Corydoras feeding techniques

[Martin_des]

Hello
I have a 20gallon tank with:

4 corydoras aeneus
7 guppy
2 platy
3 upside down catfish

And I noticed a problem while feeding. The guppys and platys are always eating the food of my corys. To help the corys I try to distract the others with flake food on one side of the tank while I sneak in the sinking wafers on the other side of the tank. but the guppys and platys still eat lots of the cory food. With the result that I overfeed all my fish accept the corys. Now is my question if it would be a good idea to bury the food in the sand so the corys can take there time or is there a better solution?

 

[Byron]

I use your stated method, of adding floating foods for the upper fish and then dropping in the sinking tablets/pellets/disks. The smaller shrimp pellets sometimes get snapped up by the upper fish, though usually after a spell. My fish are in larger tanks so this might help in my case.

You can try feeding the cories at night. By night I mean in pitych blackness, a good hour or longer after the room is in total darkness. Upper fish "sleep" once it becomes dark, but cories are nocturnal and will be out scampering about in total darkness. The room must be completely black for an hour before you drop in the sinking food. Even in very dim light, and close to the light going out, upper fish will be able to see and sense food.

Byron.

 

[Martin_des]

Thank you for the tip. Definitely worth trying

 

[Baker]

You might also like to try live micro worms or live small black worms. You can get strategic with the black worms by cupping hem in your hand and lowering them to the bottom of your aquarium before releasing them. This may give the worms enough time to begin burrowing into your substrate before the top/mid level fish get a change to snag them all up, and the cories will be able to excavate them throughout the day. Regardless, enough should survive and make their way to the bottom eventually. I use microworms with Pygmy copies because their mouths are so small but yours shouldn't have a problem with small black worms anyway.

 

[Martin_des]

Sounds like a fasting way to keep my corys buys and I like the idea to let them 'hunt' on the food too

 

[Baker]

Yup, and you can actually cultivate them yourself if you put the time into it. Which saves you a lot of money in the long run

 

[Byron]

You have to be careful about feeding worms more than as a "treat." The prepared sinking foods have more rounded nutrition and should be the staple.

 

[Martin_des]

Here a update
I tried burying the food, the corys do find the wafers and start eating it. But ones the guppys and the plattys noticed that there is food, they steal the food and the cory needs to start searching all over again.
Then I tried the dark method. I wait a good hour after the lights go out and then get some wafers in the tank as quite as possible. And yes indeed the wafers are gone the next morning.
I also palamning on starting a life food colony as treats for my fish

 

[Baker]

Another thing you can try is blanched green beans. You can put one green bean stall in the tank overnight and then remove it in the morning, I can't guarantee the cories will eat it, especially the first few times, but a lot of fish love green beans and they are really good for roughage something like once a week or so.

Don't get too discouraged if you don't see the cories eating too often, they are still most likely getting enough food and although not recommended, fish can live off less food than you think, sometimes people only feed once a week. They will find enough food to survive off of

 

[Martin_des]

I already tried customer. My catfish didn't eat from it but the rest did. I was planning on do this again. I also heard I can give them salad.
I'm not discourage, on the contrary, I will find the best day to feed my little buddy's