# How often do you feed your fish



## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

I am having a terrible time getting the feeding down for my fish. I am almost to the point where I don't add anything. I feed one small pinch (maybe 10 each) of flake, 2 sinking wafers and about 1/4 of a cube of frozen brine shrimp once in the afternoon right after work and there is still food on the floor of the tank in the evening that I have to vacuum out just before the lights go out. I have a dozen Cherry shrimp, 1 SAE, 3 otto's. 4 rummynose tetras, 3 royal black emperor tetras, 4 corry cats, 2 dwarf puffers, and a dwindling population of pond snails.

dale


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## joephys (May 9, 2006)

I feed once a day, but there is plenty of food in the tank for the fish between algae for the algae eaters, snails for the loaches and the worms that seem to be thriving in my substrate.


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## chiahead (Dec 18, 2004)

maybe I am doing it wrong but I feed every 3 days or so. But heavy.


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## turtlehead (Nov 27, 2004)

I feed twice a day on an automatic feeder on all my tanks. Minimal amounts though, just enough to make every fish full.


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## hoppycalif (Apr 7, 2005)

I feed once a day, skipping a day every few days. All I feed is a couple of sinking tablets and a small pinch of flake food. The food all vanishes in a few seconds. I have:
9 "lambchop" Rasboras
3 "yoyo" loaches
about 12 guppies
30-40 cherry shrimp
1 cory cat
1 otocinclus
1 cardinal tetra


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## joephys (May 9, 2006)

chiahead said:


> maybe I am doing it wrong but I feed every 3 days or so. But heavy.


It depends on the type of fish. Some fish, mostly larger predators, eat about on that schedual. Most small fish eat very small ammounts throughout the day. The best way would be to feed very very little 3-4 times a day, but most people have a hard time feeding like that so they feed a little once or twice a day.


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## david lim (Mar 30, 2004)

I feed my fish whenever I remember, which averages out 2-3 times/ week. ONce a week they get bloodworms and the rest of the time they get ground up spectrum pellets (I have mostly microrasboras). The pellets last a long time ground up . The fish are great! I've had some of my guys for 3-4 years and they're going strong.


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## yoink (Aug 31, 2005)

I feed my fish once a day, skipping a day here and there. You might try feeding a little less, like only one algae wafer and only offer brine shrimp on occasion.


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## sarahbobarah (Sep 5, 2005)

I feed a few times a day whenever I'm walking by the tank and want to watch them eat. I like watching animals eat.


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## trenac (Jul 16, 2004)

frozenoak said:


> I am having a terrible time getting the feeding down for my fish. I am almost to the point where I don't add anything. I feed one small pinch (maybe 10 each) of flake, 2 sinking wafers and about 1/4 of a cube of frozen brine shrimp once in the afternoon right after work and there is still food on the floor of the tank in the evening that I have to vacuum out just before the lights go out. I have a dozen Cherry shrimp, 1 SAE, 3 otto's. 4 rummynose tetras, 3 royal black emperor tetras, 4 corry cats, 2 dwarf puffers, and a dwindling population of pond snails.
> 
> dale


I personally think you are feeding to much for the amount of fish you have. I would cut back to half of what you are feeding now. You should not have to clean food off the bottom ever night.

I feed only once a day, except weekends I feed twice a day. I alternate between flake and frozen foods, feeding frozen on Tues, Thurs, sundays and flake all other days. I feed my bottom feeders, algae eaters & shrimp 2-3 times a week. I gave a pinch of flake and half a cube of frozen.


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## itchy201 (Aug 28, 2006)

I feed my guys 5-6 times a week. I do alternate what i feed one day would be flakes and pellets and the next day would be frozen blood worms. I over feed on the blood worms because of my baby lung fish who is kinda "special" when it comes to eating. It takes him forever to find the blood worms.


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## tfmcder (Feb 22, 2006)

I feed mine once a day and sometimes skip a day here and there. I give them the "usual" amount, just enough so they are done in about three minutes. My Rams let me know when I'm not feeding enough because they will dig up my plants looking for food when they are really hungry.


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## tropism (Jul 21, 2006)

I think the standard advice is to "feed only as much as the fish can eat in 3-5 minutes", but that may or may not work, depending on how fast the fish eat, type of food (tablets obviously take longer to eat), etc. I agree with trenac's & yoink's advice...

