What do you guys do about floating food and overflows

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
I know you shouldn't believe everything you read on the internet, but I heard that turning pumps off and on frequently shortens their life...it's just not good for them, so what I did is made a feeding ring...easy and cheap. Check mine out...you can see my overflow in the background...it keeps floating pellets from getting sucked into my sump.

[video=youtube_share;zOIPtWJ-pW0]http://youtu.be/zOIPtWJ-pW0[/video]

I think I have fallen in love with your tank! Your fish look amazing and your water is crystal clear from what I could see. How do you keep such a large tank so clean?! Water changes must be expensive haha Also how big is the JD, GT, and (if Im not mistaken) texas.
 
For a screen you can cut up one those mesh bags that oranges come in.
 
Food in our overflow boxes was a major problem for us. We put foam bumpers around the overflow boxes, turned the pump in the sump off, waited until the water level dropped an inch in the main tank, turned the other pumps off before feeding. None of this worked. One slap of a massive tail would send about 30 pellets into the overflow box clogging the slots of the overflow box. It was a situation that needed a solution. The new tank has half inch grids which will be a total disaster with floating food.

Out of desperation I bought NLS large sinking pellets 3mm which were so microscopic the fish couldn't see them. The pellets sank to the floor like debris.

I now use floating pond pellets and NLS pellets and make jumbo sinking food for our fish. It works really well. Nothing gets in the overflow. I did a thread on jumbo sinking food. Can't post it off this phone, but you can search my threads and find it you're at all interested.

sent from my DROID RAZR MAXX
 
A feeding ring would not work in my tank. My fish hit the surface so hard they literally splash pellets out of the water up onto the tank top up on the canopy! Pellets would get splashed right out of that ring. When I feed my fish they get two big hand fulls of pellets in one feeding.

you could just as easily make a ring with a mesh cover over the top to prevent flying food.
and start your feeding on the opposite side of the food ring so the fish go for that first and the turlte has a chance to get the food
 
I just stopped feeding floating food.
 
I didn't read all the answers so I don't know if someone suggested this already, but they make floating rings that keep the food from getting sucked in the over flow.
 
I think I have fallen in love with your tank! Your fish look amazing and your water is crystal clear from what I could see. How do you keep such a large tank so clean?! Water changes must be expensive haha Also how big is the JD, GT, and (if Im not mistaken) texas.

Thanks. Weekly filter sock cleanings and weekly 30% water changes seem to do the trick. It's not too expensive...less than $10 per month for water. None of the fish are done growing except maybe the Yellowtail Rasbora and the Arulius Barbs...the JD, GT and Texas are all roughly 5-6". Sorry for the derail OP.

I think I'm going to screen it but how'd you make your ring

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I made the rings out of tubing from my local hardware store and two "T" barbed fittings. I started with just one ring, but my fish were eating too aggressively and knocking pellets out...so I made an inner and outer ring to help keep food in. I tied some string onto the rings to keep them centered over my feeding opening... I now feed sinking pellets because of all the loaches I have so it's not as big of an issue anymore, but it used to drive me nuts to see food literally go down the drain.
 
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