That Fish Blog – Aquarium Advice and Information

Hello, Patty here. Everyone has heard the old saying “you are what you eat” and, when considering your diet, we all know which foods we’re supposed to eat (not that we always do) to keep our bodies happy and live long and healthy lives. The same goes for our pets; even our fish!  Just as we supplement and vary the diets of dogs, cats, and other pets, it is important to vary the foods we give our fish, so that they can develop to their full potential with regards to color and size and so they can get nutrition necessary for breeding, fighting parasites and diseases, and for looking their best for years in your aquarium.

Flake food is a staple

There is a plethora of foods in the market today for feeding aquarium fish.  Most of the foods aquarists are accustomed to are in flake, pellet or granule form.  These foods are the staple diet most people feed their fish as they are economical, well preserved, easy to store and convenient to feed. They are formulated with ingredients like fish meal, wheat flour, and a laundry list of other ingredients including added colors and vitamins to make up for the natural nutrients lost in the preparation of these foods.  These foods are often sold as complete diets, and will keep fish alive and well-colored, but may ultimately be lacking.  Kind of like one of us eating ramen noodles or some similar packaged food, every meal of every day. 

Fresh is best, Frozen is still better

So what do you do if you want to give your fish a diet upgrade?  There are very few fresh or live fish foods available to consumers, but earthworms, blackworms, ghost shrimp and some others can be a nice treat for some fish if you can find them.  A terrific alternative is choosing frozen foods and formulas to  supplement the flake food regimen several times through the week.  These foods are harvested and frozen at the peak of freshness, preserving the naturally occurring vitamins and nutrients.  Many of these foods are (or are very similar to) foods that the fish in your aquarium would seek out in their natural environment.   Today, there are varieties of frozen foods available to suit the needs of just about any type of fish you keep.  These high-quality, high-protein food items increase the vitality and color of your fish, and allow you to see the fish develop and thrive.

Many of the frozen foods on the market are aimed at marine fish and corals, but not exclusively.  There are brine shrimp, mysis, plankton, baby brine shrimp, clam, mussel, and more which give you lots of options for variety and each with its own benefits.  Baby Brine, for example are very tiny but high in nutrition and ideal for fish fry and filter feeding inverts and corals, while clam, mussel, and squid come in larger pieces for larger fish.  Whole silversides and sand eels are great for groupers, eels and other larger fish with big appetites! 

Freshwater options include bloodworms, glass worms, and beef heart, though mysis shrimp, plankton and brine may also be fed. 

There are also several formula foods available, which are combinations of these proteins which may be suspended in a gel with other foods such as spirulina, sponge or other specialty food bits to enhance the diets of specialty feeders like marine angels and omnivores.  Consider the fish you’re keeping and what they might eat on the reef or in the river bed to select what’s best.

Some Things About Frozen Foods

Frozen foods are available for purchase online or in retail stores. Being frozen, these foods are shipped with dry ice to keep them in that state.  The foods must be thawed before feeding, but this is easy as the foods are usually in cube serving form or in thin flat packs that can easily portioned and the appropriate portion snapped off from the body of the pack.  The food portions can be placed in a small vessel of cool water (never warm or hot water as it will cook the food and break down the nutrients) and will be thawed in minutes and ready to feed. You may even choose to soak frozen foods in additional vitamin supplements like garlic extract or Selcon as they thaw to enhance them even more.

Frozen foods may be a bit more expensive and perishable, but the benefits to the food will outweigh the disadvantages.  Give it a try – your fish will love you for it!

Thanks for reading, and if you have any questions about feeding frozen foods or feeding fish in general let us know!

Until Next Time,

Patty

Hi everyone, Cory here.  I’ve blogged before on how the weather can effect fish availablilty , but weather conditions aren’t Mother Nature’s only tools. Sadly, the disaster unfolding in Haiti will effect the lives of hundreds of thousands of people long after the next few weeks as the world gathers to assist the injured and displaced denizens of that beautiful island nation.  Our thoughtss and prayers are with the victims and their families.

