Feeding Rat Tailed Maggots

[juliehainsworth]

Ok I know we are a long way off from summer but I have a pond in my garden that I usually collect daphnia/bloodworm/mosquito larva from but also in my pond I also get rat tailed maggots and possibly even mayfly larva (look kinda like shrimps with a three pronged tail (also sometimes come in bags of daphnia from LFS))! Do you think it would be ok to feed the fash the rat tailed maggots as well as the others? I have never tried them on it before but would be interested to see if they eat them. The rat tailed maggots are the larva of the hover fly not sure what they eat it'll either be the daphnia or algae or some other planktonic stuff from the pond)!

Reason I ask is that some people feed earthworms to they're fish so wondered if there was a problem in feeding these to them?

 

[moray]

rat tailed maggots eat decaying organic matter and as far as I know are a perfectly safe food for fish, they are usually found in more stagnant water than fish, so are not usually a large part of the fishes diet. But they have no defences and have been eaten by my sticklebacks without any adverse effects; so I can't see any problem feeding them to your fish.

 

[juliehainsworth]

Yay, roll on the warmer months! unfortunately most of the live food for fish seem to come from stagnant water I know mosquitos prefer it but not too sure bout daphnia........ but that is an extra food source on the menu!

Works out a lot cheaper to be able to harvest them yourselves than to have to buy it in all year round!

Only four more months to go until I will be able to start harvesting in small amounts..... Hmmm hope I dont get hold of too many tadpoles this year!

Dead happy now!