DIY clown loach diet?

[neb_16]

Hi everyone. Im a new member of MFK, but have been browsing and utilizing your forums for years... Tons of great info here. Anyways, anyone have any home recipes for clown loaches? Have a young pack in a 180, anywhere from 2-4 inchest. Currently feeding varied diet consisting of store bought pellets, f/t bloodworms, zuccini, algae wafers, homemade "beef"heart - no beef just seafood, and occasionally raw whole scallops. They do well, but looking for other ideas. the store-bought pellets dissolve and idk how much they actually get. The beefheart mix is good, but even though its a solid gelatin mix they still tear it apart and make a mess.

They most enjoy raw scallops, which are also the least messy... they tear into it for a while, afterwords i remove any uneaten portion. tank stays clean and they get fat and happy. Scallops are obviously salt water... is there a concern of too much sodium in scallops? Is this a reasonable stable food or does it lack alot of other nutrients they need?

Anyways, anyone have any recipes for home-made clown loach food or other food ideas to help them grow and be healthy?

thanks!

 

[Matteus]

Sounds like yourself doing quite well thus far. Have you tried red wigglers worms? Mine love those, just need to give smaller ones. Also I like to get bulk loads of snails from auctions or friends who have infestations and give them as nice treats.

 

[RD.]

I hope that those auction snails go through a quarantine process. Yikes.
As far as the op's diet, scallops would definitely be lacking in various nutrients. Imho nothing beats a mix of high quality pellets for growing out healthy clown loaches. I would recommend NLS TherA 1mm, along with NLS Algaemax a few times a week. You can feed others, but IMO those would be considered a nutritionally sound diet.

 

[Matteus]

I hope that those auction snails go through a quarantine process. Yikes.
As far as the op's diet, scallops would definitely be lacking in various nutrients. Imho nothing beats a mix of high quality pellets for growing out healthy clown loaches. I would recommend NLS TherA 1mm, along with NLS Algaemax a few times a week. You can feed others, but IMO those would be considered a nutritionally sound diet.

Oh dang. How would you quarantine/ treat snails prior to feeding to fish? I just realized on of my clown loaches looking no not so hot yesterday and didn’t even think about the snails as a culprit. I pulled out the hex shield but do you think I should do something else as well Neil?

 

[RD.]

Hey Matthew, unfortunately all it takes is a single drop of water to transfer pathogens/parasites. Personally I would just pass on snails, unless I raised them myself. This is why I try to keep things as simple as possible. That, and some fish get a taste of fresh/frozen, and they become stubborn when offered foods that are probably healthier for them in the long run. It's difficult to duplicate mother nature, even if we think that we are.

I would try the hex-shield and see if the loaches condition improves over the next several days.

 

[Matteus]

Ok will do. Shoot. I can’t believe I did that. I should know better by now

 

[cvar]

My CL also eat up sliced earthworm pieces (they emerge from lawn after it rains), as well as tiny cubes of pork loin, or beef heart, or rockfish, or scallops. And of course their favorite is bloodworms.