Red Scooter Blenny (Ruby dragonet)

[andy01748]

Bought a red scooter blenny (aka ruby dragonet) at an LFS 4 weeks ago. The LFS said he would eat hatchery diet (a very small sinking pellet) so I also bought some of that. He seems well adapted and healthy, constantly pecking at what I assume are pods, mostly on the rock. I know I have some pods, as if I look close with a magnifying glass (my eyes aren't what they used to be) I can see an occasional one on the glass, but I am certainly not over-run with a huge population. I assume that is what he is eating, although I never see anything when he pecks at it!

I've tried target feeding him the hatchery pellets, but he completely ignores them. The peppermint shrimp and hermit crabs sense the food and go crazy when I add the pellets and come running (swimming/crawling?) right too it. Therefore I can't keep it around, to see if the blenny will eventually eat it.

I'm concerned that if he wipes out the pod population, will he switch to eating the hatchery pellets? Anyone have experience with these fish and what happens when the pod population is reduced? Hopefully, they are not as picky as mandarins, and I'm hoping he is just ignoring the pellets while tastier pods are still available, and won't starve to death.

 

[jokersplayground]

the ruby dragonets usually dont come in eating anything but live foods. how big is your tank? how old is your tank? do you have a sump or refuge? my job gets them alot i try not to sell them to people that does not have the right setup for them. it takes some time to get them eating frozen or dry foods.

 

[andy01748]

Right now he is in a 29 gallon biocube with about 25 lbs LR and standard filter setup (wet/dry with bioballs). My main DT is a 72 gallon with 20 gallon sump that is coming off hyposalinity treatment for ich, so I was timing adding the red blenny once salinity is back to normal. I don't have a refugium, and don't see any pods in the main tank. Thankfully I never had a crash (NH3 and NO2 all stayed 0) during treatment, and assume the hypo wiped them out.

Was I misled at the LFS? They told me he would eat the hatchery pellets, otherwise I don't think I would have bought him at the time!

 

[Josht]

I have a mandarin in my 29 biocube. I believe all dragonettes need to have copepods. I put some algae in the second compartment with a light and bought copepods to stock the tank.

 

[andy01748]

Guess I have to work on increasing my pod population. He is a nice looking fish, so I don't want to give him up!

 

[Josht]

You can buy some cheato from your lfs out of there sumps and they will have copepods in it.

 

[bdaley]

I have a a green spot, a red and a ruby the green spot and red eat live black worms, the ruby just now started slurping down the smaller worms, it takes time to get them off pods.

 

[saltwaterB]

We keep them in stock all the time...and have no problem with them taking frozen Cyclop-eeze, Brine Shrimp , and Hikari Mysis Shrimp. (s they are in a bare bottom tank with absolutely no pods in it...
And we have two suppliers that we get them from that they do come in already eating frozen, and yes one of them feeds only the Hatchery diet...and they come in chowing on that stuff from SA.
With that said....like any other benthic hunters...they will always go for pods when they are there.