Hello again. Thanks Andy. You've brought up some very good points. Feeding the fish can be tricky. I've always felt that a little less is best for maintaining a steady and healthy water chemistry. Fish will always appear to be hungry. I've found if I feed a bit less, the fish are more actively moving around the tank looking for the bit of food the others have missed. I was taught that a fish that's a bit on the hungry side is healthier.
B
"A slightly hungry fish is a healthy fish" is something i often see quoted.
My Mentor told me way back when that "reducing feed to improve water quality is not the way to keep fish or any animal. If you want a healthy animal, you have to feed them." Other wise old sayings he told me are " A healthy water quality is maintained through water changes." and " A healthy fish is a breeding fish." By following these words of wisdom I've produced literally millions of fish for the aquarium trade. If you reduce feed or feed poor or low quality foods, breeders don't breed. I rarely suffered from that situation.
Back then, we also had many fish that were wild caught so treating them with wild conditions was not the worst thing. It's why adding slightly cooler water during a water change spurred on fish to spawn because it replicated the rainy season which was when many species bred in nature. We even used Ice Cubes in the Cory breeding tanks to make them think a cold front was coming and that spurred them on to spawn. Wild fish also had a better more nutritious diet of insects or water bugs or fish flesh, crustaceans, etc. so they were used to infrequent feedings because the healthiest fish were getting what they needed through the diet while the unhealthy ones became food for other fish. They didn't always need a lot of food to survive or they were used to periods of low foods to basically go still to not expend the energy. Water flows were not always constant so the fish could rest in the pools or still water. But that was then, this is now. With so many fish in the hobby being farmed, they are fed many times during the day to ensure growth and health. ( We can talk about lack of culling at another time.
) So these fish are accustomed to be fed frequently so they are not adapted to infrequent feedings. They burn up the caloric intake quicker because the water flow and temperatures in a tank are constant. They have no long periods of time to rest quietly. They are also getting a poorer quality diet in tanks as most people do not feed variety or quality due to financial constraints or lack of knowledge of the need. And now we even have so many diseases and resistant pathogens created on the farms that it's not really safe to keep farm bred fish and wild caught fish in the same aquarium anymore.
So the reality is, like all things fish keeping, it's situational. For example, If you are feeding larger cichlids feeder fish, they will remain fairly sedentary while they digest their meal. That could be a couple of days depending on how much they were fed so they don't always need multiple feedings every day. On the other hand, take fish that are in constant motion ( i.e. Barbs or some Tetras) and they will burn up their food intake faster so they need more frequent feedings just to stay static. So there really isn't any one size fits all when it comes to all fish which is why using the " pizza pie" method works because at the end of the day, the fish does not overeat even if they are fed 3,5, 7 even 10 times a day. With every increase in number of feedings, there's a reduction in the amount fed at each feeding. They are consuming the same amount of food per day vs per feeding.
My tanks got fed 3 times a day, everyday. ( I'm not a believer in the " fasting" method. ) They also didn't get fed the same food twice on any one day. One feeding was for ease ( usually flakes), one was meat ( usually live or frozen worms, bugs or shrimp) and the last meal of the day contained vegetation or foods with chiton ( either bloodworms, brine shrimp or Daphnia) so that it pushed out the day's feedings. I never had a bloating issue until I tried switching to freeze dried and pelleted foods. Today, I won't feed any of them anymore because I have done autopsies on some bloated fish and found clumps of these foods in the intestines. It was just disheartening to see.
So that's my story and my why.
