Conditioning Feeding And Baby Food

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

are there substitutes out there that i can use to condition to breed and for "baby food"? i really dispise (sp?) using live food if it can be avoided. i understand it has to be used in some fishs' diets, but can it be avoided for conditioning and the babies?

 

[HODDY]

babies must be fed live foods.bbs or microworms are the best.For conditioning you can use freeze dried foods

 

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

no liqui-fry? i've seen that in my area and it seems to be decent...

 

[dmarie04]

Liqui-fry wouldn't really be good for betta fry. They really need extra protein. If you are dead set against using live foods there are substitutes, but they won't be as good as using live. Fry will naturally go after anything moving to eat it..but it might take them awhile to realize that non-live food is actually FOOD! They can be stubborn, too. I've heard of batches of fry that literally starve themselves to death because they don't want to eat anything other than live. Going without live food will probably result in slower growth and smaller spawn sizes. But, here are some options for non-live foods you can try:
Egg yolk-boil the egg, use the yellow yolk and mash it up and put in squirt bottle and spray a fine mist over the top of the water. It will definitely foul up the water, though, so suck up any uneaten portions right away
Atison's Betta starter- I actually used this in combination of MicroWorms and BBS and they ate it. I don't think they liked it as much as the live stuff..but they ate it and it's suppose to be good for them.
Decapsulated Brine Shrimp eggs-If you don't want to hatch the shrimp and feed them live then you can either buy decapsulated eggs or decap them yourself. These might be a bit big for newly hatched fry, though. It might take a week or two until the babies are big enough for them.
Infusoria- plants and other vegetable matter have tiny microorganisms living on them that fry can eat. There's some good info on infusoria on this page: http/www.bettysplendens.com/articles/pag...p?articleid=750
Frozen Daphnia-can be fed at about 2 weeks or so.
Hikari Micro Wafers-too big for tiny fry but I started my 8 week old fry on it recently and they are eating them easily enough.

 

[Nevergone815]

Good posting ^^

8)

 

[HODDY]

liquifry fouls the water veryquickly.Add a drop of it in the tank when the eggs have hatched.This will start infusoria.You can buy de-capulated brine shrimp eggs.There very good and growth rate is good.PLus its not live.

 

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

thanks guys, i'll have to start a hunt for these things. i just don't feel right putting live animals into a tank where they can't escape just to be killed.

 

[rollntider]

thanks guys, i'll have to start a hunt for these things. i just don't feel right putting live animals into a tank where they can't escape just to be killed.

How are you going to cull your deformed members of your spawn? A painless humane way is to feed to a big cichlid.

FYI I have used Decapped BBS with success and used micro worms. The spawns I had took to the decapped BBS with no issues. Some people swear by live foods. I think both are very handy and worth while.

 

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

i just dont see how people complained about the mouse in the pirahna (sp?) tank on this forum before and how he had no way to escape but feeder foods are different.

since it's my first spawn and from what i've been reading, most of the fry will die off anyways, i dont think i'll have to worry about culling

 

[HODDY]

de-capulated brine shrimp eggs are the way to go if you don't use live foods.Ive heard they have exceptionaly good growth rate.Betta fry can go from 1mm to 1inch in three weeks on these.Im going to order some.

 

[Nevergone815]

i just dont see how people complained about the mouse in the pirahna (sp?) tank on this forum before and how he had no way to escape but feeder foods are different.

The piranha and the mouse hting was completely different. Mammas for the most part, or even living creatures aren't on the diet of most piranhas. From what I undertand, by nature, piranhas are more of a scavenging fish not a hunter.

As for culling, I wouldn't breed if I were you then. Culling is part of responsible breeding programs. Even if you only get 20 fry out of the batch to survive. If they are deformed they should be culled. Sometimes htese fish need special requirements that many people, not even the msot expert keepers can handle.

I breed cichlids and hybrid cichlids and cull HUGE numbers. I use convicts as feeders fo my larger cichlids. You have to remember that yes, the live foods in a tank don't have as much room to get away, but do you honestly think a microworm, mosquito larvae or a brine shrimp will have any more chance of surviving in the wild? They aren't going to move all that fast then either.

To me its much better to feed as close to the natural foods the animal would eat if given the oppertunity in the wild. By nature fry are ore prone to feed off of moving targets, than ones that do not. It is in their instinct. In the wild thy eat insects off of the surface and many other things out there. If you don't consider them living things, infusoria and daphnia are really good fry foods and will get them all the way up to eating fry bites. I've never seen any kind of fry actually eat Liquifry. I've only seen itfoul up the water and jump the stats of the tank.

There are other solutions to feeding live and these have been discussed, but in some way shape or form, you are going have to think about if you could actually cull a fish if it isn't desireable to the goal you set out when you bred the fish to begin with. Do you know how many lfs carry the leftovers from people breeding bettas and refuse to cull? Many that I've come across will take all the bettas o any fish that I can't rehome.

Deformities and poor genes should be eliminated and feeding them to another fish is the best solution, this way there is no way that those weak genes can be introduced into another breeding program elsewhere. Just my $0.02 though.

 

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

another thing is i don't have fish big enough to eat the fry. they may get eaten if i throw them in my 10g but the biggest thing in there is mollies, then again i haven't seen one guppy fry in there in the five months i've had the tank - there's four females and one male.

 

[Nevergone815]

Don't get me wrong here, you don't need ot feed them to bigger fish. Besides, by the time you can clearly see any potential deformities, it'll be WAY to late or your mollies ot have a chance at eating them.

Soem other culling techniques that don't even involve killing are jsut simply giving them away to a goiod home, where you KNOW they won't be bred. Sometimes though, culls aren't even necessarily deformed, but just simply, not the finnage or color you set out to breed for. Culls are anything undesirable to the breeding population. So anyhting that you didn't want ot breed, can be considered for culling. That's all. Culling is removing form the breeding population.

Feed them foods as close to what they would eat, what your fry accept and what you are comfortable with feeding them. It'll all work out in the end. Good luck with it, you got plenty of good advice about alternitives ot live foods in this thread !

 

[t.ropical_m.istx3]

thanks much
i don't mean to go against your guys advice, i just feel terrible taking somethings life away

 

[Nevergone815]

thanks much
i don't mean to go against your guys advice, i just feel terrible taking somethings life away

Oh, I understand where you're coming from. Like I said, some good alternatives ot live foods are mentioned in here. I would stay away form liquifry and eggyolks unless you want to clean the tanks more than usual is all. Microworms are really smelly, but you could harvest infusoria. This will get them by until they are bigger. Baby brine shrimp is good, but I think they might need ot feed off something lese first.

I'm not a big betta person personally, more of a cichlid man, if you couldn't tell form my avatar, signiture and profile

But I do knwo a few things. Infusoria is easy ot harvest, you jsut add soem drops form an eyedropepr ot the tank, i nthe infusoria you can harvest daphnia, which is good as well. I personally dont consider things like infusoria, daphnia and microworms as really, "real" living things. But that is jsut my opinion. Technically they are, but I breed cichlids and such, so I think there is a bit of difference involved.

I hope any future spawns work out for you and whatever food you do decide to use works for you !