# Feeder fish?



## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

Hey, I have an axolotl with an insatiable appetite. He's a beast  I hate only giving him worms. I occasionally get him feeder fish from the LFS but i feel as if these fish could be bad news for my little Levi. So, I'm thinking of starting a feeder fish set up. The problem is... what fish? I did some research and found that convicts breed like crazy but the dorsal fins may be a problem. Also, I don't know how large the fry will be as I have never kept any cichlid but one lonely yellow lab juvenile. Any suggestions on what fish and how to set up? I heard guppies take too long


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## Fishfur (Mar 4, 2012)

Rosy minnows make good feeders too, from what I hear. But even guppies will do. You just need to figure out if you have the space needed to keep enough adult fish to provide the feeders you want.

First, figure out how many fish you might want to feed in a week. 

Then find out how long it takes for new fry of the species you're considering to mature to feeder size. It will take about that long to establish the feeder tank so it's always providing enough feeders.

Next, you need to know roughly how many fry you can expect per brood, or per spawning. That will tell you about how many females you need to provide the supply of feeders. Usually you have far more females than males, unless it's a species where the the fish prefer the same mates each time, in which case you may need more males to provide pairs.

Once you have all that figured, you'll have an idea how large a tank you'll need to breed enough feeders to have an ongoing supply. Bit of work, but once you have it up and running, it will be fairly easy, just feeding and cleaning as for any fish tank.


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

and then to help the feeder fish grow faster you need something live to feed the feeders like microworms or something. It can turn into a never ending cycle, feed this to feed this to feed this to feed that


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

It's just to feed one axolotl as a supplementary kind of thing. I'm probably going to breed mollies and whatever ones actually make it to adult age, I'll probably give away for free. It's either convicts or Mollie's though. I hear a pair of convicts in a 10 gallon produces a lot of young but mollies do as well. Should I go live bearers or convicts?


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

I would do guppy over molly if live breeder, especially if only a 10 gallon because molly are much larger than guppy and just the adults used to breed is a bit of a bio load.

Convicts are about the best parents you can get and I've heard of many people using them for feeders but with a 10 gallon, that is really pushing it just for the two parents bio load wise.

I recommend feeder guppy unless you use a larger tank


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

pyrrolin said:


> I would do guppy over molly if live breeder, especially if only a 10 gallon because molly are much larger than guppy and just the adults used to breed is a bit of a bio load.
> 
> Convicts are about the best parents you can get and I've heard of many people using them for feeders but with a 10 gallon, that is really pushing it just for the two parents bio load wise.
> 
> I recommend feeder guppy unless you use a larger tank


How long will it take to get this going? If I get a 6 to 1 female to male ratio then I should have fry by when?


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

knowing guppies, could be the same day, I swear they are born pregnant. It should take at the very max, a month but I expect to see fry within 2 weeks as any females purchased are probably pregnant already.


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## Ryan.Wilton (Dec 12, 2012)

I've found that platys breed more quickly than guppies.


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

Ok so I am probably going to use a 33 gallon I have that is far too scratched to reuse as a show tank. I gotta figure out how to divide it without letting fry through. Plan on breeding livestock and feeder livestock in it. Do I need gravel in this tank?


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

I would use gravel, the new fry hide in it for their first couple days quite often. If doing feeder guppies, I wouldn't worry about dividing it, just plant it well, buy a couple dozen and you are set. Try plants like wisteria, egeria and stuff, plants with lots of smaller leaves


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

pyrrolin said:


> I would use gravel, the new fry hide in it for their first couple days quite often. If doing feeder guppies, I wouldn't worry about dividing it, just plant it well, buy a couple dozen and you are set. Try plants like wisteria, egeria and stuff, plants with lots of smaller leaves


I wanted to section it off so I can breed my rainbows in one section and have feeder guppies in another. I was also thinking a tertiary segment so that I can put in a heater and filter. That way no fry get sucked up and I can have better filtration compared to bubble filters


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

Another option instead of a sponge filter is having a sponge over the HOB intake.

