Tropical Fish Forum
Tropical Fish Keeping Help and Advice => Fish Food and Feeding => Topic started by: MichaelT on March 24, 2015, 07:57:32 PM
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I wonder if someone with some experience could help me.
I recently got some Peppered Corys, 4 to be precise, and am not really sure how to feed them properly. I initially followed the advice of my LFS and bought some Tetra Mini Granules to feed them with. The problem is my Cherry Barbs eat most of them before the Corys realise there is food the tank.
So I had a read around and found something about Hikari Singing Wafers being good for them, so I purchased a pack. My Corys are quite small tho, probably 3 cm or under, and they cant eat the whole wafer and seem to have trouble breaking them up. After leaving them to feed for about 20 mins I started taking some of the uneaten bit out, which is much easier said than done.
So I guess my question is how should I feed my Corys? Should I put one or two wafers in and leave them to nibble at it for as long as they need? Or am I better breaking the wafer up into much smaller bits beforehand? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
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Hi Michael!
I have a peppered cory ( his mate died recently) and feed him on wafers occasionally but to be honest I find them a pain in the bum!!! I tend to break them up and put a small piece in but soak it first so it is soft.
I tend to use sinking pellets, which I drop into the most frequented areas whilst the other fish are busy with their flake.
The other thing I find really good for them is frozen bloodworm. Thawed in a bit of tank water and then sucked into a syringe and deposited right in front of the corys whilst simultaneously feeding the other fish at the other end of the tank!! This gives them a chance to eat it before the other fish muscle in!!!
Hope this helps!!
FC76
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One way to feed cories is to soak the sinking pellets, wafers etc in water until they are thoroughly water logged. Then use a turkey baster or something similar to deposit these soggy pellets right in front of where the cories hang out. With big wafers, break them up before soaking.
Being soaked before they go in the tank means they will stay where you put them; they won't have a tendency to drift away. And putting them near the cories means they have more chance of finding them before the other fish, especially if you do this just before adding the food meant for the cherry barbs.
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I've found that Hikari's mini algae wafers work well. The tetras watch it fall but the cories get almost exclusive access to eating them, usually with 3 munching away on one at the same time. 2 at the one time are usually enough and are fully consumed within an hour. I've just bought a carnivore version but they don't seem so keen on it (yet).
The other technique which I've found that works is to feed them at a time of day when the other fish are less alert and less hungry - and so much of it falls. (In my case, the tetras are not as alert/hungry first thing in the morning.)
Having the food chopped into various sizes (really only possible to do with flakes) also helps- the bigger/higher fish tend to go for the larger pieces whereas the very fine pieces tend to get missed, and therefore found later by the cories.
Another suggestion by someone else was to put the food in the filter flow so that it disperses - the higher fish wouldn't be able to get it all before it fell.
Hope these are useful suggestions, in addition to those by others above.
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I use a length of plastic pipe to aim the food at the target area.
I also use a pill crusher to crush the sinking foods up, and then (as Sue says) tip the food into a tiny plastic food container (poundshop).
I got a good selection of fish food teters from 'Cheap Fish Food' on Facebook, not bad!
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I have peppered cories (6) and their main food is AquaCare tropical pellets. They sink pretty quickly and I always feed in the same spot. One of my platies does try to eat them but only once they have finished their flake food - I do tend to feed all the fish at the same time. For treats they get live food normally blood worms or daphnia which they really seem to enjoy.
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My problem, surprisingly, concerns Pearl danios. No matter how much flake etc. I feed them, they seem to have insatiable appetites. They particularly love the pellets I put down for the False Bandit cories (C. melini) in the tank. Far from being surface feeders, they get right down to the bottom and swirl around, snatching the pellets from under the noses of the cories. They swim around with a pellet in their mouths until it explodes into tiny pieces when they swallow what they can before the others get it. They are incessantly active (definitely the fish with Duracell batteries) and so I assume they have high energy requirements.
I've taken to putting in pellets for the cories at the very last moment before I switch off the room lights at night hoping they will sniff the food out in total darkness. They are doing OK and so I assume it's working.
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Thanks everyone for the advice. I tried breaking the wafers up yesterday but they were still not small enough for them to eat. I would have to crush them in order to get them any smaller.
I like the idea of using some form of pipe guide food to the bottom. At the minute, the filter makes it difficult to target feed anywhere with the pellets. Assuming I can get some food to the bottom, the Corys should get enough.