Using Live Feeder Fish in Marine Aquariums

[M.Dandaneau]

Another thread, originally about a large shark tank, seems to have turned into a discussion about using live feeder fish in the home aquarium.

This said, as I've stated in the past, I regularly use live MARINE feeders in several of my home aquariums for several different reasons:
1) Many predatory fish are much more easily kept if they are offered their natural food, particularly when they are first purchased/captured......they may or may not be switched over to frozen whole or pieces of the appropriate food later depending on the type of fish, either completely, or at least primarily.
2) By feeding some ambush predators a diet that changes seasonally, it's been my experience that growth rates are maintained well with a minimum tendency towards obesity.
3) It's my own personal opinion that appropriate whole live feeders may have some bearing upon bringing some predators into breeding condition due to the hormones contained in and released into the water by the prey species.
4) In some cases, allowing a predatory species to hunt APPROPRIATE sized live feeders in actually seems to keep aggression in the home aquarium down by eliminating boredom.
5) By keeping live prey in some tanks, waste is never a problem as all prey is ingested whole, with nothing wasted and no pieces drifting of to decay in the recesses of the LR.

I realize by living seaside in Florida I have ready access to many prey species at 0 cost that the vast majority of hobbyists do not have.
Likewise, I fully realize that, although external parasites can often be visually checked for, there IS a risk of picking up internal parasites and act accordingly if and when a fish displays signs/symptoms of illness, and no, I don't feel that I'm being cruel by putting living fish in these tanks JUST to be eaten......many of the prey species I utilize reproduce in VAST numbers simply because they ARE natural prey species to huge numbers of predatory species.

I seemed to sense that some posters were upset, not because live fish were being utilized as food, but rather because of the choice of WHICH species that the individual was allowing to be eaten, but I suppose reactions to this post will verify or prove that feeling wrong.

Mike

I seemed to sense that some posters were upset, not because live fish were being utilized as food, but rather because of the choice of WHICH species that the individual was allowing to be eaten

Hi Mike, so the discussion goes on But you know, at the time i had my shark tank up and running and i thought about having a large holding growth tank setup for less expensive fishes, i would had done so but i wouldn`t do that with a tusk, they run with a price of $90-110 at a small size, that sounds to be a bit high cost for just a snack And any number of things will depend on ones success in maintaining these animals. And besides the price on the tusk, their so beautiful a fish for such a purpose, I mean their are so many other choices one could make and the cost could be less.

It's my own personal opinion that appropriate whole live feeders may have some bearing upon bringing some predators into breeding condition due to the hormones contained in and released into the water by the prey species

Now this i`ll not be able to fully comment more on for when i done my shark tank years ago i not kept the sharks till full grown size, like i got a single blacktip at a time because the size the tank and with it a number of Leopard sharks and few others and like the blacktip i kept only to it reached a size of under 3' and it i feed with a feeding stick, but the leopard sharks i was able to keep till a larger size of no more then near to 5' and i enjoyed feeding them by hand.

I thought about starting a new shark tank some years ago and with my disability and im not getting any younger that this newest tank i setup or had setup a 240 gal tank in which i will do a reef tank after moving some years from now, so it will be a F/O tank for the time being and when i do make the switch over to reef, the only upgrading i will need to do is the lights, for i will have all else in place.
But back to the topic at hand, when i had blacktips in my shark tank years ago, i learn that if the tank had rounded corners it be so much better with having blacktips, and Mystic
, your tank just a little bigger then the shark tank i had back then and the extra 200 gals not make much differ in the holding of these blacktips for the long haul.
And right now as some here might know, im enjoying my Grandchildren more then my tanks It was my birthday last week and the 19 month old twins (Boy & Girl) called me by name I told my daughter that what ever she got me for my birthday that it will never top the kids calling me by name.

Mike, i not know if you know or remember that with m 130 dragon moray tank i have an attache 30 cube yank that hose my dwarf golden moray and now im changing the 30 cube to a 65 ...3' long and im not sure yet if i will go within a pair of goldentails or some other of the species and the dwarfs will go into my 180 reef right after i secure the overflow box and the back with some type of net that the dwarfs not get out, maybe you know or have some idea in where i could get this netting from?
Happy Aquariums All
Buddy

[M.Dandaneau]

The most secure screening that I can think of for containing small eels would be window screen made of nylon, which I believe can also be obtained at most good building supply stores.

The screening could be cut and folded, with the edges sewn together with fine monofilament fishing line to make a "slip on" type cover as long as the direction of flow pushed it toward the edges it overlapped, not pushing it off.

The biggest problem I can visualize is needing to keep a toothbrush around to scrub the screen daily or at least every other day to prevent water flow obstruction.

Mike

[marrone]

I think you have to remember that if the fish wasn't in the trade it mostly likely would be food either for another fish or for us. If the fish was sold as food the price would be alot cheaper and actually sold by the lb. You have to remember that the wholesale price would be alot less and if the fish is caught locally, like Mike does, than it would be very cheap or free. Does it make sense to spend $100 bucks on 1 feeder fish when you can get one for cheaper? no it doesn't. But if you can get live feeder fish/inverts for the same or around the same price it's the better way to go in feeding your fish.

As for the fish being beautiful alot of places they eat Butterfly fish and snappers and groupers and other fish that are also beautiful. I have also seen small feeder fish that are really beautiful also.

[redpaulhus]

Mike -
Are those mojarra's in the photo ?

We used to seine them up by the bushel in the Indian River Lagoon / Intercoastal Waterway... I always wanted to try a handful in a native tank...


When I was living in florida I regularly seined up grass shrimp and small (1") hogchokers to feed my oscars... I keep various temperate marine fishes now, and usually seine up some killies and other small fishes for them from the same areas (New England) for food/treats (they eat frozen food as a staple diet).

I'm considering setting up a small tank for a single Anglerfish, and part of the plan involved keeping some of the local baitfish in one of my native tanks so that I have a dependable live food supply during the winter.

Like you (I think) I'm against LFS goldfish feeders for marine fish, but not against using clean healthy marine fish as feeders for other marine fish (but not as an exclusive food source).

(for years I used large FW piscatory fish as 'disposal units' for culls from my FW fish breeding programs, and even bred some fish fry as 'transition foods' for finicky native fishes, so I don't see this as much different.)

[M.Dandaneau]

In many 3rd world countries the fact that we would keep fish as pets is viewed as from strange to downright hilarious.....when I was sent to Viet Nam I was shocked to find the villagers out with throw nets and taking home wild betas, gouramis and the like as food. Being a protein starved country, all small fish are simply cooked whole and added to rice and other vegetables for their standard diet.

Good eye there Redpaulhus....mojarras they are, one of my preferred prey species used as feeders as they have soft fins, low fat content and no teeth (the mouth extends into a protrusible feeding tube for sucking in plankton). While the vast majority seined up are in the 1"-2" range, they CAN grow up to 10" or 12".

There's one species that occurs locally that's even attractive enough to be worth keeping as an aquarium fish......while the silver body is identical to the feeders shown, the dorsal and caudal fin are both white with vivid black horizontal bars, very much looking like the S. American freshwater Prochilidus (which is often quite pricey for a freshwater tropical).
I've never been able to find this local species in any book, and catch them very rarely, indicating that they are quite scarce or else occur in a very specific zone of the ecosystem where I (and apparently anyone else) would rarely encounter them.

Mike