Unless you can divide it enough that the smallest fry can't get through, I wouldn't do rainbows, which are valuable, in the same tank as guppies.

If you end up with multiple tanks for breeding, I recommend going with sponge filters to greatly cut costs of running them all


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

pyrrolin said:


> Another option instead of a sponge filter is having a sponge over the HOB intake.
> 
> Unless you can divide it enough that the smallest fry can't get through, I wouldn't do rainbows, which are valuable, in the same tank as guppies.
> 
> If you end up with multiple tanks for breeding, I recommend going with sponge filters to greatly cut costs of running them all


The thing is, I already have a 10 gallon tank to breed dwarf neon rainbows. I figured that I could also breed guppies in the same tank if I increased the tank size from 10 to 33 gallons. Also my axolotl is going into a 20 gallon soon too so if the tank become too heavy on the bio load, I could always just have a bunch of guppies in his tank as well. So doing two types of breeding in one tank is not a good idea?


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

I'm thinking the adult guppies would eat the valuable rainbow fry, its ok if they eat some guppy fry but losing extra rainbows would suck


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

pyrrolin said:


> I'm thinking the adult guppies would eat the valuable rainbow fry, its ok if they eat some guppy fry but losing extra rainbows would suck


That's why I was thinking a divider that fry cannot surpass! I don't know what material it would be, lol, but it would have to let water through. If I get this diver, I should be ok right? I'd rather have a Huge rack of tanks but I still live with me mum so I can't do that just yet, haha


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## pyrrolin (Jan 11, 2012)

as long as the divider keeps fry blocked and still allows proper filtration and even flow for the heater should be ok.

You need to try to take a guess at how many feeders need to be in the tank to provide a steady flow of food and judge the bio load of that number and then take into account the bio load of successful rainbow breeding.

I am guessing that when you take into account successful rainbow breeding and grow out space, you won't have the room, but that is just my rough estimate and guess. You don't want to have to do a huge water change every few days to control nitrates especially if you have valuable rainbow fry in the tank.

It might be doable, but I have my doubts. But you are the only one who has an idea of how many feeder fish you need to really figure it out. I can just help give you the factors that you need to consider.


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## sunshine (Feb 18, 2011)

Just a thought. Sometimes the health of "feeder" fish isn't important. I would wait for a few months before I put any other fish in with feeders. You wouldn't want the feeders giving the rainbows a disease. The health of live bearers at a lot of stores atm is bad. Feeders are worse. One of my tanks ended up with calamanus worms. They can take quite awhile to show up.


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

sunshine said:


> Just a thought. Sometimes the health of "feeder" fish isn't important. I would wait for a few months before I put any other fish in with feeders. You wouldn't want the feeders giving the rainbows a disease. The health of live bearers at a lot of stores atm is bad. Feeders are worse. One of my tanks ended up with calamanus worms. They can take quite awhile to show up.


Oh yeah, I quarantine all my fish for a week or two before they go into any of my tanks. Will I still have to worry about nitrates if I have a lot of moss growing in he tank? I was going to use it to feed the fry and suck nitrates. I can also get some easy growing plants like elodea or hornwort.


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## Ryan.Wilton (Dec 12, 2012)

Kimchi24 said:


> That's why I was thinking a divider that fry cannot surpass! I don't know what material it would be, lol, but it would have to let water through. If I get this diver, I should be ok right? I'd rather have a Huge rack of tanks but I still live with me mum so I can't do that just yet, haha


If you block it off so no fry can get through then chances are greater that you'll have one side with minimal flow and therefore more waste build up. I'd say use the 33 gallon for the neons and use the 10 gallon for the guppies. This way you have no issues in water quality.

Remember, better water quality= better success rate. Also, changing the Neons over may mean you'll need to wait for a while for them to start breeding again as they'll need to reestablish territories.


