Feeding BN fry in a community tank

[Rynofasho]

Hello all,

I wasn't trying to get my BNs to spawn in my community tank, but low and behold they have and now I'm scrambling to try to make sure at least some of them survive. I've done my fair share of google searching, and I've seen a lot of advice, but it seems to all work under the assumption that you have them in a smaller species only tank.

I've got a peaceful community - 5 Zebra Danios, 8 Lambchop Rasbora, 3 Honey Gouramis, 7 Peppered Corys, 5 Pandas, and two BNs. The tank is 36 gallons with abundant cover in hygros, pennywort, driftwood, caves, etc, so I don't think hiding places are tough to come by, but I'm concerned about how to get them all fed. Pretty much all the fish will come to the bottom to snack on algae wafers, so I don't think the babies will have much chance at getting to them without getting 'trampled' so to speak or being in harms way.

Would you recommend sticking to say saltless french cut green beans and zucchini? How often / how much of it should I feed? I think I'd rather stick more to the green beans as the zucchini seems to pollute the water more. Anything extraordinary I should be aware of or do / not do?

[MatsP]

For best survival/growth rates, you want constant supply of vegetable food - take out what wasn't eaten after 24 hours (if any - if it runs out before 24 hours, add more next time). Supplement this with algae wafers or similar.

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Mats

[Rynofasho]

Thank you for that -- I suppose that implies too that I should be changing at least 20% of the water or so every day or two? Man, my trumpet snails are going to loooooove this hahah!

[MatsP]

Obviously trumpet snails can compete quite well on the food front, so trying to get rid of some of them (by picking them out) would probably be a good idea.

Your tank doesn't sound extremely high stocking level, so I don't think you would be desperately needing 20% water changes until the fry get a fair bit bigger - obviously if you add a couple of hundred bristlenoses to your tank, you will need frequent water changes, and more water changes will certainly encourage the fish to grow fast and eat more...

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Mats

[Rynofasho]

Mats - thank you for the quick updates. I'll definitely pick more MTS out. I don't care what anyone says, overfeeding or not, MTS just reproduce a lot and that is that, so I actually have a dedicated little 1.5 gallon tank that I plunk them in when I decide I'm tired of seeing them all over.

Last question surrounding this then - I was entertaining the idea of more frequent water changes based on the fact that the veggies sitting in there for 8-10 hours at a time will muck it up, not at the fry producing a tremendous amount of waste just yet. I know it is a bit of an opinion question, but do you reckon that 8-10 hours of veggies sitting in there isn't terrible for water quality then? Would it be a better idea to instead of blanching veggies (since they tend to get pretty mushy afterwards, to instead just use all fresh veggies and weigh them down or get some clips to affix them to the side of the tank? Or is blanching a must since the fry are so small?

[Proteus]

I don't ever blanche my veggies for the plecos I just weigh them down with butterknives or leaad weights used for the plants I saved alot of them for that reason and tied fishing line with them and once they done or needs to be pulled out I just pull the line out instead of having my hands in the water sometimes.

BN Fry seem not to have trouble with snacking on veggies esp cucumbers I believe were my BN fry favorites along with pumpkins.

[MatsP]

Agreed, don't heat the veg up, and it lasts longer. If you still find it going off before you can take it out again, try some harder forms of veg: sweet potato/yams, zucchini/courgette rather than cucumber. Green beans. For many more ideas,check out the "Feeding plecos" article [should be in a link to the right of this post].

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Mats

[Rynofasho]

Alright, I was unaware that you can start the babies on an identical diet to the adults. I'll give that all a shot. Thank you very much for your help.