Orange Spotted Filefish

[McLovin]

I've been keeping an Orange Spotted Filefish in my aquarium for a number of months now and thought I'd share my experience.

First of all, this specific filefish had been kept with Copper Band Butterflies at the store -- I believe that keeping them with other fish is a good thing, helps them learn how to eat from another long-nosed companion.

I started her on live adult enriched brine shrimp with a turkey baster, she LOVES them! After a very, very short time, she would get very excited every time I put the turkey baster in the tank and would follow it around eagerly. Shortly thereafter I added enriched frozen brine, she ate these as well without any qualms whatsoever. Once I ran out of live, it was frozen only, added frozen rotifers, finely crushed flake, small frozen mysis and frozen cyclopeeze over time.

Many books will state that Orange Spotted Filefish will nip at and kill SPS. This has not been our experience. She does indeed nip at SPS, especially anything new, but she has not killed anything to date. She is by far the sweetest fish we have in our very peaceful tank. 

She now eats anything and everything. She's also far more interested in algae than any SPS. We have a 112 shallow reef tank with LPS, SPS and softies. She picks at both the LPS and SPS as well as hunts on the rocks but has not killed anything in the tank.

This is our experience and we are now looking for a male.

Matt P has successfully bred this fish as documented with Marine Ornamental Fish & Invert Breeders Association (Google it).

[McLovin]

Got a PM from my lfs, he just got in 4 orange spotted filefish, he's going to hold on to them for awhile till he knows they're healthy enough to sell. He'll be holding a male for us!

[McLovin]

We picked up all 4 Harlequins yesterday after work, they look great, not very emaciated at all.

We floated the bags in our DT when we got home, our resident female went nuts darting in and out of the bags, fanning her tail and flicking her little "horn". A club member swung by for a beer and to pick up 3 of the 4 files, he's keeping a male & female and holding the second female for another club member.

I tried feeding the male after acclimation and a little time to settle in, he was interested, it was a mix of everything including frozen cyclopeeze and rotifers. Today we're picking up live adult brine to start training, will post progress.

[Achilles]

Thanks for the info, I saw one at a LFS a few months ago and was going to jump, but I always do some research and with my tank primarly going to be sps from what I read this fish would have been a bad choice, but at the same time I do like pushing limits as fish don't read the internet or books.

Can you please post some pics?

[McLovin]

[Hookup]

Frigg'n awesome fish!

$1000's in SPS vs 1 fish... I would not have one.. but they are AWESOME!  Maybe in a 500gallon system where there were very big, mature SPS colonies to pick-at.. but even still...

DAMN, you have one of the best fish on the planet!  And I am the Jealous.. kinda...

[Achilles]

Amazing pic, thanks

[McLovin]

Just wanted to post an update, after a week in the display without any success, we moved both filefish to our fuge with NO SPS. Our lfs gave us a dead acro on which I smeared homemade fish mush twice a day, it didn't take long for the male to catch on. After a week, I cut the acro mush feedings to mornings only and fed him via the water column 2 or 3 times in the afternoon. In the 3rd week he really put on weight and in week 4, we moved him back to the DT.

However, the polyp extension on our acros in the DT have disappeared and hubby wants the FF moved.

I'm supposed to be getting a new tank at the office if all goes well (friggin' designers!) so they'll be coming to work with me. FF are grazers and eat throughout the day, I don't like the idea of leaving them at the office over weekends, especially long weekends, without sufficient food. We need to rethink this.