Feeding Questions

[MARITA]

For over 6 months I've had one goldfish and 3 loaches (khuli & dojo) in a 30 gal tank. Usually I feed the goldfish flakes and the loaches get the leftover flakes.... so I hope. My goldfish is a "pig" when it comes to eating and I never know just how much the little ones get.
So, I bought the Algae Wafers.
I try to hide little pieces of the wafers inside their hiding places but they keep floating back out ----and then my goldfish eats them (and almost chokes on the pieces!).
I'd like to feed the whole wafter to the loaches since it stays in place inside the decoration better. But is one wafter too much for 3 little loaches and will it make the water/tank dirtier by having leftovers if they don't eat it? I'd love to feed them shrimp pellets, but my goldfish eats anything small before they can get to eat.
I've tried a baster to put small feed in their hiding places, but it always ends up coming out.
My loaches have not grown at all in over a year (I had them in a 10 gallon tank before moving them into the 30 gal).

[adrea]

Hi Marita,

I suggest trying Spectrum Thera by New Life - It has a pic of a clown loach on the lable and comes in short plastic jars. We feed this to our clowns, weathers, and yo-yos every morning- they all love the food and seemed to have bulked up quite a bit as a result. We feed them algae wafers in the evening and on the weekends we give them veggies, shrimp (a new addition to their diet thanks to loaches.com forum) or frozen food. I am sure that the fish enjoy a bit of variety so we try to mix it up. You may also want to try some frozen fish food like bloodworms - they normaly come in small cubes - have never seen a oach not get excited over frozen food (I though it out in a shooter glass with warm water first but a lot of people seem to put the frozen cube in the tank directly)- I expect that you would only need to feed them maybe 1/3 to 1/4 of a cube at a time with the # of fish you have in your tank. We normaly split 1 cube between 3 tanks - a 10 gal and 37 gal and a 55 gal.

I am not an expert by any means and I could be totally wrong. But do you mean you have 3 khulis & 3 dojos or just 3 in total or 3 in total ex. 2 Khulis and 1 Dojo? If you only have 3 in total between the 2 species That might be your issue there - I would have a minimum of 3 of each if you do not already... From my understanding 3 or 4 is the bare minimum you shold have of any one kind of social/community loach such as khulis and Dojo's. If they are not with enough of their own kind I think that can stop them from growing as well.

Again by no means am I even close to an expert though (I am just getting started myself) so I would watch for more comments...

Good luck!
Adrea

[MARITA]

It's a total of 3 loaches - 2 weather and 1 khuli loach; then just one goldfish in same tank. He's the problem with feeding the loaches anything else but flakes because he eats EVERYTHING.
The loaches stay inside their "homes" most of the daytime ... so I try to find food that they like and that will not come floating back out of their place. The best so far is a whole round Algae Wafter - it stays inside. I don't know if a whole wafter is too much for one feeding. If I break it up, the piece will float out & the goldfish will eat it (half chocking on it).
How can I feed bloodworms, etc. without the goldfish eating all of them?

I live in a very rural area - no access to frozen fishfood for 50 miles. Loaches & goldfish were "rescue" from a local Walmart.

[adrea]

Hi Marita,

If you do not have access to more Dojo's and Khuli's right now no biggie - just know they are happier in groups of 3 or more with their same species! Good rescue - you got some really fun loaches.... What is your lighting like in the tank? My weathers and Khuli's seem to be more active when I subdue the lighting.

You do not have to go with blood worms I know there are frozen foods people swear on that is better - lol - like I said I have only been in this for a while... Do you have access to frozen cocktail shrimp or even the baby cooking shrimp? If you do soak the shrimp for 20 mins to an hour to get out most of the salt and thaw the shrimp (lol again - i just learned about the shrimp on this forum). I will only feed my little dudes cooked shrimp because I am in a landlocked area and figure if I would be comfortable eating the raw shrimp as sushimi then the fish probably shouldn't either...

The shrimp will sink normally or you can always weigh it down with a food clip or any other means of weighing down the food...

Maybe try extra hiding spaces, fake plants etc to give as many hiding spaces as possible so they feel more comfortable going from hiding spot to hiding spot scouting out food...

Is your tankmaybe a bit warm? A good happy medium for Khuli's and weathers seems to be around 78 or 80 or there abouts....

I hope this helps! Let me know how it goes for you!

Adrea

[Diana]

78 to 80 is way too high for Dojos and Goldfish.

I would try to make more hiding places, and try feeding in a cave. If the food floats, it will hit the top of the cave, and not escape.

Can you find garden bugs (no pesticide)
Aphids, mosquitoes, earthworms? All your fish ought to eat these.
Try fresh or frozen (defrosted) vegetables. The goldfish ought to eat these, even if the Loaches do not. Try a thin slice of orange. Fish like the same part as we eat.

Try feeding after lights out, many Loaches are more willing to explore at night, Golds sleep at night.

[MARITA]

I keep the water temperature around 74-75 degrees which seems to be ok for all of them. Thanks for the suggestions - I will make a trip to Petsmart (about 50 miles away) tomorrow & get some more loach food as well as some more "hiding places" (Walmart only has limited selections). My goldfish actually tries to get inside those little ones I have right now - a miracle he has not hurt himself or got stuck yet!

[helen nightingale]

do you have a cold bag, or a polystyrene fish box? you can put frozen food in something like this and it will be fine for a 50 mile trip.

if you are worried about a whole wafer being too much for you r loaches, can you put it in the tank somewhere that you can fish the remains back out after a while?

[loachdad]

search loaches on line site. There is a fantastic recipe for home made frozen fish food. It will tempararily float inside hidey holes wile the loaches get to eat at least some of it. My loaches just love it but my next batch i am only using half the spinach called for as they seem to just expel it trough their gills and i have a lot of GREEN mater to vacume out. It is cost effective and easy to get ingrediens with your groceris.

[loachdad]

The frozen food recipe is a link on the home page. I hope this will help you and help the kids eat better.