I've had him for about a week. He's about 9 in. long and is in a tank with a clown knife that is only about 6-7 in. So far they get along just fine. But...I recently got the ck off live food and on frozen blood worms. I bought the blood worms that are frozen into little squares and usually cut one in half and feed them twice a day. The thing I'm wondering about is....first...is this enough food? They seem to gobble it all up pretty quickly. And....second...the ck easily gets to that food first so I wonder is the eel is getting enough to eat. BTW....neither seem to be very interested in shrimp but maybe I'll put some in there to see if the eel comes around because the ck won't touch it. Thoughts?
Tire Track Eel question...
- Thread starter fook
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Half a cube of bloodworms twice a day for a 9" TT and 6-7" CK seems a bit lite on the feeding. I buy bloodworms in flatpacks because dealing with cubes was cumbersome. At 15"-16" my TT takes down the equivalent of about 10 of those little blocks per day.
you can hand feed your tire track, they normally get used to this tactic very easily. with my second tire track it was the rest of the inhabitants I had to make sure got the food, he was a very agressive eater. you can try feeding insect larve as well wax worms, and what they call super worms (beetle larve), earth worms. neither one of my guys liked shrimp and would only take in occationally. blood worms won't suffice at your guys size they are growing in leaps and bounds.
No, blood worms aren't enough. IME, frozen or freeze dried krill has been the best food for mine. If you want yours to take shrimp, you can just starve it for about a week and it will probably start accepting it. If you don't want to have to starve it, you could try earthworms or superworms, but I think shrimp/krill would be the best thing to feed it (except maybe pellets, but I think it would probably be difficult to get it to accept them, though it has been done before). Also, as meghanashley said, you should hand feed it. Hand-fed tt eels are 10x more active and friendly than tt's that aren't hand-fed. Once they get used to you they will even come to the top of the tank to beg for food and will also let you pet them.
Also, I hope you have a much larger tank planned for the near future, because neither the tire track or the CK will last long in a 30g. You will need at least a standard 180g for them.drgnfrc13;4012218; said:
drgnfrc13;4012267; said:
Not a problem. I have room to build something massive if I want to. I've been looking at tanks that mfk members have built. I'm actually very good at building/remodeling/etc. and I have no doubt about being able to build a tank. The 30 g is just for a few months...if that. According to my math (and the mfk conversion link) I can accomodate nearly 2000 g. but I think I'll be closer to 300-500. That will house my ck, eel and 2 red belly pacus.
Also....thanks for the advice guys. I appreciate it.
I see a lot of people recommend earth worms for eels if they won't eat. There's nothing wrong with this, but if you start feeding earth worms be prepared to always have to feed earthworms.
I have a Fire Eel that wouldn't eat when I first got him. I freaked out and gave him some earth worms. He's become the most high maintenance, finicky fish I've ever owned. It's gotten to the point where he won't eat unless I cut the worms in half and hand feed him. I have to hold the worm right in front of him or he won't eat. If I so much as drop it in front of him he'll just stare at it until I pick it up and hold it for him. I've finally gotten fed up with it and haven't fed him in the past 3 days to work on converting him to FBW, which will hopefully lead to market shrimp and tilapia filets.
Most of my fish have FBW as their primary diet. Once or twice a week I'll soak them in Seachem Nourish before feeding to make them more well balanced. I also rotate pellets, market shrimp, and cut tilapia filet into their menu on occasion to balance things out a bit. On the days I feed pellets my eels don't eat, but skipping a day doesn't harm them.
As far as water quality goes.....
When feeding FBW I shut my filters off for 30-45 minutes. With the filters off they don't get blown all over the place and sucked into the filters before the fish get to eat, thus minimizing the impact on water quality. It's worked for me for a long time with no negative impact. Just make sure not to forget to plug your filters back in.
I have a Fire Eel that wouldn't eat when I first got him. I freaked out and gave him some earth worms. He's become the most high maintenance, finicky fish I've ever owned. It's gotten to the point where he won't eat unless I cut the worms in half and hand feed him. I have to hold the worm right in front of him or he won't eat. If I so much as drop it in front of him he'll just stare at it until I pick it up and hold it for him. I've finally gotten fed up with it and haven't fed him in the past 3 days to work on converting him to FBW, which will hopefully lead to market shrimp and tilapia filets.
Most of my fish have FBW as their primary diet. Once or twice a week I'll soak them in Seachem Nourish before feeding to make them more well balanced. I also rotate pellets, market shrimp, and cut tilapia filet into their menu on occasion to balance things out a bit. On the days I feed pellets my eels don't eat, but skipping a day doesn't harm them.
As far as water quality goes.....
When feeding FBW I shut my filters off for 30-45 minutes. With the filters off they don't get blown all over the place and sucked into the filters before the fish get to eat, thus minimizing the impact on water quality. It's worked for me for a long time with no negative impact. Just make sure not to forget to plug your filters back in.