Holiday update

FishForums.net Pet of the Month
🐶 POTM Poll is Open! 🦎 Click here to Vote! 🐰

seangee

Fish Connoisseur
Joined
Feb 16, 2008
Messages
5,042
Reaction score
4,319
Location
Berks
Arrived home this evening and for the benefit of those who expressed concern that my fish didn't get fed for 2 weeks everyone is thriving :)
The community tank gave me a little concern as I could not find the otos, just had to look harder all is well (and its a month since I bought them so the critical stage is over). The BN has been doing some decorating in my absence - but that's nothing new. He has also dug himselelf a lttle crater next to one of the pieces of driftwood. Before I left I broke off some frogbit leaves and threw these into the left half. These have covered over and I have some nice new plants. Nitrates were closer to 0 than 5. Fish in this tank got lucky tonight and were fed. I rinsed the filter sponges. No food for the other 2 because they had water changes instead.
20200205_215316.jpg

All good in the nano too. Here nitrates were a bit less than 5
20200205_215417.jpg

Finally the sids' tank. Nitrates were under 10 in here, but this one has the least plants. There are holes and tears in the crypts. I am blaming the sids for this because there is no sign of any damage in the other tanks.
20200205_215441.jpg
 
You shoulda made a video for the first feeding after 2 weeks. Musta been a sight.
 
Last edited:
No food....no (nitrogenous) waste ---little ammonia, no nitrates.
Worth considering very light feeding moving forward?
 
No food....no (nitrogenous) waste ---little ammonia, no nitrates.
Worth considering very light feeding moving forward?
You're preaching to the converted there. Many on here would call me a chronic under feeder :rofl:
The reason for the post is I mentioned in another thread that not feeding for 2 weeks is the best thing to do if you happen to go on a 2 week holiday. Several people suuggested this would be bad for the fish :angel:
 
Nice looking tanks, love the loaches.
Thanks. I try to stick to my own advice for social fish. I have 12 in there. Its quite a spectacle when they all decided to come out and play together.
 
You're preaching to the converted there. Many on here would call me a chronic under feeder :rofl:
The reason for the post is I mentioned in another thread that not feeding for 2 weeks is the best thing to do if you happen to go on a 2 week holiday. Several people suuggested this would be bad for the fish :angel:
Mixed feelings - you could go for two weeks without food too...but would it be good for you?!?!? Light feeding is probably good, but under feeding, maybe not so much. But slight under feeding is probably better than over feeding.
 
Mixed feelings - you could go for two weeks without food too...but would it be good for you?!?!? Light feeding is probably good, but under feeding, maybe not so much. But slight under feeding is probably better than over feeding.
It would probably benefit lots of people (including me) in the western world :)

Fish and mammals metabolise food completely differently. Mammals use most of the food they eat just to keep warm. Most fish don't have to do this because they take their body temperature from the surrounding environment. This simply means fish can go without food for a lot longer than people can and not suffer any deleterious effects.

Most animals, including people, never used to get regular food. Wild animals might go for days without food. Wild fish are the same and might not have food for weeks or months. It's only since modern agricultural methods have been implemented that humans have had a steady and regular food source. Prior to that, we ate as much as we could whenever we could because we didn't know when or where our next meal would be.
 
I think it comes down to 'grazers or gorgers'. Many of our smaller aquarium fish have small stomachs and are grazers. They eat small amounts of food throughout the day. Some larger fish are gorgers and have adapted to eating a lot, then don't eat again for some time.

Surviving long periods without food is not necessarily healthy and in some cases takes a toll. And then there are special cases. I think fry might starve to death and young growing fish may be stunted if/when food is withheld. So if those cases are real, it's likely not good for any fish?

I'm not a biologist, just a long time fish keeper. When I've been away (although I don't get away for long periods much any more) I'd have someone come in to feed specific amounts at least every other day. More recently I've used auto-feeders as there are some really reliable ones these days. Eheim makes a couple of really good ones...(I have used both of these models of auto-feeders:
feeder-E.jpg
feeder2-E_.jpg


EDIT Footnote: I've been breeding, growing out, and selling hundreds of swordtails. I feed them 3-4 times a day.
 
Last edited:
He has also dug himselelf a lttle crater next to one of the pieces of driftwood.
Oh my word, my albino BNP does this more times than you could ever imagine! It’s funny and at the same time annoying! :lol:

But do we really need autofeeders? They just seem like a cool toy to me. (A cool toy that may not be some people’s budget.) I never knew that fish could go 2 weeks without eating, how is this possible? I feed my community tank once every 2 days. (Shrimp/Pleco is a different story, with them I feed alage wafers/shrimp cuisine every 3-4 days)
 
But do we really need autofeeders? They just seem like a cool toy to me. (A cool toy that may not be some people’s budget.).....
A matter of perspective. Lets say you're raising fry that need to be fed 3-4 times a day and you have a job that keeps you away 8-12 hours a day? Or your on the road a lot for a job? Or a vacation and aren't comfortable not feeding for an extended period....?
Some folks with large fish rooms swear by auto feeders along with automated water changes.
Ted Judy spoke at one of our club meetings. Ted once had an amazing fish room and YouTube channel. But at the meeting he said he scaled down to 2 or 3 aquariums, When I asked why, he told me that when he went to work for Custom Aquariums, his fish room just wasn't automated enough so he had to shut it down.
 

Most reactions

trending

Staff online

Back
Top