help: weaning a lion fish off live food

[eleyan]

I have had this antenatta lion for about a month now. He looks well adjusted now and is eating live ghost shrimp and gold fish. I'm trying to wean him off live food so he can get a better diet. Based on what the guys at the LFS told me, I should starve him for 3-4 days and then he will go for the frozen stuff. I tryed this twice so far, but this guy doesn't even look interested. I tryed both krill and silversides. I tryed wiggling the fish at the surface of the water and tried using a stick. He starts to look interested when I first but the food in, but then he just goes back to his spot. If I drop a live ghost shrimp, he pounces on it right away though.
Should I go for 5-6 days, or is that too long? or is there another technique I should use?

[Richard]

When you give him live goldfish, hold them by the tail and wiggle them at the surface like you did the silversides. The goal is to get him to start coming up to the surface whenever it's feeding time. Once he starts doing that you can just hold a goldfish over the water and drop it straight at him, he'll start grabbing it the second it hits the water. Then you can start tricking him by dropping a piece of krill instead and it will be in his stomach before he realizes what it was he just swallowed. Eventually he'll just take krill all of the time. Sounds strange but has worked for me.

[Richard]

Oh yeah, once you have a lionfish that practically eats out of your hand err...Be careful at feeding time!

[Ram_Puppy]

if you haven't already discovered wetwebmedia.com, check it out. Here is some great reading on lionfish, feeding (and more if you click the links on the page.)

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/lionfdgfaqs.htm

[eleyan]

Thanks for all the info. I'll try holding the live goldfish next time I feed him