madasafish
Aquarium Advice Addict
Hi all,
Sorry I've been so distant from the board recently. I've been in England celebrating my parents' anniversary with them. This plays into the short story I'm including here.
When I left for England on the 24th, I made sure to clean out the fish tank that I maintain for a professor I know. Because of a recent automatic feeder malfunction, the tank was going through tough times, and ammonia had risen above 0 (the fish are fed exclusively by automatic feeder, as the people who work there are unwilling to feed them; I can only visit the tank 1-2 times a week). On the 23rd, I changed 50% of the water, and sucked out all extra food that had made its way into the tank. I also decided to close off the automatic feeder for the next day until I left so as to reduce the amount of potential pollutants to the tank. Somehow, I forgot to open the feeder the next day: no food would be entering the tank while I was away in England.
When I returned to the tank yesterday (2 weeks later) I found, to my surprise, that the fish had not been fed once in my absence!! However, the fish were all alive and well. Keep in mind these are Lake Malawi Mbuna cichlids, so they eat algae from the rocks, but still... I was amazed to have (unintentionally) tested the conventional wisdom about leaving fish without food for long periods of time, and to have found that great aquarists--who say that fish can do without food for over 2 weeks--are absolutely right!
So, that's a lesson to all fretters out there. If you're leaving for a week and absolutely cannot find somebody to feed your fish for you, the fish will be perfectly fine if they're healthy to begin with. I'm sure that some exceptions apply with more sensitive fish, but IME, this remarkable fact is absolutely true. I'd say that 2 weeks is pushing it, but take comfort in the fact that fish are very metabolically adaptable.
So to all of you planning on taking a trip soon, Merry, and Worry-Free, Vacationing,
Jon
Sorry I've been so distant from the board recently. I've been in England celebrating my parents' anniversary with them. This plays into the short story I'm including here.
When I left for England on the 24th, I made sure to clean out the fish tank that I maintain for a professor I know. Because of a recent automatic feeder malfunction, the tank was going through tough times, and ammonia had risen above 0 (the fish are fed exclusively by automatic feeder, as the people who work there are unwilling to feed them; I can only visit the tank 1-2 times a week). On the 23rd, I changed 50% of the water, and sucked out all extra food that had made its way into the tank. I also decided to close off the automatic feeder for the next day until I left so as to reduce the amount of potential pollutants to the tank. Somehow, I forgot to open the feeder the next day: no food would be entering the tank while I was away in England.
When I returned to the tank yesterday (2 weeks later) I found, to my surprise, that the fish had not been fed once in my absence!! However, the fish were all alive and well. Keep in mind these are Lake Malawi Mbuna cichlids, so they eat algae from the rocks, but still... I was amazed to have (unintentionally) tested the conventional wisdom about leaving fish without food for long periods of time, and to have found that great aquarists--who say that fish can do without food for over 2 weeks--are absolutely right!
So, that's a lesson to all fretters out there. If you're leaving for a week and absolutely cannot find somebody to feed your fish for you, the fish will be perfectly fine if they're healthy to begin with. I'm sure that some exceptions apply with more sensitive fish, but IME, this remarkable fact is absolutely true. I'd say that 2 weeks is pushing it, but take comfort in the fact that fish are very metabolically adaptable.
So to all of you planning on taking a trip soon, Merry, and Worry-Free, Vacationing,
Jon