Peacock Eel Feeding Regime

[Starfishpower]

I got a 4-5" peacock eel a few weeks ago. at first he wouldnt eat the packaged blood worms and then when i went looking for live food small enough for him (or her) to eat all my LFS were out. so i went down to the bait shop and picked up some red wiggler earthworms. iv had to chop them up into centimeter long segments. he seems to absolutly LOVE them, but i wonder if im overfeeding as i know this can be very harmful. so my question is this: i need to know (1) how many meals he should have within a given time period (twice a day? .... once every other day?) and (2) how much should be given at each meal (total of one inch of worm, 1 and half inches? ect.) apart from my not knowing this i think hes doing very well, iv even got him to eat from my hand already! im presently feeding him about 2 inches once a day, and sometimes i skip a day to ensure im not overfeeding and so he doesnt get lazy.

 

[Colin_T]

generally feed it once a day and give it as much to eat as it wants. When it is full and no longer interested in food stop feeding and remove any excess ifrom the tank.

Try offering it other foods besides the worms as nutritional deficiencies can occur when fish are fed the same thing all the time. It also means if one food isn't available for some reason the fish can eat something else.

 

[nmonks]

Colin is right that you shouldn't feed the same thing all the time, but earthworms might be exceptional. Unlike feeder fish, they don't contain thiaminase, so you don't run the risk of vitamin B1 deficiency. Also, earthworms are herbivores, and they will be "gut loaded" with decaying vegetation as well as fibre, ensuring the spiny eel gets additional vitamins and minerals. So on balance I don't think that you are likely to cause problems feeding these fish earthworms as the bulk of their diet.

All this said, once settled in spiny eels become quite tame and will try new food items. Frozen bloodworms are definitely worth using. Live (but clean) tubifex are greatly enjoyed. River shrimps are taken by the bigger species. My specimens always seemed to love small chopped prawns.

Cheers, Neale

Try offering it other foods besides the worms as nutritional deficiencies can occur when fish are fed the same thing all the time. It also means if one food isn't available for some reason the fish can eat something else.

 

[Starfishpower]

thanks so much! ok, so once a day, as much as he wants, and through in some other food every week or so for nutritional support. sounds good. oh and i have put some ghost shrimp in their with him, they are disappering but im not sure that he is the reason. his mouth is really small at this point and i thought they were too big to fit. there's nothing in the tank with him that could eat ghost shrimp (just black khuli loaches) so my conclusion is that maybe he is eating them... since they turn pink when they die and im always checking out my tank and never see any pink shrimp. hmmm heres a thought, black kuhlis eat dead things, or so iv read, maybe if the shrimp die the kuhlis just eat them up before i get a chance to see them. or maybe their called ghost shrimp for a reason and i just cant see them all wow, it just hit me, i hope my shrimp arent just flat out dieing. that could be a sign of whether or not something would be wrong with my aquarium, i better check into that. maybe they just arent getting the nutritional supplements they need on sinking wafers and the little amount of earthworm they can get before my eel takes it away from them. ok, thanks for all the help, i really appreciate it

 

[nmonks]

heres a thought, black kuhlis eat dead things, or so iv read, maybe if the shrimp die the kuhlis just eat them up before i get a chance to see them.

Not very likely. Kuhli loaches will nibble on soft, dead things but a shrimp is likely too tough. Primarily these small loaches eat algae and insect larvae of various types.

wow, it just hit me, i hope my shrimp arent just flat out dieing. that could be a sign of whether or not something would be wrong with my aquarium

Shrimps will be eaten by spiny eels big enough to swallow them. But shrimps can also die if the water is not hard/alkaline, and they are also very sensitive to copper, e.g., fish medications.

Cheers, Neale

 

[cgbender]

Would you recomend anything other than frozen bloodworms and earthworms (in addition to not insted of) for feeding spiny eels ..... as we are talking about creating a more welrounded and nutritionally stable diet. And what exactly are they talking about when they say blackworms ... I asked and I was told that it was the same as bloodworms but then people talk about them together as if they are seprate things.

 

[nmonks]

Bloodworms and earthworms would be a fine staple diet. As I've said above, once settled, these spiny eels will eat a variety of things, including small bits of seafood. Some species become hand tame, so with forceps you can actually offer them bits of prawn or whatever.

Bloodworms, blackworms, glassworms etc are all just varieties of insect larvae. Bloodworms are midges, blackworms are mosquitos, and glassworms are gnats. Not all fish like all varieties equally well, so you might need to try them out to see which your fish like best. Nutritionally they're all the same.

Cheers, Neale

Would you recomend anything other than frozen bloodworms and earthworms (in addition to not insted of) for feeding spiny eels ..... as we are talking about creating a more welrounded and nutritionally stable diet. And what exactly are they talking about when they say blackworms ... I asked and I was told that it was the same as bloodworms but then people talk about them together as if they are seprate things.

 

[Colin_T]

what exactly are they talking about when they say blackworms ... I asked and I was told that it was the same as bloodworms but then people talk about them together as if they are seprate things.

In Australia blackworms are an aquatic worm similar to tubifex but live in cleaner environments and have less fat and less bacteria on them.
Bloodworms are the larval form of the Chirominid midge. They are red and feed on rotting plant matter.
Mozzie larvae are mosquito larvae. Black wrigglers you get in buckets of water that have been sitting outside for too long.

