Feeding Your Reef Question

[Mouse]

I feed the fish not the tank if you see what i mean. Sorry, i wasn't trying to be funny. When there done there done. I try to make sure thry dont get so full there sick, but thats only coz it grosses me out.

 

[toptank]

Do any of you have recipes for making your fish food? What is the best way to do this?

 

[Anonymous]

Try this link:
Reef central's so you want to make your own food.

B

 

[HARRISON]

I have many books that talk about feeding fish and corals various things. A buddy and I have been discussing what to feed and when and how. I am curious to hear from all of you. I want to see what you do. Specifically, what foods do you use and if you have a recipe that would be interesting to see. Which corals and fish do you feed with what you put out. And very impotantly, how much so as not to over feed.

I try to vary the diet but I am not sure if I am doing it right. I have softies and some SPS, whereas my buddy has mostly SPS.

My setup:
80 Gallon Reef
30 gallon sump/Refugium
2-250 Watt Halides, 2-55watt PC's 10k and blue
CPR BakPak Skimmer on refugium/sump (light caulerpa growth) don't tell the Feds...
Deep sand in Refugium / thin layer of sand in tank

Fish:
Atlantic Blue Tang
Barnicle Blenny
Royal Gramma
One O. Clown
Pair of Scooter Blennies
1 Coral Banded Shrimp
Hermits and Snails(Bumble bee, Astrea, Trochus,Turbo
2 Rototiller stars in top tank, 1 in Refugium

Corals:
Sacrophyton
Xenia
Gorgonian (whip, plume)
Frogspawn
Monster Brain
Devils Finger Leather
Cup Coral
Capnella
Montipora, acropora (small)
4 Clams
many shrooms and some polyps of different types
and a funky lettuce looking leather

oh yeah and a few aptaisia...thank you BARRY!!!


Thanks for the input...

 

[toptank]

If you need more aptaisia I would be glad to donate more

If we get some good recipes we can make some up AT YOUR PLACE

 

[Anonymous]

I think each tank is different and must be treated as unique. Some have very high bioloads in the same size tanks and one feeds heavy and the other does not. The one that feeds heavy has no cyano or diatoms. Then the guy with the light fed tank throws in an extra feeding and has a diatom out break. Maybe explainable,then again,maybe not. You'll get a ton of different opinions but each one works for that individual,and possibly not the other.

 

[toptank]

Sounds like a plan to me. Get that blender out Michael.

Bingo were you a Ranger? My Son was in the 2nd Ranger Bat. in Ft Lewis, Wash. "Operation Just Cause."

 

[SPC]

Barry, how is your acrylic 180 doing, scratch wise?
Steve

 

[Anonymous]

Toptank,
No service for me I only wanted to fly fighters, and once I needed glasses, That dream went down the tube.

In honor of Ranger, a guy on the board who got sent over to the mid east, a bunch of us have it in our sig.

Just a word, make sure the blender is glass. I don't like seafood flavored margaritas, and I don't know anyone else who does.

B

 

[toptank]

Hi Steve, my 180 has been setup sense April 2 and no scratch to speak of except a few toward the bottom where I try not to get gravel in my cleaning pads. I try to be very careful though.

Michael is your blender glass?

 

[SPC]

Glad to here it Barry, so if you had to do it again, would you still go with the acrylic?
Steve

[ November 30, 2001: Message edited by: SPC ]</p>

 

[toptank]

Tough call but most likely would go with glass. I like the looks of the acrylic, don't seem to get yellowish after a year or so like my other glass tank did but then it was a lot harder to scratch. If I ever go with another tank it will be a 300 but have to move first as my townhouse isn't big enough for what I would want to do. Next time I am going to have a room behind the tank so everything will go behind the wall.

 

[HARRISON]

Thanks for the link Bingo...Anyone else going to share?

Barry tell your wife to get out the crystal...its time to mix up some chow. I know she was impressed when we used it last time

 

[toptank]

Hey, I thought that everyone used there wifes crystal to use as fragging bowls..