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

Ok, so I think i've got this figured out. I'm going to use my 33 gallon for my main breeding tank which involves my rainbows. I'm going to use one of my ten gallons as another tank with liver bearers. I'm thinking of doing mollies or platies instead of guppies, mainly due to the fact that Levi is so big he could eat an adult guppy.


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## SwimmyD (Feb 9, 2013)

*My 2 cents*

Hey there! I would highly recommend that you stick with your plan to keep your rainbow fry separate from your other feeder-breeder tank. Once you get your rainbow fry you will be amazed at how incredibly small they are. They could easily swim through a divider. If I was going to try it I would use a thick small porous foam as the divider. And I'd still be nervous. They are barely visible when they first hatch, and stay like that for a couple weeks as they grow out. Guppy fry are absolutely enormous compared to rainbow fry! Be sure to have a good supply of infusoria ready too! And use a sponge filter in the tank for sure!

As for good feeder fish- endlers do a good job of multiplying and growing quickly. I agree that some LFS guppy/endlers can carry unwanted parasites - including internal parasites. If at all possible I would try to get some of these starter feeders from someone on the forum. Although I suppose if you buy tons at once and keep in a separate tank for a month- that becomes your own quarantine/ breeder-feeder tank! Good luck!


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## colio (Dec 8, 2012)

While it seems you are OK using your 10 gallon for gupplies/mollies/platies/whatever you choose, if you want to keep the 33 gallon idea, one option is to buy a pane of glass and silicone it in as a divider. It is not hard, Glass will cost about $10 at a place that does custom cuts, silicone about $10 to. I did a sump this way, and it worked well and was easy. 

That way, you could basically make your 33 gallon into two aquariums, with separate water supplies and no worries for contamination. Put a separate sponge, or lighter HOB with sponge over the intact, in each. 

Just an idea. Not as hard as you might think : )


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## BillD (Jun 5, 2006)

A little late to this, but will the Axolotl eat pieces of fish? Setting up a tank to breed feeders is a waste of a tank in my opinion. I wouldn't be able to get it out of my mind that if I didn't have the feeders, I could use the tank for something else, like breeding rainbows. Just my opinion.


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## Ryan.Wilton (Dec 12, 2012)

colio said:


> While it seems you are OK using your 10 gallon for gupplies/mollies/platies/whatever you choose, if you want to keep the 33 gallon idea, one option is to buy a pane of glass and silicone it in as a divider. It is not hard, Glass will cost about $10 at a place that does custom cuts, silicone about $10 to. I did a sump this way, and it worked well and was easy.
> 
> That way, you could basically make your 33 gallon into two aquariums, with separate water supplies and no worries for contamination. Put a separate sponge, or lighter HOB with sponge over the intact, in each.
> 
> Just an idea. Not as hard as you might think : )


I think his main thing though was to minimize cost on the filters and equipment. This as well would change the tank(s) to 16.5gallons per side, not really a lot of room to raise a breeding colony of rainbows.


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## solarz (Aug 31, 2010)

Kimchi24 said:


> Ok, so I think i've got this figured out. I'm going to use my 33 gallon for my main breeding tank which involves my rainbows. I'm going to use one of my ten gallons as another tank with liver bearers. I'm thinking of doing mollies or platies instead of guppies, mainly due to the fact that Levi is so big he could eat an adult guppy.


I would go with endlers in the 10 gallon, and feed your axolotl adult male endlers. I don't think fries are particularly nutritious anyway.

Would your axolotl eat shrimps? You could breed cherry shrimps to feed him. They multiply even faster than guppies, and you could keep them in the same tank as the endlers.

I would recommend using a sponge filter, some sand substrate, some decent light (10 gallons have those screw-in bulb canopies, so you can use CFLs), and a bunch of hornwort for nutrient uptake and fry/shrimp protection.


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## Kimchi24 (Mar 22, 2013)

how long does it take for endler fry to reach adult size?


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## Ryan.Wilton (Dec 12, 2012)

Took mine about a month. Platys reach around the 0.5" size closer to 2-3weeks if fed properly and kept in good quality water.


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