Cutting back on Feeding (Planaria related)

[follicle]

Well, I found out the the reason my water is so cloudy is because of overfeeding. Tonight I noticed very small 1/32" white worms crawling all over the aquarium glass (hundreds of them!). I really didn't think I was overfeeding but I can't be sure. Anyway, I plan on doing a 20% water change every other day and cutting back on feeding.

Here's what's in the tank:

1 African Butterfly Fish
1 Pleco
1 Black Ghost Knife
2 Rosy Barbs
2 Rosy Tetras

I usually feed them a tablespoon of Tetra Flakes and a frozen blood worm cube once a day.

So, two questions. One, is this too much? And two, if I were to cut back, how much would you suggest to cut back?

I'm just scared that if I cut back to much, I might starve them.

Thanks!

 

[krap101]

Well, it seems that you don't have any "cleaners" like cories or loaches, so you should gauge how much you feed by how much gets left on the bottom afterwards.

 

[missileman]

The cube of frozen bloodworms is too much. feed half one day and save the other half for the next day. and I wouldn't give it every day either.
Give your pleco a slice of Zuchini every once in a while, he will love it. no seeds and you can leave it in overnight if you remove it first thing in the morning and hold off till you get your water clean.
Are you vacuuming the bottom real good when you do a partial water change?

 

[FishStarter89]

A tablespoon of flakes seems way too much. You shouldn't worry about starving your fish; when you feed them, if every single fish in the tank gets something, no matter how much, out of the food you feed them then they should be fine. Fish do not starve easily because they're bodies are made to go periods of time with no food at all.

Plus, it's bad for the fish's health and your bio-filter to overfeed them. It can lead to health problems and ammonia spikes.

 

[darkmule27]

I second FishStarter89. A tablespoon sounds like way too much food. Feed a small pinch or two, make sure everyone gets some, and you should be fine.

 

[new2betas]

In agreement with everyone else...I read "a tablespoon" ??? and thought way too much. I just give mine a couple of pinches a day and I have two angel fish, two albino cories, five cardinal tetras, and two threadfin rainbows. The cories, however, get either sinking shrimp pellets or algae wafers.

 

[follicle]

Thanks for all the replies! They are all very helpful. Looks like I'll be cutting back quite a bit; especially over the next few days.

Missleman, I did a pretty aggressive gravel vac last night and I was sucking up dirt that I never knew existed – I'm talking dark brown, almost black dirt. I plan on doing a 25% change every day through the end of the week.

Zucchini? That's awesome! I'll give it a try.

 

[krap101]

Unless theres ammonia/nitrites, I'd wouldn't suggest wc's every day. It could stress out the fish, and planaria are harmless. Also bringing up all of the stuff from under the gravel could start a mini-cycle so watch yourself

 

[bluerose]

Fish can easily go 5-6 days without food... I regularly skip a day so the fishies go around the tank cleaning up. The bums get lazy when they have room service every day

For my crowd (see sig) I feed a small pinch of flakes and 1/2-1 small algae wafer. A few are too plump... well, some of the neons steal the algae wafer pieces from the cories, and so do the shrimp. Darn shrimp are supposed to be eating the real algae!

 

[follicle]

Unless theres ammonia/nitrites, I'd wouldn't suggest wc's every day. It could stress out the fish, and planaria are harmless. Also bringing up all of the stuff from under the gravel could start a mini-cycle so watch yourself

Good point. Should I even increase my water change frequency or should I stick to just once a week like always?

 

[krap101]

I'd say just reduce feedings and do your once a week, unless something else happens.

 

[follicle]

Okay. Thanks!

 

[gzeiger]

Make sure to test for ammonia about... now. Usually it's recommended to do a thorough vacuum cleaning of about half your gravel each water change. If you went several water changes without getting down in the gravel and then did all of it, it's likely you stirred up some stuff into the water that could cause harm. Luckily it's easy to tell by the presence of ammonia. If you see any, change water, if not then your regular schedule should be fine.

There's nothing wrong with twice weekly though. That's not too much that it would be stressful to the fish.

 

[follicle]

Make sure to test for ammonia about... now.

I did that just this afternoon. Everything turned out as usual. No Ammonia, no nitrites, and very little nitrates.

Just to be safe, I'll probably test the water again in a few days.

 

[gzeiger]

It's never bad to test the water often, but there's no real reason to increase your normal testing schedule. The reason several people mentioned a mini-cycle is that unvacuumed gravel can build up anaerobic areas where uneaten food and fish poop can accumulate and don't decompose normally because of the low local oxygen level. When you stir it up, even if most of it gets vacuumed out, what's left is now in the water column where oxygen levels are much higher and it breaks down quickly in much larger quantities than your fish normally produce and therefore in larger quantities than your filter is equipped to handle. If a day has gone by and you haven't seen a spike, it isn't going to happen later because of this effect, so you're good to go.

 

[follicle]

Yeah, that would be scary! I did get quite a lot of it into the vacuum, but I'm sure some of it made it into the tank. I vacuumed the tank last night around 8:00 or so and tested the water around 4:00 today, so I'm hoping that's enough time. I think I'll test one more time tomorrow just to be sure (I worry like that).

Thanks a lot for the information. Very informative!