I used it the other night to accimate the copper and SHE WAS NOT impressed . hehe

 

[HARRISON]

I should have borrowed the crystal when I fragged that colt. I will come get it when I do these other two leathers...I am sure she will like that.

I thought more people would have input on the feeding though. Surprised, go to the fish forum and ask about food you get no answers, talk about Marc Weiss and get a string 100 people long hahahahha.....

 

[reefaquariumsecrets]

What to eat lets see???????????? I agree, I pretty much feed my fish and let the scraps and wastes from the fish go to the inverts. Also many corals will feed on water born organisms present in healthy systems such as bacteria and other microbes. I also like to stir up my sand bed from time to time to kick up some muck and spread it around.

I like ESV's freeze dried phytoplankton, OSI has some decent micro food both which many of your fish will go nuts for. I feed good quality freeze dried krille mainly the other stuff is just when I find the little spoon!.
The krille besides being high in proteins and other essential nutrients is also a good natural source of iodine which is always a plus.

I try to stay away from any flake foods period. Alot of it really depends on the corals and fish you are keeping and their feeding needs but in a healthy tank unless you have a preditor that needs to eat other fish or inverts which is usually not the case in a reef tank their is always something to snack on.

Worst case go to your LFS ask them for their deads and borrow your wifes blender!!!! Don't laugh I started doing this with the deads from a store I managed and it was a great source of natural marine proteins. The price was right and it seemed alot less wasteful to life to feed them to the fish in the store than to simply throw them away.

A few sharp people asked what about any diseases the fish may have had. Most times a disease needs a living host to survive. But I figured the genetic instructions of the disease would still be present in the dead fish acting as kind of a flu shot by exposing the fish in the system to these various diseases and not infecting them out right so their immune systems
should be able to build up natural antibodies.

What I found out from the fish in this system is that they loved eating their dead buddies and honestly I never seemed to have your typical vibrio or other out breaks that wipe out so many LFS systems from time to time.

You guys must have it good using your wives crystal I get my butt chewed when I use her damn plastic containers. No matter how I try I always seem to lose the damn lids!!!!!!

 

[toptank]

reefaquariumsecrets, that was very well explained. Never would have thought of that.

Do you recommend a good vitamin for your fish, I know alot of frozen food suppose to have it in there food.

Now you could tell your wife that you know a guy who uses crystal and then she won't think using the rubbermate stuff is so bad.

LOL

 

[reefaquariumsecrets]

Hey will do! As for the vitamin thing I have never found the need to add vitamin suppliments to my systems. Usually if you are using a good quality food and have a healthy system many of these nutrients are naturally available

In my tank downstairs I have a purple tang, a sailfin tang, a hippo tang, a squirrel fish, a lunare wrasse, a huma trigger, some damsels, and an unidentified eel that is really cool. The reason I bring this up is some of these fish are typically fed spirulina and other things but all I feed the tank is krille! By the way the odd selection of fish is due to specimens I have rescued and adopted over the years.

They have all been in the tank for years and everyone who see's the tank cannot believe the beautiful natural pigments all of these guys have as well as nice fat bellies!!!! Not to mention no lateral line problem in the tangs ever.

A good friend of mine was just over a few months ago and he works with Tropical Science along with many other companies and he could not believe his eyes when he saw the health of my fish! He was truly amazed, and he see's alot of fish! This tells me in this tank that they are getting all they need that they may not get from the krille from the tank itself!!!!

Can't wait to break out the wifes crystal so my frags can travel in style like you guys lol!!!!

 

[HARRISON]

Well I have talked to pet store owners that feed fish the dead also. Aside of building up the immunity to some of the nasty stuff that haunts fish, there is another thing to consider in nature. Natural selection. The dead and dying fish in the see are usually always snacks for something bigger out there. Goes to show me that if the stronger fish ate the dying fish they soon would be dea to, but that is usually not the case. Not sure if it is building up the immunity but sounds like it could have merit. I think that giving fish a varied diet may be the best way to go but also good stuff. I don't have access to dead fish (thank the lord) but I may hunt down some alternatives...

You think the china is bad...you should see the crash cart I made out of a tool cart, hahah...