Feeding fish a varied diet is important, but how?
- Thread starter philipraposo1982
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My Oscar is on a staple of Carnivore sticks, JDs and Convicts are on cichlid gold 3mm. And as treats I randomly give them all frozen blood worms, frozen brine shrimp, live meal worms, live crickets
Yup.
Yup.
I do whichever I feel like at the time, if I feel like opening a bunch of different containers they get a bunch in one meal. If I don't feel like it, I just throw in a handful of tetrabits or whatever.
On a regular basis 3 I think, plus a few more occasionally.
I don't care as much about variety (a varied diet) as providing a suitable diet. Imo, there's an implicit assumption that a varied diet will be suitable simply because it's varied. That's a tenuous assumption since what is seen as "varied" to one person might not be considered varied to another. (And all this assumes we know what each fish consumes.)
E.g., someone might consider using 5 different fish filets (e.g., tilapia, cod, salmon, catfish, trout) as being varied, when because none of them are whole, may be a diet that lacks large amounts of key minerals and vitamins.
I have used various foods (crickets, earth worms, various pellets, shrimp, fish filets, etc.) but I've always felt a HQ pellet must be a significant part of the diet for most fish, (perhaps some exceptions being herbivores or picsivores that are fed whole fresh fish.
E.g., someone might consider using 5 different fish filets (e.g., tilapia, cod, salmon, catfish, trout) as being varied, when because none of them are whole, may be a diet that lacks large amounts of key minerals and vitamins.
I have used various foods (crickets, earth worms, various pellets, shrimp, fish filets, etc.) but I've always felt a HQ pellet must be a significant part of the diet for most fish, (perhaps some exceptions being herbivores or picsivores that are fed whole fresh fish.
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I use different size pellets or flakes for different fish and keep freeze dried products as well as some frozen to offer something different from time to time. Occasionally raw frozen fish or shrimp are offered, maybe once or twice a month. I use to feed earthworms, crickets and mealworms but have decided even though slight there is some risk feeding any live foods so I quit doing it.
I had trouble feeding my fish and sharks a varied diet. One only wanted squid and another sardines. Also had trouble getting them to take the vitamins, one sly shark kept filtering the vitamins out of the squid and spitting the vitamin out its gills. To counter these smart fish, I came up with an awesome idea to get a varied fresh diet, and not to mention avoid excess food waste.
I picked up a small sausage maker from Amazon, and empty sausage casings. I can create whatever mix I want, which typically includes, crabs, shrimp, squid, sardines, vitamins and little seaweed flake. I was able to get my fish to finally eat some of the shells of the shrimp and crabs this way and eat foods they would normally leave at the bottom of the tank.
Made the mix, pushed into the casings and froze it. Once fozen is was easy to cut into slices, which are now pefect bite size pieces, that I can pull from the freezer, thaw for 20 min and drop them into the tank. Less mess in the tank too, and can better manage how much food I feed them withoit leaving uneaten food in the tank.
I picked up a small sausage maker from Amazon, and empty sausage casings. I can create whatever mix I want, which typically includes, crabs, shrimp, squid, sardines, vitamins and little seaweed flake. I was able to get my fish to finally eat some of the shells of the shrimp and crabs this way and eat foods they would normally leave at the bottom of the tank.
Made the mix, pushed into the casings and froze it. Once fozen is was easy to cut into slices, which are now pefect bite size pieces, that I can pull from the freezer, thaw for 20 min and drop them into the tank. Less mess in the tank too, and can better manage how much food I feed them withoit leaving uneaten food in the tank.
I'll be totally honest. I think the varied diet is bs. A quality pellet is all you need. I feed dubias, earthworms, grasshoppers, etc very rarely. A quality pellet like omega one or nls is really all you need.
It just makes them picky and they go on pellet strikes if you feed other stuff regularly
It just makes them picky and they go on pellet strikes if you feed other stuff regularly
I've found the opposite, if you feed them a variety of foods they'll eat everything you feed them. If you feed them only a single type of pellets, they won't eat anything else, including different types of pellets.
Mine have picked what they like and refuse everything else. Throwing in a variety of pellets for example. They will pick omega or whatever they like then the rest just gets refused. Doesn't matter really as long you have healthy fish and maintain good water quality that's all that matters
