My
First Tank
| Fish Foods
Feed different variety
of food for fishes to do well.
Dry
Food alone is not the best food for your fishes, no matter what
the manufacturers say. Regardless of how much you paid for it too. Nutrient-wise,
they may contain everything your fish needs but nothing make the fishes
grow like live foods do. Image all of us having to eat health food all
the time. Yuks. Once in a while, pizza is nice, Steak is good, Char Kway
Teow now and then, Laksa, Chicken cutlet,.......... You know what I mean.
So what you do is to give them some varieties. Perhaps, once a week, you
can feed them some live foods, like Tubifex Worms, Bloodworms, or Daphnia.
Of course, the bad part is that you may introduce unwanted pest, and diseases.
This can be minimized if you take the necessary precautions.
When you buy tubifex
worms, do not throw the worms straight into the tank when you get
home. Instead, put them in a small basin, fill the basin with water, and
aerate the worms with an extension air tube (no air stone). Bubble like
this for 1-2 hours. The worms will form into ball-shaped at the end of
the air tube. To feed, switch off the pump and allow a minute or two for
the water to settle down. Place your hand over the worms completely, leaving
the bottom part exposed. Any dirt present will drop from the centre of
this "ball". Any worms that falls off from the centre should not be used
to feed your fishes. If there is excess, place the worms on a tray with
just a little water, and tilt a little. The worms will move towards the
dry part of the plate leaving their execration, etc. behind. If you buy
only twenty cents each time, it will be almost impossible to wash them
yourself.
You will have to trust
the shopkeepers to do a good job. I suggest you buy more say about a dollar
and wash and clean the worms to feed for a day or more. This way you know
what you've done and you will also sleep better.
Bloodworms
are much more tricky and wasteful. Fill a large pail of water and pour
the worms in. In a few minutes, scoope-up all those worms that are swimming
along the surface. Those that are white, light reddish or brown, or not
moving at all are the "BAD" Worms. If you bought too much, place all the
clean worms in a plastic bag and freeze them in the freezer compartment
or you could get those small ice cube trays. Make sure you tell everyone
in the family. Flatten the plastic bag. Once frozen, cut the worms up into
strips or cubes. With each strip or cube enough for half a feeding, you
simply throw 1 or 2 cubes during feeding time. This is simply for your
own convenience only. Nowadays, many shops sell frozen Bloodworms saving
you the chore. Be careful as most of these worms are imported and no one
knows for sure how the worms are prepared. Keeping a bag in the fridge
as an emergency food is a good idea.
Another food not available
as a live food but as a dry food is what they call "water mosquito". It
is available from bird shops and sold in pre-packed plastic bags. Birds
love it and so do your insect loving fishes. |
| Daphnia.
Nowadays, this is very
quite hard to find in Singapore. Fill the pail or basin with water and
pour them in. Place an air tube in to bubble them. Scope the red coloured
ones that are along the water surface and feed as necessary. |
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Brine Shrimps
(Artemia Salina)
Also known as Sea Monkeys in the USA.
Now for the fish food
that saved the Aquarium Industrial. No, I am just exaggerating. This is
the Brine Shrimp or Artemia. The eggs are expensive but can last a long
time. You hatch them as and when you need to feed the newly hatched frys.
Hatching takes about 24 to 48 hours depending on the type. Although 48
hours is the norm. They require saltwater to hatch and will only live in
freshwater for about 12 hours. This is good as the is no danger of introducing
diseases and parasites into your tank. Great feeding for baby fishes and
filter feeders. Large fishes, or fishes with big mouths, will not be able
to enjoy much as the newly hatched larvae is too small. This food is very
important for the marine fish hobbyists. Corals, anemones, sea horses,
and plankton feeders will enjoy such a treat.
Available in the market
are hundreds of types of Brine Shrimp hatchers. The best ones are those
that will make the newly hatched shrimps swim towards a light source and
into a net. This way, the feeding will be relatively free from eggshells.
OR
You can make you own
hatcher. Use a 1.25 litre bottle from the soft drinks, and insert an air
tube weight down with either lead or air stone. To make your own saltwater,
add about 1 tablespoonful of salt to half the bottle of water. Actually,
just for hatching, so long as the water is saltish, the eggs will hatch.
If you are using seawater, dilute the water by 10% for hatching. This solution
is only suitable for hatching the eggs and will not be suitable if you
intend to keep them to adulthood. Add just a tiny amount of eggs into this
solution. KFC coffee stirrer is most suitable. Use less than a quarter
spoonful. Too little? Too many eggs will mean that fewer will hatch, wasting
all the rest of the eggs. Too few eggs will mean not enough for feeding.
Eggs floating along the surface are eggs that did not hatch. Hatched Eggshells
are those that have sunk to the bottom. If your salt content is too high,
the eggs will hatch unevenly.
After placing the eggs,
turn on the air pump. After 24 hours, you will notice that some eggs have
hatched and the free-swimming larvae are pinkish in colour. You can see
clearer if you do this at night with all the lights turn off and use torchlight
to light the side of the bottle. The artemia will be seen swimming towards
the light. Leave them for 2 to 3 days to allow all the eggs to hatch.
Feeding: Switch off the
pump. Pour the contents into a very fine net. Rinse them thoroughly in
tap water before feeding. OK, the unhatched eggs and shells will also be
introduced into the tank. There is no harm if the fishes eat them. The
eggshells, etc., will be sucked into the filter and will be removed whenever
you wash your filter or do your water change. |
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Easy to keep and grow.
They swim in a circular
motion.
Adults are 80% shell
-- not much nutritional
value.
Fish fed continuously
with
Artemia can get constipation. |
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| Feeding
Marine fishes are different
from freshwater fishes. In freshwater fishes, feed them once a day. If
for instance, you feed 25g of dry food daily, and you intend to feed 3
times daily, you must feed only about 10g per feeding. The rule of the
thumb is whatever that can be consumed in 5 minutes. In Marine, the fishes
in its natural habitat, is constantly looking for food. So more feedings
are required.
You can also feed them
de-shelled prawns cut into strips or chopped finely.
Should one day, there
is completely no fish food in your house and all the fish shops have closed
for a super long holiday, you can still feed your fishes with bread.
Gently tap the glass as
you feed them so that in time, they will learn that there is food whenever
you tap the glass.
Overfeeding
Kills: When there is excess food in the
tank, the foods will decay. This will affect the water condition,
there maybe a bacteria boom and your tank water becomes a whitish colour.
The pH will drop and this will inturn affect your fishes and if unchecked,
will kill your fishes.
If going on a short holiday
(up to 1 week), start feeding your fishes well and regularly prior
to your trip. Your fishes should be nice and "plump" before you leave
for your trip. When you leave, DO NOT Feed them for the whole week.
They will be alive but skinny when you return (assuming nothing else go
wrong!). For longer trips you will need to entrust the job of feeding
them to someone who is also a fish hobbyists. Entrusting this job
to someone who is not a fish hobbyist will most of the time kill them.
They tend to overfeed and should something be wrong with the tank, they
will not detect it until it is too late.
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