Any ideas how to get food to featherfin catfish

[josh7]

Ok well my Oscar won't give my catfish to eat lol I have tried everything I can think of feed in middle of night I see the Oscar go over and grab food . Then I put food on opposite side of tank he eats all of that and goes over and eats other food to before the catfish can get food.

Any ideas how to get my catfish some more food?

 

[bettaowner]

Have you tried sinking pellets?

 

[christine2012]

My feather fin is very skiddish. He doesn't come out to eat so what I do is soak a few shrimp pellets in tank water and suck them into a Turkey baster. Ill feed my cichlids at the other side of the tank to distract them and while they're over there I shoot the pellets into his hidey hole.

 

[Convict2161]

At feeding time mine just shoots out from I don't even know where and just races from one end I the tank to another. I tried those sinking algae wafers but then saw my Cichlid's carrying them around in there mouths.

 

[Tetra1990]

I second the spot feeding idea.

 

[josh7]

I do spot feeding doesn't work and I mean mine isn't shy hes always out during feeding time but gets like 1 shrimp pellet and 3-4 mini cichlid pellets a day he can find the food before the Oscar eats it all will just keep spot feeding though. See if the featherfin will get more competitive and find food quicker.

 

[kay-bee19]

Nocturnal feeding: add some food to the tank after the lights over the tank and the room the tank is in have been out for some hours and not exposed to any light.

In the darkness, your catfish's sense of smell will grant it an unparalleled advantage over the oscar which primarily uses sight to find its food.

 

[Mogurako]

Mine have learned to come out when I feed the rest of the fish, they seem to get plenty. I give them two good sized pinches of sinking NLS pellets and distribute the food across the whole length of the tank.

 

[Labenator65000]

I worried about the same thing for a while. I also feed my tank NLS sinking pellets and initially I never saw any pellets hit the ground. I "toss" a pinch down in so that a small cloud would hit the water and dissipate in the water flow and inevitably a few would make it to the ground. Eventually it learned to come out at feeding time.

 

[Malawi Freak]

I worried about the same thing about my striped Rafael catfish. He lives under a rock and I have not seen him come out once in the past 2 years. I swear on that. I've camped out for hours of the night watching and he just doesn't come out. He's fine, healthy, and has had the best looks ever. They will find food when they are hungry, it's their way of life and will find little particles floating around.

 

[Malawi Freak]

One thing I have learned over time is if you have a power head I put food right over it to help push it to the bottom for my loaches and synodontis before the greedy cichlids can snatch it all up. It's been working great for me for years.

 

[sally pu]

Catfish are scavengers...as long as any food is making its way to the bottom of the tank the catfish is eating...whether you see it or not...I used to house a convict, a pictus and a bluegill together and everytime feeding time would come along I would never see the the pictus getting any food...I tried everything but my **** convict and blue gill would get "all the food" well I couldn't sleep one night and was up watching my tank and saw the pictus roaming the bottom scooping up leftover food, I feel asleep watching him and the next day his belly was huge and he was really sluggish...needless to say I think he was full from his late night snack.



tl;dr catfish eat, you may not see it happen but they definitely do as said above it is in their nature!