What time is chow time: How often do you feed your fish?

[Reefer Matt]

I'll never understand the logic of restricting food to an animal that snacks all day in the wild. And if you can't feed a couple times a day without getting high nitrate and phosphate, you've failed to incorporate adequate filtration.

Different ways to reef. Most people overfeed, not underfeed.

 

[happyhourhero]

1/2 nori
Pinch of pellets a couple times a day
Frozen reef frenzy, herbivore frenzy, calanus, Hikari Marine cube 2 times a day (usually a mix of 2 types) and I add some reef roids, benereef or fish eggs to some feedings when I feel like it.

 

[vlangel]

My auto feeder gives flakes at 10a and I feed frozen in the afternoon. I also add zooplankton for pods and coral at 6a.

 

[Stoneyed]

Auto-feeder with pellets in morning and early afternoon.
When i get home from work, ~1/2 sheet of nori + frozen, then more frozen in the evening when the lights are dimming.

The frozen is a diy mix of frozen seafood blend, mysis, calanus, macroalgaes, lemna protein powder, and selco

 

[Joe.D]

75 gallon display. Auto-feeder does pellets at 11am - everyone except Banggai Cardinals eats them. At some point in afternoon I’ll feed about a half inch cube of Reef Frenzy - everyone loves that. I even squirt a little to my Diamond Goby - as soon as he sees the baster he starts swimming up toward it. Nori every few days.

I was doing pellets twice per day and a bigger piece of frozen and nori everyday. Decided to cut back on feedings to try to keep bubble algae at bay.

Anyone have any luck getting Banggai to eat something other than frozen? Mine just stare at the pellets. Sometimes they may follow a sinking pellet (if the others don’t devour them all), but won’t eat it. I haven’t tried flakes - are they more likely to eat flakes over pellets?

 

[Rich Klein]

Frozen twice a day and a Nori Sheet once per day.

 

[Icryhard]

View attachment 3099898

Over 130 fish -- Mostly Smalls



Dave B

By any chance you swim in it when you have to clean the glass?

 

[o2manyfish]

By any chance you swim in it when you have to clean the glass?

MagFloat XXL Magnet with See-Cleer pads from UniqueCorals and I don't even get my hand wet to wipe the algae off the panels. Once since setting up the tank I have had my long armed helped clean the coraline out of the corners with a plastic razor blade - so he got wet. I'm too fat to fit in the tank and not bust up the aquascape

Dave B

 

[jpmazzone]

Pellets twice a week and misys twice a week. A clown and possum wrasse in a 20 gallon nano. I feed just enough for a bit of food to reach a peppermint shrimp and a few hermit crabs.

 

[Derrick0580]

Eheim auto feed set for 2x a day, 1 hour after lights come on and then 6 hours later. Then every other day I feed frozen on top of the auto feedings. I also stick nori in a couple times a week.

 

[GarrettT]

4 times a day

 

[Scubadoo4u]

View attachment 3099898

Over 130 fish -- Mostly Smalls



Dave B

Wow!

 

[Stephen Glover]

3 times a day. Noon, 4pm and 8pm. Frozen, freeze dried and flakes. Some are more finicky than others.

 

[SlicVic]

View attachment 3099898

Over 130 fish -- Mostly Smalls



Dave B

This is so amazing looking! I'm so impressed it's a beauty of your tank and the fabulous fish you have! Best one I've seen in a long time!

 

[c_ronius]

I feed frozen (mysis, brine, fish eggs, calunus, herbavore enhanced mysis) 6 cubes daily spread over 3-5 feedings. Nori once daily. 2 tangs and 7 smaller fish.

 

[1112-425XL]

Lite feeding of shrimp pellets and nori about an hour before lights on.
Frozen mix of mysis shrimp, brine shrimp, krill, plankton and spirulina about 6pm. Clam on half shell for trigger about once a week.
Target feed corals every other week with reef roids and mysis shrimp.

 

[ReefCheef]

View attachment 3099898

Over 130 fish -- Mostly Smalls



Dave B

Do you like the abyzz or panta rhei pump more?

 

[dmsc2fs]

Twice daily but about to go down to once since pods have started to populate more

can see my fishes nabbin em all day

Do you think that if you cut down the feeding the pod population will also diminish due to lack of food? i.e. less food for the pods = less pods = less food(pods) for the fish?

 

[o2manyfish]

Do you like the abyzz or panta rhei pump more?

It's going to depend on the size of the tank. 600g or less and the Abyzz is too strong. 400g and Up the Panta Rhei is a much more gentle flow.

Both pumps are crazy powerful, and even in a 750g unless you want them highly visible, which I don't, they need room to allow them to do their job. In a 10' tank the Abyzz at 70% Power pushes so hard that after it hits the far wall, goes around the 4' width, and then turns around and comes back down 10' to where the pump is - 24' of water movement - will lay the polyps of a Hammer, Duncan, Gorg right over.

To try to keep the pumps less visible I have them on the back walls of the tank facing forward. So they only go 4' and then hit a wall. Not the ideal setup, but I just don't want them hanging on the front sides of the tank.

The mounting system on the Abyzz is far superior and stronger. The Abyzz uses a big pancake magnet. The Panta Rhei used 3 small round magnets - that are independent. Without 2 people, and even then, it's impossible to mount the Panta Rhei without the magnets flying around and inevitably pinching your flesh.

The Abyzz has a 'strainer' built as part of the pump casing. The Panta Rhei has an open design. I've run Tunze Streams and stream 3's for over a decade without prop gaurds or cages and never seen a chopped fish. The Panta Rhei is like a fish dice-o-matic. Which means you need to buy the basket cage - which makes it quite a big physically larger than even the Abyzz.

Both have complex controllers and neither one is super intuitive. It takes some fiddling to get things they want you want. I am able to navigate the Abyzz faster and with more ease.

By the time you add the Magnet holder - a $180 part (which is $3 in plastic) which holds the 3 magnets so they don't crush your skin or go into the hemisphere everytime you try to move the pump. And the $350 basket strainer, then I think the price on the 2 is pretty darn close.

Both are silent up till about 90%. Then the Panta makes a slight bit more noise - I am super sensitive to noise. Most people don't hear either pump - but I do. In my tank in flow mode neither pump can run full flow at 100% - they are too strong and I have too many LPS an tentacles just start floating around the tank.

In wave mode I can run the Abyzz up to 100% in the pulse. If I run the Panta to 100% when pulsing you can hear the pump whirring.

I have not used the reverse feature of the Panta Rhei.

I am doing some pump testing and have (2) of both pumps at the moment for a project. I have all the pumps on timers. They don't run constantly and they are all on a different sequence. So the flow may be 0 pumps or 3 at any given time. Both pumps have a feature to start in a "Pause" Position that requires you to manually start the pump. Both pumps have the option to automatically start the pump when the controller turns on. The Panta Rheis, both of them randomly revert back to the 'Push Button To Start' default. We have 2 different firmwarese and 2 different vers of the controller software and both do the same thing. Which means every few days I have to look and see if the pump is running.

If you have a 400g + tank then either pump is a good choice. If you have over 1200g then the Abyzz are definitely the better choice - They move more water farther. If you have a smaller sized tank Below 650g then the Panta may be a better choice.

Oh and the Abyzz has a hideous neon orange power cord going to the pump. Impossible to hide. So I bought off Amazon some black silicone tubing, slit it with a razor and slipped it over the orange to make it less noticeable.

Comparing either of these pumps to something like a Jebao, Tunze Stream (not Tunze Master Stream) or an Eco Tech is like comparing sailboats and offshore power boats -- they are a totally different class of machine and are not equals in any manner.

Dave B