Want to change pellets, need size advice

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RampageRR

RampageRR

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Apr 29, 2012
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Is anyone here feeding their ATF or other larger characins NLS pellets? I'm going to give their floating pellets a try since my bag of Hikari food sticks is just about empty. I'm not sure what size would be closest to what my GATF is eating now, either 3mm or 4.5mm. Anyone have any experience with the pellet size vs. size of say a 8" ATF's mouth? Has anyone used the NLS floating pellets before, do you know if they're spongier/softer than their normal sinking pellets?
 
I bought 10 pounds of 3mm sinking pellets. Big mistake. Way too small. Looked like small pieces of debris on the floor. My pacu recognize the 10mm pellets as food. Had to go with sinking food as too much of the floating stuff was getting in the overflow box. Very pleased with the 10mm sinking NLS pellets.
 
pacu mom said:
I bought 10 pounds of 3mm sinking pellets. Big mistake. Way too small. Looked like small pieces of debris on the floor. My pacu recognize the 10mm pellets as food. Had to go with sinking food as too much of the floating stuff was getting in the overflow box. Very pleased with the 10mm sinking NLS pellets.
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I was thinking the 3mm might be too small myself. I know we're talking about largely different sizes of fish here though, my smaller 8" or so ATF vs. pacu. How big would you say the 3mm are in actuality, maybe BB bullet sized? Just trying to visualize the size of them.

sashimimaster said:
Mine takes pellets from the surface. They don't take food off the bottom readily. After 10" pellets are way too small and they have to eat a handful to get full. If you have dithers the other fish would end up eating all of it before the ATF get around to finishing. They are such slow eaters.
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Mine takes food from the surface too, that's why I'm looking specifically at their floating pellet line. Mine isn't a slow eater at this point, although the silver dollars in the tank may have helped him with that. He actually usually grabs 5-6 food sticks in the time it takes the silver dollars to finish one each. So he usually can keep up without any issue (I normally put the entire amount I want to feed in at the same time, and that allows for him to grab a bunch before they can eat them all).

Just trying to decide between 3mm and 4.5mm for now, I'm not sure if the 4.5mm pellets would be too big for him to get down since they're not really chewable like the food sticks are.
 
RampageRR said:
I was thinking the 3mm might be too small myself. I know we're talking about largely different sizes of fish here though, my smaller 8" or so ATF vs. pacu. How big would you say the 3mm are in actuality, maybe BB bullet sized? Just trying to visualize the size of them.

Mine takes food from the surface too, that's why I'm looking specifically at their floating pellet line. Mine isn't a slow eater at this point, although the silver dollars in the tank may have helped him with that. He actually usually grabs 5-6 food sticks in the time it takes the silver dollars to finish one each. So he usually can keep up without any issue (I normally put the entire amount I want to feed in at the same time, and that allows for him to grab a bunch before they can eat them all).

Just trying to decide between 3mm and 4.5mm for now, I'm not sure if the 4.5mm pellets would be too big for him to get down since they're not really chewable like the food sticks are.
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The 3mm NLS thera+ seems a tad bit smaller and harder than the 3mm NLS large fish formula, I feed both and my 9.5" male jaguar cichlid eats them rather easily... maybe 5 seconds to chew and swallow til he's ready for the next one. But yes, they're roughly the size of a BB pellet.

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Awesome, thanks guys. I think I'm going to give the 3mm a shot for now, since I doubt he would enjoy biting into a larger solid pellet at this size. He should be able to just swallow the 3mm ones down without any fuss, so hopefully he takes them without too much hassle.
 
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