Feeding small pellets to big fish

[Oscar Mike]

Yeah my flowerhorn chewed the 6mm too but they all swallow the 3mm whole. The 4-5" fish still chew them a bit so they would definitely do better with 1-2mm, and I think 4.5mm would be perfect for the fh, but 70-105g is a half cup of pellets a day. The pacu could find them all but she'd probably appreciate at least 6mm (sinking because I'm installing an overflow soon). I wanted to feed the smaller group a combo of .5mm growth and 2mm thera A too, but I priced out 300g of the .5/2/4.5mm formulas and 5lbs of 6mm and it came out to $120 for maybe 45 days worth of food.

So now I'm thinking about the agar agar mix again with blended 3mm thera/tilapia/krill for the fry and pellets/tilapia/veggies for the bigger fish. Both options will probably come out to about the same price so is it really worth mixing other ingredients with NLS health-wise or should I just feed 3-4 pellet sizes?

 

[Ian21777]

My oscar seems to take great delight in chewing everything regardless of size and making a huge mess lol

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[trace]

Yeah my flowerhorn chewed the 6mm too but they all swallow the 3mm whole. The 4-5" fish still chew them a bit so they would definitely do better with 1-2mm, and I think 4.5mm would be perfect for the fh, but 70-105g is a half cup of pellets a day. The pacu could find them all but she'd probably appreciate at least 6mm (sinking because I'm installing an overflow soon). I wanted to feed the smaller group a combo of .5mm growth and 2mm thera A too, but I priced out 300g of the .5/2/4.5mm formulas and 5lbs of 6mm and it came out to $120 for maybe 45 days worth of food.

So now I'm thinking about the agar agar mix again with blended 3mm thera/tilapia/krill for the fry and pellets/tilapia/veggies for the bigger fish. Both options will probably come out to about the same price so is it really worth mixing other ingredients with NLS health-wise or should I just feed 3-4 pellet sizes?

It won't really hurt to supplement with the other ingredients but it isn't really worth it either. The pellets have everything they need but some extra veggies for fillers for the pacus won't hurt if you can get them cheap. If you want a higher protein additive I would suggest freeze dried krill or squid if available.


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[Oscar Mike]

I wound up just mixing pellet sizes and it's working out great so far. The pacu mostly eats the 6mm now (thera A because there wasn't another sinking pellet size between 3 and 10mm), the fh loves the 4.5mm floating formula, and the catfish seems to prefer the 3mm but I'll probably switch him over to 6mm soon. The juvies are still getting 3mm and I got the fry a mix of the .5mm grow and 1mm ultra red, but the grow pellets are even smaller than I expected (I figured .5mm was small but this is like dust lol). It floats longer than the 1mm tho and the alpha male likes sinking pellets so hopefully that will help the smaller fry grow faster

 

[pacu mom]

Just tried the 10mm sinking NLS pellets. They are going to work for us. As soon as I finish off the 3mm food, I'll be done making jumbo food. My fish don't seem to like retrieving the food from the floor. The current tank is too small at 24" high, so they have to twist to get food off the bottom, otherwise their tails come out of the water and hit the top of the tank. The 10mm pellets are a nice size.