As aquarists, you may likely feel some small ripples of the tragedy.  You may see changes in prices and availability of Carribean invertebrates and fish. With a magnitude 7.0 earthquake hitting the capital city of Port-au-Prince, where a majority of the livestock is housed and shipped, the market may be in for some changes in the next few weeks.  Haiti is an excellent source for Scarlet and Blue leg hermit crabs, Gorgonians, Ricordea, and countless other fish commonly seen in the aquarium trade. With restrictions on collection in Florida, there will no doubt be noticeable change in the coming weeks. There are collection stations through out the Caribbean such as Belize. The problem is shipping and the cost of collecting the organisms, the further away from the US, the more it is going to cost.

The bread and butter invertebrates such as Arrow Crabs, Banded Coral Shrimp, and Peppermint Shrimp will most likely be affected as well. During the summer and fall, hurricanes and tropical storms can lead to 1 or 2 weeks of no collection, which hits the aquarium trade very quickly. No one knows right now what the extent of the damage is in Haiti, but the toll is projected to be devastating. Until we know how much the main infrastructure has been disabled, we may be talking weeks to months of no collection. So keep an eye on the news and if you are interested in something from the Caribbean, you might want to get it now, in case the availability decreases as expected.

On the freshwater side, the frigid temps blanketing Florida may also cause some extended issues with tropical freshwater fish.  The media has been covering the devastating effects of the freezing temperatures on the tropical fish farms based there.  Millions of domestically raised fish, hundreds of species, that are shipped to retailers across the nation have perished during the cold snap.  The toll of this event will be unknown for weeks, even as the temperatures rise again.  Fish not killed by the plummeting water temperatures or devoured by predators as they lay paralyzed from the cold will have to recover from the shock and disease that may have set upon them in their weakened states. From guppies to cichlids, stocks have been impacted. Just a heads up, as you may see some empty tanks in the coming weeks until farmers can replenish stocks and recover from the poor circumstances.

You can read more about the fish farms here.

Hello, Frank Indiviglio here.  Marine, grindal, micro, white, blood and other worms drive even the most peaceful aquarium fishes wild, and with good reason – they figure prominently in diets worldwide, and are packed with important nutrients.  Research in which I was involved (Bronx Zoo) has shown that earthworms form a near-perfect diet for many amphibians, and may likely be so for certain fishes as well. 

Blackworms are a pet trade staple…today I’d like to mention a few lesser-known types.

Marine Worms, Families Neridae and Annelidae

Sandworms, bloodworms and other large marine species are seasonally available at bait stores or, where legal, may be collected under rocks along bays and tidal streams.  They are an expensive but important component of the diets of a great many saltwater fishes and invertebrates.

Several species have sharp mouthparts and can deliver a painful bite, and may be dangerous to aquarium pets as well….in fact, the hard jaw material of one sandworm is being put to industrial uses.  It is usually prudent to remove the head before feeding. 

Marine worms store well packed in seaweed under refrigeration.  They are interesting aquarium animals in their own right – please look for a future article on their care.

Microworms, Anguillula silasiae and Grindalworms, Enchytraeus bucholizi

Grindalworms are related to earthworms; microworms are not true worms, but rather nematodes. 

Both breed well in damp peat moss at 75 F, and feed upon vegetable-based tropical fish flakes.

Whiteworms, Enchytraeus albidus

Closely related to grindalworms, whiteworms fare better at cooler temperatures (50-58 F) and may be fed oatmeal and staple diet fish flakes.  Cultures are commercially available.

Bloodworms, Chironomus spp.

Unlike marine bloodworms, Chironomus are the aquatic larvae of tiny flying insects known as midges (“gnats”).  Interestingly, they utilize a form of hemoglobin to transport oxygen in the blood, much as we do.

Bloodworms are impractical to breed but are available at pet stores, and survive well under refrigeration.  Like other freshwater invertebrates, bloodworms may be fed to marine creatures, but they spoil rapidly in salt water.

Further Reading

Earthworms are the most useful of all invertebrates…a breeding colony will supply the needs of fishes and invertebrates of all sizes.  Please see my article Rearing and Using Earthworms for further information.

For an interesting article on sandworm behavior and breeding habits, please see this article.

Please write in with your questions and comments. 

Thanks, until next time,

 Frank Indiviglio.

Please welcome guest blogger Jeff Berdel, a member of our sales staff, who has submitted a few tips on helping your livestock to adjust to new lighting.

Upgrading aquarium lighting is a common step forward for many aquarists who are looking to get more growth out of their corals or plants, or open themselves up to newer species that may have higher light requirements. Other times, we may find ourselves buying new light-demanding inhabitants for our already stocked tanks. Often aquarists can be too anxious for their photosynthetic pets to get all the light they think they need, but fail to realize the effect that the newer, more intense lighting will have on them.

