copper. Since I have gotten him he has ignored flake, pellets, frozen mysis and cut up scallop nor has he sifted any sand. Today I did see him dig a little which is a good sign I guess.  Behaviour wise he either sits on the bottom, or kinda hovers in the corner. He was very skittish the first couple days i had him but once i let the algae on the glass grow alittle he chilled out. He has no ick or any visible infections but his colours are quite faded. 

 

 

Water parameters are perfect, if anything my nitrates are alittle low. Aquarium is about 7 month old but has been fed amphipods, various species of copepods and phyto. Has gone through all the regular cycling process, algae, cyano, diatoms, etc, and the tank is quite stable.

 

Anyone have any ideas what to do with the little guy? I was under the impression he was a benthic sand sifter but in all honesty the more I watch him so more I find he behave similar or a hector or rainford goby. I'm really hoping he makes it, he would be the perfect fish to keep my sand bed nice and clean!

 

[Hazy]

I would try live baby brine shrimp... I just went through a hunger strike with my yellow clown goby and after 12 days he finally stated eating bbs. If you go that rout you should do it quickly though because it takeS about 2 days for the eggs to hatch after they have been rinsed and put in salt water  to hatch. I hope he makes it! 

[Tired]

BBS are worth a try if you can get some, sure. 

 

I've never heard of these guys, I had to look them up. The Wikipedia article on them is very short. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amblygobius_decussatus

In general, sand-sifters like this can be tricky to keep alive. They often won't eat prepared foods much, if at all, and wind up needing to feed entirely off of the sandbed. Live foods are a good try to get him eating. If that won't work, I would honestly try scattering some sort of fine, powdery food among the sand in his usual area- maybe he'll sift the sand and get it out. You might have to do extra water changes for awhile to compensate. Maybe you can teach him to eat food that you've just placed among sand, if you can teach him to associate a pipette or turkey baster with food. Or, heck, maybe tomorrow he'll start eating floating food. 

 

What does the whole tank look like? Does he have good places to hide? Wikipedia says they hide in invertebrate burrows, so a fake burrow might be a good option, maybe a piece of pipe or something. He could be scared. 

[TerraIncognita]

IME these sand sifters are super finicky.

 

they take an average of 1 week to settle.

 

also (from what I know about these guys) you have a goby type that burrows or uses other inverts burrows if he has 0 burrows he’s gonna naturally feel at risk of death until he can really get established.

 

He also is just a BAAAYYBBYYY 😄 he's so cute lol. let him get bigger, they sand sift once they're bigger if you're worried about sifting. If you look he can barely fit those grains in his mouth right now. Not so fun. I have had a baby sand sifter for 3 weeks and i've never seen him eat. but he's obviously getting sustenance. Just let him be unless he shows signs of real stress. But do try to give him a burrow.

[Tamberav]

I would get live worms to try.

 

In the future I would not but fish that are skinny and not eating. Copper can reduce apitite but copper should have been discontinued in a case like this. Shame on the LFS for selling a fish in such poor condition..once they get too skinny it can cause organ damage and no return.

 

Sand sifters see also not appropriate for nanos.

 

Only buy fish that are eating and behaving normally at the LFS. 

[sydbarrett]

through in a bottle of tigger pods, hopefully hell get into them.

[Tired]

Tigger pods are good to have, but he may not look for food in the water. I don't know how specialist they are. If he's one of the extreme specialist sand-sifters, he may never eat food that's not in the sand, because he won't have the instincts to catch it out of the water.

Worms are definitely a good idea. I forget if it's blackworms or whiteworms that last a decent amount of time in saltwater, but both of them make good fish food.

[Pod Your Reef]

I would suggest trying something like Tisbe Pods which hand out at the bottom of the tank or Apo Pods. 

[TerraIncognita]

hey Op. Hows he doin.

[sydbarrett]

On 8/20/2020 at 10:48 AM, TerraIncognita said:

hey Op. Hows he doin.

Hi Terraincognita, unfortunately he passed... wouldnt eat live pods or nothing. I have since picked up a ywg and  candy cane pistol shrimp. hopefully they will pair.