Lionfish Troubles

[Jer-]

Hi everyone

I have an Antenna Lionfish, and i have been feeding him cut up Prawn and Fish... sometimes the occasional live feeder Mountain Minnows.

Well, a couple of weeks ago, I fed him a piece of Fish a little too big i think cos it seemed to be stuck in the lions mouth, but I didnt think too much of it afterwards cos he managed to swallow it.

Then this week, i tried feeding him a piece of prawn but he couldnt take it in properly. He would try to take the piece of food on the long tweezer ive always used to feed him with, but fails to even bite it off the tweezer. He used to have a great bite and would often impress me with his speed of doing so, but now his attempts are terribly weak.

After he tries to take to food and failing, his Upper jaw, or lip whatever u wanna call it protrudes out and does not seem to wanna retract.
So for the next 30 or more minutes his upper mouth seems to be stretched out....sorta like when the lions yawn but not as stretched out.
Any attempts to feed him again fails with him trying to bite at the food with an even weaker force, sometimes even missing at the food.

When the jaw does retract back to the normal shape, the upper surface of his mouth seems to have a clear bubble like thing in it.
Its like an air bubble is stuck in his upper mouth, and looking at the lion face on, its near the middle of the lions 2 eyes, and this area seems to be elevated more than it used to be looking at the lions face side ways.

Am i making any sense?

Have I dislocated the Lions upper jaw? has anyone had this problem before?
This lion is my baby and i sure hope that he wont have to deal with troubles feeding for his lifetime. He is only a small lion at about 8 or 9cm....approx

How can i fix this problem?

Thanks in advance

jeremy

 

[enjoiskater158]

Lionfish along with Large marine puffers sometime get a "Lockjaw" type disease. Did some research on it and it seems its not clear what causes it or how to sure it. But some places do say that the cause may be a chemical imbalence in one of the lionfishs glands because of a lack of Iodine. so some places recommend makes sure you iodine levels are normal. Also how often are you feeding him iv been researching lions for a while(I hope to get one sometime soon) and it seems that feeding them 3 times a week until you can see a slight bulg in their stomach's. Also try to feed him a few smaller peices of food instead of larger one's. Larger foods can rot in the lionfishs gastrointestinal tract and kill them hope this helps

 

[Lynden]

Agreed... try to feed smaller foods, and place them in the water column instead of on a stick.

 

[Jer-]

Ok. Thanks for the reply.

I feed him 3 times a week, and i admit maybe a little too much in one go sometimes. I will cut down the load per feeding.

Iodine deficiency, how can I increase the Iodine? Are there supplements available for iodine?

I have a small suspicion that the lion may have some air trapped in his upper mouth too, like ive mentioned. I am scared of not using a feeding tweezer or stick, cos everytime i let go of the food, it usually floats up to the surface, and the lion gets a gulp of air trying to eat food from the surface. I was thinking that may cause
problems no? cos lions dont usually eat off the surface and stuff... or am I just being a bit paranoid.

any more opinions welcome

thanks again

Jeremy