Are frozen blood worms okay for fish?

[Fishyfish1]

Hi everyone,
While I'm not completely brand new to keeping an aquarium I am still new enough that i have some questions. I have a couple african dwarf frogs, cory cats, gouramis, and guppies in my tank. I feed my ADFs frozen bloodworms and my question is if it's okay for my other fish to eat those on a daily basis? I use a syringe to hand feed my frogs to ensure they get the food meant for them so my other fish aren't getting many blood worms, but they do eat the few stragglers that my frogs don't get. I just wanted to make sure it wasn't harmful to my other fish to have a few of those on a daily basis. Thank you in advance!

 

[Colin_T]

Hi and welcome to the forum

Sorry about the late response, someone in the moderator village has been a bit slack

Most fish can eat bloodworms and it isn't a problem as long as it's part of a varied diet. You cannot feed bloodworms to Tropheus (a genus of African cichlids) but most other fish are fine get a few here and there.

The main issue with bloodworms is their head. It is extremely hard and cannot be digested by fish so if a fish eats too many heads, they can block up the fish's digestive tract and the fish bloats up and dies. You can cut the head off the bloodworms or just reduce the amount you feed the fish. Corydoras are normally fine because they chew their food. Small fish that swallow the bloodworms are more likely to have this issue.

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You should be feeding the fish and frogs a varied diet including prawn/ shrimp, fish, brineshrimp, daphnia and various other small foods.

On a side note, i don't recommend keeping frogs with fish. If the frog gets sick they are very hard to treat, and the frog is more likely to get sick in a tank with fish. They are generally best kept in a single species tank. Having said that, if you keep the tank clean (big water changes, gravel cleaning the substrate, and filter cleaning) they should be ok.

 

[Byron]

Bloodworms should only be fed to fish once a week. Aside from the issue Colin mentioned, they are also not especially nutritional, and an excess can cause problems. Every marine biologist I have asked has said once a week, no more.

I also agree that the frogs and fish should not be together.