how much food is too much food?

Question

i read alot of the bottles of food i buy or the frozen food packages or even the live food.Most of them say feed what your fish will eat withen 3 to five minutes and suck ou t the rest. They also say feed 2 to 3 times daily.Is this too much food m fish eat it and im careful not to eover feed or at least what i think would be over feeding. I've also read that feeding your fish too much can make them fat and deformed. I also want to know is it a good idea to let your fish fast at least for one day a week. I know they wont die without food for one day or at least i think i know um yeah thanks

Answer 1

Fish are cold blooded. This means they don't use their energy to warm their bodies, as warm blooded creatures do. It also means they need less food then people think, and can go longer without then people think.

Don't trust the bottle - they want to sell more food.

Allowing a fish to gorge on flakes for 5 minutes is way too much. To do it 3 times per day is way, way too much. Instead, feed them what they can eat in a couple of minutes per day, total - this means if you prefer to feed them twice, do so for just a minute. Doing this will keep the fish healthy and the tank cleaner.

Yes, overfeeding can result in fat fish - more mishapen then deformed though. It takes a long period of continuous overfeeding for this to happen though.

As for how long they can go without - it depends on the fish, and the age of the fish. Young fry need to eat every day, while grown fish can go weeks, or even months, without food.

Fasting the fish one day per weekdoes no harm, and might do some good. Some people even feed their fish every other day. When you leave for a weekend, you are better to leave the fish without food for it. Those blocks they sell contain almost no nutrition anyway, and can pollute the water, while trusting someone to feed them can result in disaster. A few days without is truely nothing for the fish.

One last thing - keep in mind the difference between prepared foods and fresh foods. Fresh foods, like a fishes natural diet, contains about 80% moisture or more. Prepared foods are dry, containing 10% or less. The condensed nature of the flakes means they don't need nearly as much as they would natural food and should be kept in mind when feeding. Allowing a fish to gorge on fresh food, while messy on the tank, is mostly harmless because of the smaller percentage of nutrition per weight. Allowing them to gorge on flakes or pellets, also messy on the tank, can cause constipation, bloat, or the less then ideal growth you have heard of. The overfeeding that causes this rapid growth also decreases the lifespan.

Answer 2

OK this question isn't as black and white as ppl are stating your fish need enough food to continue growing, so if you have young fish they should be fed several times a day in minuscule amounts.
If your fish are older and more or less fully grown, which i doubt because most fish take a few years to mature then once a day should suffice.
If you have a heavily stocked aquarium then you have to feed sufficient so everyone gets a share, if you put in 5Min's worth you likely to get all the greedy aggressive fish taking the lot and then some of the less fortunate doing without. In a large balanced tank this shouldn't make much difference as there'll be enough natural food around to supplement what you put in however, in my experience ppl that say I've had this fish about 6 mths then it suddenly died have literally starved it to death.

So to answer your question its for you to find out by experimentation, your fish will only eat if they're hungry, while I'll say you don't see many fat fish it's not impossible but unlikely (to fat slow to get to food). If there's any food left cut back, if you notice fish not getting any feed half the amount in 2 different places.

AJ

Answer 3

Prep foodstuff - Sushi Gothic foodstuff - Bat heads Gangster foodstuff - Okra, collared vegetables, mac and cheese, black eyed peas, and so on... Emo foodstuff - No foodstuff. Too depressed to consume Nerdy foodstuff - Bologna sandwich and an apple (brown bag)

Answer 4

Feed them as much as they can eat like on the bottle and if you feed them too much it can kill them so be careful.

Answer 5

feed your fish once a day and they should be able to finish their food in 2 min. if they don't then you've fed them too much

Answer 6

Too much food is when it sinks to the bottom and starts to pollute the water over time.

~ZTM

Answer 7

If you get the flakes you can give one for every cm and for crumbles give two per cm.

Hope i was of help... :)

Answer 8

just go by what the food bottle says.