Other foods to try would include: brineshrimp, daphnia, marine mix (prawn, fish & squid) and grindle or white worms. Try to give them a different food each day.

 

[Starfishpower]

wow! i love all the feedback. thanks so much guys, and while iv got everybody talking i might as well go ahead ask one more thing. right now i only have the one eel, once i get my 55 gallon up and running (4ft x 1ft x 21") i want to reserve it as a species only tank for the most part... keeping it in the spiny eel family, and maybe my banjo cat Wilson. the plan is to get Smaug (my eel) 2 more peacock eel friends and leave the rest of the empty space open for when the occasional "rare" spiny eel comes in at a LFS so ill have room to take a few home. i know some species get too big, like the fire eel and the tire track, so im focusing on smaller ones like the half banded spiny eel - macrognathus circumcinctus (which I would really love to have a few of!), zebra spiny – macrognathus zebrinus, barred spiny eel - macrognathus pancalus, and black spotted eel -mastacembelus dayi. by the way, if i got any of the latin names wrong on those please let me know, i dont want to look silly. the peacocks are my main concern, so my question is which of those other eels i just mentioned can be kept in a 55 US gallon tank with 3 peacocks, and how many of said species can do that comfortably, i dont want them perturbed all the time cause they dont have enough room. by the way, the pH is 7.8 is that ok?

 

[Colin_T]

I gather your new tank is 4ft long x 1ft wide & 21inches high. If so you might be better off getting a tank that is wider and not so high for the eels. It will give them a bigger surface area and more room to move. Perhaps get a tank that is 4ft long x 18in wide & 18inch high. You can go higher if you want but eels cruze around the bottom and you will have a heap of wasted space in a taller tank. You could put hatchetfish or Freshwater butterflyfish in a taller tank to occupy the top layers.

If anyone complains about the spelling mistakes just say it was a typo

Most of the eels should be fine together as long as they grow to the same size. Obviously don't mix the fire eels with any others because they get much bigger. But generally anything that gets to a similar size to the peacock eels should be fine.

Eels spend a lot of the time under the gravel. If you have lots of wood and plants in the tank they can hide in the gravel or in the plants and you can have more in the tank. You can also put an undergravel filter in the tank and not have it running. The eels will hide under the filter plates as well as in the gravel. You can even make up a false bottom similar to an undergravel filter.

I did it with my botias. I used a sheet of hard plastic and put 2inch legs on it. The sheet had little holes drilled in it to allow water flow through it. This sheet with legs was placed under the gravel (like an undergravel filter plate) and had a couple of big holes with PVC pipe attached to them. The PVC pipe stuck out of the gravel a couple of inches. The fish used to swim down the pipe and cruze around under the plate during the day. Then at night they would come out and play above the gravel. It was funny watching them come out. You put food in the tank and all of a sudden dozens of these loaches would come out of this pipe in the gravel. Likes rats coming out of a hole in the ground.
The next time I do it I am going to use 4 inch legs on the plastic sheet. The higher legs will allow more light under the plate and make it easier to watch the fish.

Just make sure you gravel clean the tank regularly to suck out the gunk from under the plate. You can also put the intake of a powerfilter down the pipe and suck the gunk out that way.
***NB...Be careful gravel cleaning tanks with eels in because they can get squished by the gravel cleaner.

 

[cgbender]

That was rather infomative and after my last post I just wandered over to the lfs on my way to the grosery ..... realy just to check prices. They showed me bloodworms {which i already have}, krill, silver*something* (a small fish kinda like the ones my grandpa use to eat out of a can), brineshrimp, baby brineshrimp, squid, and something else that I don't really remember of the top of my head in the frozen section. In the refrigerater there they had nightcrawlers. I have seen the brine shrimp eggs as well. I kinda like the idea of having a 4' x 2' x 13" species tank for eels .... matter of fact that doesnt sound like bad idea for a coffee table and then it could be longer or square ..... rut ro ... I have a half baked idea

 

[Starfishpower]

ok, its just that i already have that tank and im saving up to get it up and running (filter, stand, ect.) but if they wolnt be comfortable in there then maybe i should look into a bigger one. and yes there will be plenty of bogwood and healthy live plants. so is it a matter of splitting hairs or should i really get a bigger tank? cause for all the money im gona need to start this one i might as well save an extra hundred or two and get a 75 gallon or so, which would be fine cause then i could get a BGK too

 

[Colin_T]

the tank you are interested in is fine for a small number of eels but wider tanks are more practical and can hold larger numbers of creatures. Personally I like to have my tanks the same width or wider than they are high. It just gives the fish more room to move. Fish swim left and right, not up and down.
If you haven't bought the tank yet then perhaps look at getting a slightly wider tank.

 

[Starfishpower]

ok, thank you. i do already have the tank i dont not intend for it to be my last (this "hobby" is SERIOUSLY growing on me) i think what i might do then is plant it, have plenty of bogwood and rocks, and add 3 peacock eels and maybe one or two little half bandeds or zig zags, a butterfly fish, and my banjo catfish too; and let that be it for right now atleast. thanks so much for the help again, oh and a pH of 7.8 isnt too high is it?

 

[Mr._Fishy]

7.8 isn't too high. In the wild they live in a pH around neutral and yours isn't too far off. Fish are generally okay with living in water with a pH that doesn't exactly match their natural habitat, it is the pH swings that will kill them.

And yes this hobby is very addicting!! It seems like yesterday that I just bought a 40g and I am already setting up another tank!