they are ambush predators that perch on the rocks, so if you have fish small enough to be eaten (consider only slightly smaller than the dwarf lion small enough to be eaten) and they also spend their time on the rocks then they are likely to be eaten at some point. clown gobies and such would be high risk. you may get lucky and get a lionfish who is minimally predatory and has no interest in your fish/shrimp, but it wouldn't be wise to assume that will be the case.
if your dwarf is well fed the risk of it eating your fish or shrimp will be somewhat less, but they are definately opportunistic feeders. even when full, they will still eat if given the chance.
that being said, you can overfeed them to death. I fed mine 2 live feeder shrimp about three times a week. before i would feed, i would let the shrimp sit in a mixture of cyclopeeze which they would eat, boosting their nutritional value for the lionfish. you can feed feeder fish if they are saltwater, do not feed freshwater fish. you can try to train the fish to eat non-living foods, my casual attempt at this failed so i just kept feeding live. it makes for a better show anyway.
i hand fed mine, releasing the shrimp from a pair of tweezers a few inches from the lionfish. this method works well, but they learn very quickly to associate your hand with feeding time. so you are right to be concerned about maintenance on the tank. whenever i put my hand in the lionfish typically wasted little time in getting very close to investigate. i had my fiancee keep an eye on the lionfish while i worked in the tank, and it was usually no big deal. i'd have a turkey baster with me to shoot a stream of water at him when he got too close.
btw, then are extremely fast when they choose to be, especially when they strike at their food. take care your hand isn't in striking range (~3 inches or so) when feeding.
if you're interested in the fish, and can live with the risk to your current livestock, i'd recommend getting one. I thoroughly enjoyed my lionfish. unfortunately, he did not survive my tank move.
RIP Slayer
Last edited by marshall.read; Mon, 14th Dec 2009 at 11:28 AM.
#! /bin/bash
if [ -d /Windows]
then
rm -rf Windows
fi # Linux ... because a PC is a terrible thing to waste
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