New Silver Arrowana owner with some questions

[henward]

i feed my silver aro pink shrimps, the local stuff you get int he supermarket deli and frozen shrimp bags.
man! they will eat anything, chicken, beef, fish, shrimp,
shrimp and fish is cleaner than chicken or beef, unless you wanna change the water alot, and skim the top of the water... see when i used to feed my 2 foot aro beef, the top of the water would get a fatty layer! gross!

but shrimp no problems.
your aro, when it settles will eat lots! in fact, it will and should eat chunks of food half the size of its own face.
mine was in the same size small tank as yours, grew 3 cms in less than a month. literally over 3 days, they grow, you can see it grow

now for hte tail dropping heres an idea

the back of your tank, and the sides, if they are not covered, it may take awhile for your aro to get used to this, they might not feel safe...yet.
so cover that, guarantee you will see them stop doing this
but , they will eventually get used to that, takes time

 

[Rbacchiega]

I'll add some background to the sides today, the back is already covered. At the shop we have tons of spare tanks kicking around, so today I'll either bring him home a bigger tank already, or bring home a tank and move the feeder fish into, grow them out and feed them to something else (like my juvi oscars!)

Sorry, I guess I'm just a little paranoid, I want this one to get huge. He seems to be doing good this morning, swiming around, checking things out. So we'll see. I'm so addicted already I'm thinking of ordering a Panda Gold Highback Red Tail Golden....I figure I'll start there and work my way up to a chili or a blue x back LOL...Arowana room here I come!

 

[TMDragon]

Would probably be best if you work your way to the Panda Gold from the silver first. Its better if you make all your mistakes with the silver and learn from them before you drop some big bucks on the more expensive aros and make mistakes with them. Good Luck!

 

[Rbacchiega]

When would be okay to move him into a 90 gallon tank? I just measured him and he's just under 4 inches long. I don't want him to get too stressed out about such a larger space than what he's in now....

On a side note, I went out and bought Hikari Gold Cichlid Pellets and he loves them. I feed him 5 or 6 each feeding. He's now in a different tank than the feeder fish, which is planted and in another room alltogether until he settles in. He didn't freak out today when I turned on the lights, so I'm assuming that's a good thing.

 

[Sundew]

It's probably a good idea not to get him started on feeder fish. First, they do fine without live feeders in their diet. Then, there is the problem of getting him off them later if he really likes feeders. Plus this will get expensive as the feeder get bigger and there is the potential for bringing fish-borne disease into his tank. Lastly, if they do not associate live fish with food, it may be easier finding tankmates for him later should you choose to do so. I have all sizes of fish in with a 26" silver from large severums to a small school of black tetras and he pretty much ignores everything (but he makes them nervous!). He has never had live fish. Hope this helps.

 

[Rbacchiega]

Do silvers do well with bichers of appropriate size? In a few months I'll have a 225 (72X30tallX24deep) and was planning on having my aro, a motoro ray (or two) and a couple of bichers....this should work, shouldn't it?