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Originally Posted by rroselavy My accumulated experience is in nano tanks, where feeding is sparse or with penalty.
Amphibious brings experience, and good advice in the concept of "thrive" versus "survive" - but I assume a tank's sustainability has a lot to do with how well a system can eliminate excess nutrients. Those with DSB's, Refugiums, more effective skimmers and better practices may have better luck with generous portioning than those with more meager systems and discipline. |
You bring up two good points,
rroselavy, thank you.
(I previewed this post, as I always do, and see it has gotten rather long. I apologize for that. However this is an important subject that I am passionate about. Please bare with me. Thanks!)
First the Nano tank owner. A nano is generally accepted to be 30 gals and less. Nanos because of their size and space limitations are notoriously under filtered. Because of my extensive experience (60 years in the hobby), I would still feed a Nano more than most people. I like to see my fish "fat and sassy". Plus, what must seem to most of you, over eons of time I've developed a keen sense (perhaps even a skill) of recognizing how much is enough and how much is too much food at any given time. I know intimately, my systems ability to handle the amount of food I'm giving. I also have the luxury of being retired and around my tank every day all day. If you saw how much food I thaw out and feed each day you would be amazed, maybe even aghast.
Think on this. If you are feeding sparingly, your fish are surviving. If you feed generously, but within your systems capability of handling the excess, your fish will not only be surviving but thriving. In which state, surviving or thriving, will your fish's immune system be at peak efficiency??? Most fish in peak health condition can fight off most incidences of disease naturally. You, the hobbyist and owner, may never even be aware of a disease fought off naturally. Many hobbyists are aware of a disease only when it approaches disaster level. Then, it's too late in many cases.
Very recently, I stumbled across a clown fish that I'd never seen before. It was emaciated for the following reasons, the
LFS guy not feeding it, it was wild caught and therefore went through the chain of capture, holding, shipping to the USA, holding, shipping to
LFS. All this in about 2 weeks time
without any food!!! The collector, the trans shipper, the importer, the wholesaler do not feed the fish. The reason is, if you feed them they will poop and that will/may foul the shipping water, raise
Ammonia levels and kill the fish while in transit. Good point, but, it emphasizes my point about feeding more, more often. When you buy that flashy little jewel from the far off reef, it hasn't eaten in days/weeks, has been stressed big time and the
LFS guy throws a bit of flake food or frozen brine shrimp at it. The fish probably will refuse to eat or pick with
dis-interest the first day or two. You need to attempt feeding them often, in increasing amounts and the choicest food, as they begin to eat.
Have you ever seen stringy white fices hanging from their butts. Their intestines are really mucked up from lack of food and stress. They are constipated and the only way to get things moving is to feed them. The more you can get them to eat the better the chance they can force that bowel obstruction to pass. Once that happens it's a good bet they will recover. A case in point - The clown fish I happened onto a few days ago. Here's the best pic I could get of him because he's shy and scared in his new safe haven, my aquarium. He doesn't know yet he found a sanctuary but, he's coming around. The pic...
You can clearly see his belly is concave. You should have seen it when I bought him 5 days ago. He is more emaciated in the shoulder area than the picture shows. He should be fat and will be in a short while.
He was in stress every moment since capture. I asked the
LFS guy if he'd started eating yet. He says,
"Oh yeah, he eats pellet food". This I gotta see. He took a pinch of pellets, dropped them into the tank. The fish dove toward them as they quickly sank to the bottom. Picked one up and spit it out. The act of picking one pellet up as it sank convinced me he would eat if given a food of
HIS choice. Clearly it wasn't pellet food. I decided to take him home to "The Sanctuary" where he could recover.
I recognized this clown to be wild caught and rare. I had to search for a bit before I could identify him positively. Anybody want to take a guess before I tell what it is???
If you read this whole post, I commend you! Hopefully you gained something from it.
Thank you Rob of TR for giving me/us a platform to speak out and teach.
Dick
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