When Should I Feed My JD Again?

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seedubs1

Jack Dempsey
MFK Member
Feb 28, 2011
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Indiana USA
This is my first JD, and I don't know how their appetite is. She's about 6" long.

Just introduced her to my tank. Figured she wouldn't be hungry right off the bat, and I'd donate my mollies to a friend tomorrow morning.

Well.....She at two balloon mollies right off the bat (about 1.5" ones):ROFL:
Seems like she's acclimating well anyways.

So when is the next time I should feed her?
 
You should feed her daily, but I recommend using a good quality pellet as a staple and not feeders. If you want to treat the fish go with some frozen or freeze dried bloodworms, brine shrimp or mysis shrimp.
 
i would let her settle for 24 hours or so. your tank may not be the same water parameters as what she is used to. she may be stress right now even though she is eating.
 
Yeah, I know to use mostly ciclid pellets as a staple. Was planning on starting feeding her in teh morning. She won't be getting feeders for any kind of a staple in her diet because I knot they aren't great nutrition wise. Mostly will be getting pellets, shrimp, krill, and some worms.

I'm more lookingto figure out when I should feed her again because she just ate what seems like a whole bunch. Raja, that gave me a bit better idea of when I should feed her again.

Also looking into volume of food to be eaten each day because I don't want to overfeed her. How many pellets to feed per day, etc...

Thanks for the help everyone. I'm really loving this JD already. The fish has such a personality. I can see why so many people love these fish.
 
Is she going to be solo or will there be other fish?

I have found getting my fish on a routine works well. 5 small feeds a day would be the best because in the wild they are constantly eating, but probably never large quantities. I feed 3 times per day personally. Just sprinkle a couple pellets at a time, for 2-3 minutes. I find this best because you won't have a lot of food floating around that can cause your water to get cloudy.

If feeding frozen blood worms, brine shrimp, etc...try half a cube. If she takes that well, then step up to a full cube. Almost everyone recommends this as a treat, and not meal replacement. You will get a feel for the quantity after a few feeds. You will probably never under feed, but it is easily to over feed, so keep that in mind.

I use a mixture of Cichlid Staple and Bio Gold. Have not gotten my JD to eat live worms yet.

Good luck!
 
Yes. It'll be just him and a Pleco. The pleco gets algae tablets at night, and I'll be feeding the JD tablets as a staple daily.

Thanks for the help. It's much appreciated.
 
Well.....Woke up this morning and found the two baloon mollies I though she ate hiding under some driftwood. Man they hid really good last night. So they're out of the tank and elsewhere not getting terrorized now.

Fed the JD some cichlid tablets this morning. She's a pig. Destroys the tablets and just strews them all over the tank. What an awesome fish.

And watched my Bristlenose show the JD what's up. Had it's horns out and everything. The JD doesn't go near it's spot anymore.
 
Are they normally this sloppy of eaters? I fed her about 8 medium size cichlid pellets (she's about 7-8 inches long). After she takes them, she looks like she chews them or something, then puffs out some of the crunched up pellets and leaves them. Most of the volume it looks like she swallows.

Should I be using small pellets instead of medium sized? The medium ones seem like they should be fine (she'll take 3 at a time if they're clustered up). She's not small by any means. I just want to make sure I'm not feeding too large of pellets and she's choking on them or something.

Please forgive the stupid noobish questions. This is the first fish I've had that's big enough to eat pellets like this.
 
Generally just throw a couple pellets in and wait for them to be eaten, then you can throw in a couple more if she is still hungry. If 5 minuites has passed and she hasnt finished, just remove the uneaten food, so it won't degrade your waters quality.

Good luck!
 
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