In my tank I have 12 neon tetras and three 3" SAEs. I once shook some flakes directly from the can into the tank and accidentally dumped "enough for 3 minutes" into the tank... I planned on just scooping out what wasn't eaten, but to my horror, in less than three minutes 4 or 5 of the neons gorged themselves to the point that they were floating on their sides at the top of the tank unable to swim!  I was terrified that I had killed them, but they were swimming again (still *very* fat) 30 minutes later.

Usually I feed Hikari "Micro Pellets" once a day, and only what they can eat in less than 30 seconds. Sometimes I give the tetras some newly hatched brine shrimp, but I almost never feed my SAEs anything special (and they never look the least bit skinny).


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## cs_gardener (Apr 28, 2006)

I feed my fish morning and evening. I alternate between several different foods: flakes, crisps, frozen, freeze dried, and I usually add something sinking once a day for the bottom feeders. I know I've been feeding too much when I suddenly notice an explosion in the snail population.  

My fish are healthy and my angel pair keeps spawning about once every 2 weeks, so this system works for me. [smilie=r:


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## turtlehead (Nov 27, 2004)

I alternate too, one day it's pellets, next day its brine shrimp... etc.. I think you are feeding too much too Dale.


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## Raul-7 (Feb 4, 2004)

Fasting your fish for a couple of days is never a bad idea - it helps them digest, take in nutrients and relieve themselves better than feeding every single day. You'll find that your fish rarely suffer from disease as much as overfed fish do. 

I feed my fish about every 2-3 days a week. Sometimes more or less depending on the particular group. Usually once after the lights are off (nocturnal plecos), but when I feed them - I give them a pretty good amount, which goes back to the fact of conditioning them to breed.

HTH.


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## JanS (Apr 14, 2004)

I feed once per day, and skip a day or two per week, unless there are fry in the tank that need more feeding.

How much I feed depends on how much gets eaten. It normally disappears within a minute or two, but if it's gone before that and the fish still look hungry, I'll pinch another small portion into the tank.

As for the bottom feeders, they get fed 3 - 4 times per week; more if their tummies are looking sunken, and less if they are fat and getting lazy.

Dale, if you're having to vacuum leftovers from the tank, it's probably counter productive, although it's good that you're vacuuming it out, rather than letting it decompose in there.
Your flake feeding doesn't sound like too much, but I would cut back on the sinking wafers, or feed them at night separately, rather than at the same time as the flake or frozen food. I would also alternate the flake and frozen food on different days, so they get a better variety.



david lim said:


> I feed my fish whenever I remember, which averages out 2-3 times/ week. ONce a week they get bloodworms and the rest of the time they get ground up spectrum pellets (I have mostly microrasboras). The pellets last a long time ground up .


David, how do you grind the spectrum? I sort of crumble it in my fingers before feeding the little guys, but if you have a better method, I'd be happy to try it.


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## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

Thanks for the help. I think I am going to start alternating frozen and flakes and feeding the sinking wafers at night.

I forgot to add my endler's to my list of fish. I tend to forget they are in there. I don't know why, they are the most "in your face". And they just had babies.

Thanks again,
dale


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## Burks (May 25, 2006)

I'll feed mine once a day. I normally go home every other weekend so that leaves them nearly 72 hours without any food (unless they are algae eaters). It hasn't seemed to bother them any. I do like to skip a day once a week if I'm not going home that weekend. 

Pellets I just put them in the lid and use the end of my pocket knife to grind them up. My guppies go nuts for them.


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## joephys (May 9, 2006)

The advice to feed as much as they can eat in 3-5 minutes is bunk in my opinion. My fish eat for about 5 seconds and then they ignore food. 3 minutes of food is way too much.


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## BryceM (Nov 6, 2005)

"How much" really depends. I used to feed my piranha a few feeder fish twice a month or so. The wait never seemed to bother him.

I typically feed the "community fish" flakes once day. They usually clean it up in 90 seconds or so. Once or twice a week I substitute frozen brine shrimp or mosquito larvae. If I'm growing out small fish they get the "good stuff" more frequently.

I've left fish unfed for up to a week before without any visible problems.


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## Jdinh04 (Oct 7, 2004)

When I used to have a lot of fish back then, I would feed them twice a day. One time would be when I wake up and one time before I go to sleep.


