Looking for new food for Barbs & Gourami.

[CompMage]

Ok, thanks in advanced.

I've been looking at my fish. They seem to be fairly messy eaters. So I'm looking for a food that will hold it's form long enough to be eaten, but brake down afterwards so I don't have flake bits on my larger plants leaves after wards. Or something like a floating pellet that I can easly scoop out when they are done done.

This is food for Tiger Barbs, Gourami.

Rainbow shark seems to like to get his food from anything on the bottem and loves large sinking pellets.

I saw one by Hikari's Micro Pettlets
http://www.thatpetplace.com/Product...ood/T1/F29JX+0551+0037/EDP/4988/Itemdy00.aspx

I trust Hikari to put out a quality food, I'm just wondering what other options I have.

 

[puffergirl]

Have you tried frozen food such as blood worms or brine shrimp? Or you can try freeze dried stuff? I find my tiger barbs and tetras absolutley love the frozen stuff, it never has a chance to hit the ground. Its easy to break off into portions so you can avoid giving them too much. Your fish will love you too.

 

[Michael]

I agree, frozen foods are great, especially, daphnia, Mysis & cyclop-ezz. For both your Gourami & Barbs, I would consider a Veggie & Spirulina Flake.

 

[Zezmo]

Well if you want less messy frozen may not be the way to go. Though, I use lots of frozen foods myself. All the fish go crazy for frozen daphnia or bloodworms. I also have some of those micro pellets. They sink fairly fast, the fish do like them though. I will mix those with freeze dried daphnia as a meal. Really, food choice for fish should be a variety.... flake, pellet, frozen, freeze dried, and fresh. With different foods in each category. More variety will result in happier more active fish IME. At Petco they sell flightless fruitflies for reptiles. They come in a little cup and about 10-15 flies hatch every day for a couple weeks. Gouramis go berzerko to eat these, if it is a Dwarf Gourami he may spit water at them like an archer fish does. I suspect the Barbs will enjoy them too. This leaves no mess, the flies sit on the surface of the water until eaten.

Sound like what you really are looking for is less maintenance. Easy solution is feed less food. You are not likely to starve your fish, and if you have unsightly leftover food to worry about then just feed less. You can also use a feeding ring. The food is kept in one place, and the food that sinks lands in one place. The fish always know where to go for their food.

I use a ring, and the fish know that when I open that side of the tank they may get fed. So they all come zooming up to the ring to see what they get.

 

[CompMage]

Currently I feed them Freeze-Dried blood worms... they never tend to hit the bottom of the tank. I'll grab some frozen every now and they, but frozen is expensive.

I am a MAJOR fan of my feeding ring. Every one knows where the food is. They see the ring and they will follow it all over tank. I find if funny to play with them a little with it at times and move it.

They are blue Gourami. Yea I do like throwing live food in there every now and then when I find a small cricket around the house I throw it in. Poor thing don't stand a chance. I've watched flies land on the surface to meet their doom too.

I'm going to try the micro-pellets along with the freeze-dried stuff, treating frozen every now and then. And substitute veggie flakes into the mix every now and then. Thanks, I just wanted to get a more round fill for my options. Less food it is.

 

[willowthepoet]

my gouramis love the hikari betta pellets, and those seem to never hit bottom, but that could be because i have a bunch of little piggies.