When You Install New Lighting

There are some easy things you can do to help the photosynthetic organisms in your tank to adjust to new lighting.

When you first install your upgraded fixture, start with a very short photo-period like 3-4 hours a day and gradually add an hour on every 2-3 days until you’ve reached the desired photo-period. You can also elevate the lighting system about 18 inches above the aquarium and gradually lower it a few inches every other day until it’s at the desired height above the tank. If the lighting system features numerous bulbs (like a T5 HO fixture), try the system first with a few of the bulbs out, and then after 3-4 days add a bulb until all the bulbs have been replaced. These small adjustments can help to ease the transition to what will soon make them very happy!

Introducing a New Inhabitant

When you can’t resist purchasing a new and exotic addition to your planted tank or reef, place the new specimen close to or on the bottom of the tank, or in a place with less direct light exposure. Then, gradually move the specimen to the desired position over the course of no longer than ten days. Be sure to let new additions remain at the lower position for 2-3 days before you attempt to move it to any other position.

Anemones can be more difficult as they generally adhere themselves to rocks or the substrate. However anemones and also mobile, and more often than not, the anemone will move to the desired lighting location. Remember, it has the ability to sting anything that gets in it’s way, so be sure you know where it is moving and where it settles so you can relocate anything too close for comfort.

Photosynthetic inhabitants aren’t the only ones to consider when upgradign your lighting. Fish are also susceptible to being stressed out from a sudden increase in the light’s brightness. Just like when you acclimate a new tank inhabitant to your tank’s water chemistry, it’s important to acclimate your livestock to your new lights. It may be safest to introduce new fish with the lights off for the first few hours, or with only actinic or accent lighting fired. Results of not doing so can lead to fish becoming severely stressed. Fish may be skittish and might want to jump out or hide under rocks, anemones and soft corals might retract, and hard corals may lose polyp extension or possibly bleach out. All of this can be avoided by following the above methods for acclimatin to new lighting.

Putting a light over the aquarium with a higher intensity requires a little more than just plugging it in and flipping the switch if the tank is already stocked with aquarium inhabitants. They have become quite used to their source of light being as bright as it is, and a sudden shift in that intensity may shock them.  If given time to adjust with these easy steps, your fish and corals will be more vibrant and your plants more lush than ever!

Thanks,

Jeff

Hello, Craig here again! With 15 years on the retail side of this hobby, I have been asked a lot of questions, many of which have been centered on the well-being and growth of live plants for the freshwater aquarium.  In my next couple of entries, I thought I would explore some frequently asked questions about aquarium plants. Here we go!

Why is my sword plant losing leaves when I just bought it?

As a general rule, most aquarium plants are not actually true aquatic plants. Most of them are found along the banks of rivers, streams, or lakes. This is the case with Echinodorus sword plants. In their natural environment wild Echinodorus are very rarely fully submerged and some individuals may never be fully submerged. Rainy seasons are part of what allows hobbyists to keep these beautiful plants in a fully aquatic environment!

When swords are cultivated at an aquatic nursery, they are typically grown in a bog like setting, or even grown hydroponically in a greenhouse. The growth rate of an emerge-grown sword is more rapid and transportation and shipping of that plant tends to be safer than if the plant was grown completely submerged. Knowing that the plant has been grown emerged helps to explain why some of the leaves die off when you get the plants to your home aquarium.  It helps to explain why, even though you have a nutrient rich substrate and bright light, your swords still seem like they are dying. When that plant is fully submerged in water, the growth form changes somewhat. Those long, rigid stems and smaller leaves that you see will begin to decay shortly after the plant is placed fully underwater. Once you see that emerge-grown leaf start to turn brown, simply clip it off near the base of the stem and the plant will pop a new leaf out to replace it. This new leaf will grow from the center of the sword’s rosette and will often have a slightly different shape and/or color. The new growth may start slow, but adding the proper nutrients will ensure that the sword maintains growth. Fortunately, most plants make the transition to fully submerged form rather quickly and easily!

So, next time you see a big beautiful Sword that you can’t resist , just show a little patience and give it a little pruning. You will be amazed how resilient swords can be!

Thanks, Until Next Time,

Craig