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## erijnal (Apr 5, 2006)

For my otocinclus, 1/8th of a Hikari algae wafer per otto before the lights go out, two or three times a week.

For my 20 or so boraras brigittae, either two to three flakes crumbled up in my fingers as small as I can get them, or four granules of Tetramin grounded by placing them in a folded index card and crushing it, or 8 granules of Hikari Micro Pellets ground in a similar fashion. I also grind small pieces of Sinking Wafers and Crab Cuisine for them once in a while. The fish are usually fed daily, unless I overfeed some by accident, which is really easy to do since they're all over the aquarium and the food doesn't always get distributed equally.

Rather than going by a time limit, I've heard somewhere that you should try to feed fish as much food as how big their eyes are. I'm not sure if that meant one eye or both eyes, but either sounds pretty reasonable since that's probably around how big the fish's stomach is. Then again, sometimes I feel that's too little.


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## MiSo (Nov 4, 2005)

once a day, a mix of flakes and sinking pellets.
just enough flakes to dissapear in about two minutes.
and i never see leftover pellets on the ground so i'm okay.


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## eklikewhoa (Jul 24, 2006)

i feed twice and sometimes three times a day till i see a pudge in the belly.


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## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

I have been feeding about half of my usual the last couple days. They still seem to ignore the food I do add. I plan to feed as I am now for about a week then cut back if they still seem uninterested.

Thanks for all the help.
dale


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## eklikewhoa (Jul 24, 2006)

if you are having a problem with them accepting foods starve them for a day to two.


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## newguy (Mar 18, 2006)

I feed exactly the same amount every day at noon thanks to the eheim autofeeder. My fishes all know to hang out at the same spot a few mins before the feeding. 

For those of you without a lot of time, the eheim autofeeder is truely a lifesaver and the only set-and-forget feeder i trust my fish to. if i didnt have this, my fish would be in terrible shape due to inconsistent feedings, as i work late a lot and sometimes dont come home on the weekends etc.


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## Ibn (Oct 20, 2004)

Really depends on what you're feeding and what you're feeding them to. I'm trying to squeeze some size on my fish right now, so I feed them whenever they're in front of the tank. 

At the moment, I'm going through about an oz. of worms per day, whether it be frozen or live.


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## sarahbobarah (Sep 5, 2005)

Wow. An ounce per day. Do you keep them in your fridge?


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## banderbe (Nov 17, 2005)

yeah i feed once a day.. but sometimes I go for a few days without feeding.. then sometimes I'll go every other day.. sometimes if I go out of town fish don't get fed for six, seven days. They are okay but beyond that who knows.. I feed enough that they eat it all in five minutes or so..


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## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

They are not exactly hard to get eating but its more like they are eating something else. All my fish are fat bellied most of the day and when I feed they just ingnore it.


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## Ibn (Oct 20, 2004)

Yup, the frozen stuff, I buy by the pound. Usually stick four 1# flatpacks in the freezer. 

With the live stuff, I buy 3 oz. and then stick those in a mini fridge.


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## frozenoak (Jul 30, 2005)

I might have to try live food. Just for the heck of it realy. I have never fed live food. What would be a good live food to start with?

dale


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## wiste (Feb 10, 2006)

> I might have to try live food.


You could try live brine shrimp. You might also try frozen blood worms. They seem to be a bit tastier than the frozen brine shrimp.


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## gabeszone (Jan 22, 2006)

I feed my fish only once a day flakes, and feed frozen red bloodworms every other day.


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## gpodio (Feb 4, 2004)

I feed no more than 2-3 times a week, but heavily when I do. Usually wafers, frozen prepped foods and flake... fresh veggies when there's leftovers from the kitchen  Nothing goes uneaten...


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## standoyo (Aug 25, 2005)

Anyone ever tried feeding ADA's AP-2. I've seen some really fat and fast cherry barbs in friend's tanks on strictly that.

I like to feed tabs, fun to watch all of them come and peck at it and it doesn't fly all over the place. Once a day for these guys. Denisoni, kalachroma, assorted tetras etc

My altums will only stare at that though. They love frozen bloodworms. I soak them in vitamins once awhile to give them a boost. These guys eat 2-3 times a day.


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