Just youtube chinese eating live fish with chopsticks pole and im sure you will not care to much about the snails lol 
is it wrong to feed fish live food
- Thread starter dudefish82
- Start date
I'll take your word for it lol.Just youtube chinese eating live fish with chopsticks pole and im sure you will not care to much about the snails lol
Are live feeders really necessary with the high quality dry fish food we have these days?. As for giving the occasional treat, why not feed thawed frozen fish or pinkies rather than live?. Feeding live feeders has got to be more for the owners benefit/entertainment and not the fishes.
Apart from keeping fish I also keep and breed reptiles and have seen similar discussions on reptile forums. With reptiles, feeding a live mouse for example is not only pretty hard to watch but it can also be very dangerous for the reptile trying to eat it as mice fight back but yet we feed live crickets and roaches to reptiles so some will ask what's the difference? Imo the difference is simply this, reptiles will not eat pellet food or feeder insects that are dead, the movement of their food items is what triggers their feeding instinct, with fish they will typically eat anything that hits the waters surface.
To me, if you want to feed your fish a treat, why not frozen shrimp, bloodworm or even the occasional frozen thawed pinkie mouse.
Just my 2c.
Cheers-
Dazz
Apart from keeping fish I also keep and breed reptiles and have seen similar discussions on reptile forums. With reptiles, feeding a live mouse for example is not only pretty hard to watch but it can also be very dangerous for the reptile trying to eat it as mice fight back but yet we feed live crickets and roaches to reptiles so some will ask what's the difference? Imo the difference is simply this, reptiles will not eat pellet food or feeder insects that are dead, the movement of their food items is what triggers their feeding instinct, with fish they will typically eat anything that hits the waters surface.
To me, if you want to feed your fish a treat, why not frozen shrimp, bloodworm or even the occasional frozen thawed pinkie mouse.
Just my 2c.
Cheers-
Dazz
Yes and no. There are lots of predatory fish that thrive when provided the opportunity to hunt as part of their natural instinct. I've delt with a few marine species in displays that will only take live food.
Parachromis always settle a bit better, for me, if allowed to hunt initially. I had my Freddy starve herself for about a week before I added a few small fish. Ate them, pellet trained and she hasn't missed a meal since ....
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The argument is no argument at all. Is it humane to feed live fish to other fish? Of course it is. Is it humane to feed fish live foods? Of course it is. But, and I cannot state these things more clearly, 1. There are better and healthier (for a host of reasons) options than live food - unless you are raising your own food (heck, I even have to swallow hard when I feed frozen processed food) Why risk your prized animals? And 2. If you are feeding live food for your own personal enjoyment, outside of the fact that some animals may be enriched by the hunt, then I have some problem with that. If the enjoyment is the enjoyment of seeing the fish fulfilled in the hunt, then fine (even though that's not necessarily my cup of tea) - but if you are doing it for making a youtube video, or showing off for your friends, you might want to check your priorities.
Unfortunately some fish species are impossible to be pellet trained. Esox species, Sander species, yellow perch and crappies prefer live foods over pellets. But they can take frozen foods but it has to be whole fish and not a fillet. Live foods also keep the predatory fishes active.
My yellow perch eats sinking Hikari pellets...sucks them from the bottom surface.I'd like to get my Chinese perch to do the same.
