3,895 answers about fish & aquatics
A healthy aquarium is a balanced one — water chemistry, filtration, stocking and feeding all work together, and most fish problems start with the water. This page gathers the fish and aquatics library of KinsLe Answers in one place, organized by topic for freshwater and saltwater keepers alike. Every answer is original, written by KinsLe, and tied to a real KinsLe feature.
351 answers in Feeding & Nutrition — page 10 of 15
A healthy bristlenose pleco diet is plant-led and built around food the fish has to work for: algae wafers as the everyday staple, blanched vegetables such as zucchini, cucumber and sweet potato several times a week, and driftwood in the tank at all times for the fish to rasp. Tank algae alone is nowhere near enough…
A healthy betta diet is built on protein, because bettas are insect-eating surface feeders rather than general omnivores. A quality betta pellet should be the daily staple, rotated with frozen or freeze-dried bloodworms, daphnia and brine shrimp so the fish meets the variety it would find hunting insects at the…
Newly hatched fry eat in stages, because their mouths grow faster than almost anything else about them. The tiniest fry start on microscopic life such as infusoria and green water, move within days onto newly hatched baby brine shrimp and microworms, and graduate to finely powdered fry food and crushed flake as they…
Zebra danios are fast, surface-snatching omnivores with small mouths, so variety means small foods delivered where they feed. Crushed flakes can stay, but rotate in micro pellets, frozen or live daphnia, baby brine shrimp and finely chopped bloodworms, with the occasional spirulina-based food for plant matter. Scatter…
A siamese algae eater needs far more than the algae it grazes and the odd flake it catches, especially as it grows and its interest in algae fades. Build the diet around algae wafers and sinking pellets dropped near the bottom, blanched zucchini and cucumber slices, and regular protein in the form of frozen bloodworms…
Pearl gouramis are surface-leaning omnivores that do best when flakes become just one part of the menu rather than the whole of it. Rotate in small floating pellets, frozen or freeze-dried daphnia, brine shrimp and bloodworms, plus a little plant matter such as finely crumbled spirulina flakes or a soft blanched pea…
A kuhli loach barely gets a look at flakes, because flakes float and dissolve at the surface while this shy, eel-like fish feeds along the bottom after dark. Vary the diet with foods that sink and stay put: small sinking pellets or wafers, frozen bloodworms and daphnia thawed and dropped near its hiding places, and…
Harlequin rasboras are small mid-water omnivores from slow forest streams, feeding on tiny insects, larvae and zooplankton — so their variety comes in miniature. Use a micro-pellet or finely crushed quality flake as the staple, then rotate thawed frozen cyclops, daphnia and baby brine shrimp — sized for a rasbora's…
Guppies are small omnivores that pick insects, larvae and algae from the surface and plants all day, so rotate beyond flakes with foods in that image: baby brine shrimp and daphnia, live or thawed, for animal protein, and a spirulina-based food or blanched greens for the plant side. Everything must suit a guppy's…
Goldfish are grazing omnivores with a plant side and no true stomach, built to nibble amounts all day rather than gorge on one food. Replace flakes with a sinking pellet or gel food — a goldfish gulping flakes at the surface swallows air, which troubles the swim bladder, especially in fancy varieties. Then rotate the…
Corydoras are bottom-feeding omnivores that sift the substrate for larvae, worms and scraps, and flakes betray them twice — they are eaten by mid-water fish before sinking, and the scraps vanish before the corys finish foraging. Build the diet on sinking pellets and wafers sized for a cory's mouth, then rotate frozen…
Cherry shrimp feed themselves more than owners realise: the biofilm coating every plant and pane of a mature tank is their main course, and flakes are irrelevant to them. Variety means supplementing that grazing with powdered shrimp food or a sinking pellet two or three times a week, blanched spinach or courgette, and…
A bristlenose pleco is a grazing herbivore that rasps biofilm and plant matter, and flakes barely feature in that life — most are eaten at the surface before one reaches it. Anchor the diet with driftwood, which the pleco rasps for fibre its digestion needs, then rotate sinking algae wafers with blanched courgette,…
A betta is an insect-eating carnivore with an upturned mouth made for snapping prey off the surface, so flakes designed for community tanks are a poor base. Use small floating betta pellets as the staple, then rotate thawed frozen or freeze-dried bloodworms, daphnia and brine shrimp across the week for the variety a…
Angelfish are omnivorous cichlids that hunt insects and small crustaceans at the surface and mid-water, so build the rotation on a quality pellet staple plus regular animal foods: frozen bloodworms, brine shrimp and daphnia two or three times a week give the protein that drives growth and colour. Add an occasional…
Target-feeding means delivering food to the slow fish rather than to the tank in general: use a pipette or tongs to place food in front of it, in the cave, plants or corner where it feels safe. Feed the greedy fish first at the opposite end, so their attention is occupied while the slow one eats undisturbed. Choose…
Fish food loses its goodness to air, moisture, heat and light, so keep it sealed in its original container in a cool, dry cupboard away from the tank — the warm, humid air under an aquarium hood is the worst storage spot in the house. Decant a week's worth into a small pot for daily use so the main supply stays…
One greedy fish usually wins because all the food lands in one place at one moment, so change the delivery rather than the fish. Scatter food across the surface and at both ends of the tank so the bully cannot guard it all, and drop a portion into the shy fish's territory while the greedy one is busy elsewhere. Match…
Restart pond feeding only once the water holds steadily above about 10°C, because a pond fish's digestion slows with the cold and a heavy meal in a sluggish gut does real harm. Begin with an easily digested wheat-germ food, offered once a day in an amount the fish finish within a few minutes, and build up gradually as…
Powdered gel food made for grazers mixes with hot water into a thick paste you spread over driftwood and rocks or pour into shallow molds before it sets, and plecos and other grazers then rasp at it for hours, much as they work natural biofilm. Make it firmer than the packet's softest option so it survives a long…
Homemade gel food blends soaked quality pellets with cooked vegetables such as peas, spinach and squash, sets the mixture with plain gelatin, and freezes in small cubes you thaw one meal at a time. Because it sinks softly and holds together, goldfish — especially round-bodied fancy varieties — digest it more…
In a mature tank, well-fed shrimp are almost never still: they pick constantly at leaves, wood and substrate, swarm an offered pellet within minutes, and females regularly carry eggs under their tails. Most of their diet is biofilm — the microscopic layer coating every surface — so a settled, planted tank does most of…
Green water is simply tank water turned pea-soup green with free-floating algae, grown in a jar on a bright windowsill, and infusoria are the microscopic animals that bloom in water soaked with boiled lettuce or hay. Both are first foods for fry whose mouths are too small even for baby brine shrimp, fed by the…
Conditioning means two to three weeks of rich, varied feeding — live and frozen foods like daphnia and baby brine shrimp alongside a quality staple — offered in small meals several times a day to bring the breeders into spawning condition. The abundance mimics the rainy-season flush of food that tells wild fish it is…
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