how often do you feed ?

[Somonas]

building on the previous thread by catfishmike how often does everyone feed their fish ?

me - once a day, at night, before the lights go out. sometimes I skip a day, by accident or sometimes intentional, to give the fish a bit of "digestion time".  

the fry get food twice or 3 times a day depending on if I am near the tank.

 

[fishboy]

I feed my fish once a day and somtimes i forget :-[But, that probably  is good for them  anyway

 

[Jay S.]

I feed my fish 20 minutes after the lights turn on in the morning, and 20 minutes before the lights go off at night time. Once a month I will not feed them for 5 days to fast them.

 

[Backdraft Bagel]

I have noticed that my fish don't eat with the same gusto if I feed them daily. I feed 'em every other day.

 

[catfishmike]

i have approx.25 fish in my tank(not sure on how many,haven't seen two usd cats in a while but i'm sure their in there)i feed half in the morning half at night 10 small pellets and one broken up algae wafer,same at night.i also supplement during the week with bloodworms,brineshrimp,and zuiccni. some times i'll turn of the filters for a momment and dump pre soaked flake to the bottom, but only if the pleco looks too fat that week.i have 4 bettas that eat 3 bio gold pellets in the morning 3 at night for 3 or 4 day then they get fd bloodworms on days 5 and 7 to clean them out.fd blood worms are high in fiber and is helpful in case fish get constipated(yuck!)

 

[Atlantic Fish]

Usually at 9am and again at 7 then a day of fasting once a week... i dont thing fish in the wild will get to eat everyday and ive heard many, many people say you should hold back a day once a week, thats its good for them..

 

[colesea]

Whenever I feel like it.

Okay, that sounds harsh, but I have the very very bad habit of being a chronic over feeder. I -know- chronic overfeeding is wrong intellectually, but when the fish do their "begging dance" I can't resist to throw in a "pinch."  So I've given up on the set schedual thing and feed them when I want to watch the tank.  That could be once a day, three times a day, every other day, depending upon my mood.  But they've never gone more than two days in a row without chow.

Truth be told, food in the wild is very sporatic, especially in a predator's case depending upon migrational movements and hunting success.  Although fish have been domesticated for many years, the metabolism of our fish at home respond to changes in food abudance the same way their wild brethern do, chanelling more engery towards growth and reproduction in times of plenty, and then conserving energy for phsyicological "housekeeping" in times of scarcity.  This is why fish can handle a fast, as well as grow to huge sizes when very well fed (as in the case of oscars and certain species of catfish).

~~Colesea

 

[mike the zealot]

ouch.

my lfs told me to feed my fsh like 4 - 6 times a day, as much as they can eat in 3 - 4 minutes. I was feeding em twice a day before... no wonder my waters all cloudy

 

[tizme]

I was doing the 2x a day feeding that was suggested. *thumbsdown2*

Well, needless to say, I was battling the white cloudy thing along with high levels of ammonia.  To heck with the 2x a day schedule!  Now its once a day and even then I fast them periodically.  No set schedule on the fasting.

Oh, and I noticed adding the salt really does make a difference.  Though, I'm not too sure how much my plants like it. ???

 

[luvfishies]

2 times daily, minimum....one feeding usually frozen food...the mbunas get "people" veggies too..about once a week.

Fry get as much as they can eat, as many times as I can feed them.

Once a week all fish fast.

 

[ronrca]

My feeding schedule varies. Sometimes I feed in the morning and then sometimes in the evenings. Of course, this does not happen on a daily basis. I usually feed mornings for a couple of months then switch. Y u ask? Good question and the only reason I could make up is that my fish are now begging for food mornings and evenings.  8) What I mean by begging is that when I approach the tank, the fish almost take the front glass out of the tank. Gotta like that.  *twirlysmiley*

I feed once a day. My community tank I put in around 3 minutes of food. My discus tanks I use pellets and feed them 3 pellets at a time. I also feed them heartbeef once a week. My baby discus (3&quot I feed twice a day.

My food for the community tank is a mixture of flake, pellets and dried shrimp. I dump all the food together in a container and mix. My fishies just love it.

Once a week, the fish fast.

 

[Nativefish Boy]

i feed my rainbow fish a healthy pinch 2-3 times a day. usually spaced out over 4-5 hours between each. They eat almost all of it so not much makes it to the bottom and the tank is crystal clear. I have yet to feed my new bluegill hybird, so i can't say on the one. Oh and mt rams get feed once a day.

 

[VooDooFishy]

I dont have a real set schedule, except no fish ever get fed on Saturdays...and they all get fed live on Sunday  8) Sometimes they get fed once per day, sometimes 2or3 times per day and sometimes they dont get fed that day. But fry get fed 5-6 times per day minimum. Variety in both amount of feedings and type of food is key, IMO anyway.

 

[Somonas]

Colesa that was very interesting, your comment about fish in the wild having sporatic feedings.   when we get wildcaught african cichlids for example you have to be very careful not to overfeed them...  I have 12 in quarantine right now and I swear they jump out of the water and walk to me when they see me for food.. I have to resist this and feed them very little once every other day, until their system gets used to flake foods, which takes about 2 weeks.

It is also interesting to note that people with different types of fish obviously have different feeding routines -  I have frozen bloodworms but only give it to the tetra tank once every few weeks, and make sure some gets down to the clown loaches..  maybe I should be feeding bloodworms more?  I don't put bloodworms or even brineshrimp in the african tanks, with the exception of frozen bbs for fry but even that is limited most mbuna/hap frys can handle crushed spirulina flakes right away.

I try to give my fish a varied diet.. I mean the cats get dry food every day but twice a week I try to give them some canned food too... the fish get different types of flake , they don't seem to mind however. they are always ravenous similar to ronrca's fish taking out the glass,  

 

[WonderFish]

I'm like colesea.  I feed them whenever I get around to it or whenever I feel like it.    The fish don't mind, as long as they get the food.  But when I'm away at school, my mom's in charge of feeding them, so who knows when they get fed.  

 

[skamps]

once a day in the morning....here fishy fishy :-*

 

[Medic6666]

I feed mine everyday when I get home from work.

I also feed them frozen brineshrimp once a week as a treat.

I don't give them much as when I first started I was feeding them too much and the flakes were sinking rather than being eaten.

I started giving them less until they eat it all. Then I add a extra pinch until I have the servings right.

I have a plastic O/J lid on a stick that I put some food under it and push down next to my corys and they now wait for the lid to appear and then charge at it...

just my pennies worth.

Medic6666

 

[Billy Bob]

one time a day six times a week always in the evening before the light goes off. *thumbsup2*

 

[caveman]

Twice a day six days a week. And I try to keep their diet varied.
Caveman