Can you overfeed a needlenose gar?

[speedenator]

I have a 50 gal tank in my office... current residents include a Chinese algae eater, 5 tiger barbs, 4 yellow-tail barbs, 4 New Guinea red rainbows, and one needlenose gar. I've been feeding the gar 5-6 guppies once or twice a week for the past two weeks now, to the delight of my teammates (yeah, we don't get out much).

I'm going on vacation for a bit over a week, and one of my co-workers asked if she could feed the gar. In particular, when I mentioned that guppies were $0.15 at PetCo, she wondered what would happen if she blew $15 and bought 100 for the tank.

I don't actually know... I'm guessing the gar would eat nicely for quite some time with 100 guppies running around, but not eat himself to death. The filtration on the tank is fine, so should keep the balance in check.

Any thoughts here?

-speed

 

[crimsontsavo]

As long as the filtration can handle it, it will be fine.The gar wont overfeed.I like to keep feeders living in the tank with my predatory fish.Not only does it feed them......but it adds more movement to the tanks.You can see some pretty amazing hunting when kept like this.

 

[Colisa lalia]

I think it would work, but the bioload is quite high all of a sudden, and the other fish might get stressed. I would suggest you remove the other fish OR you could set up a 55-gal for feeders and breed your own, cheaper safer and much, much more caring to the guppies. But you could if your removed the other fish add all those guppies at once and the gar would probably be unable to eat the guppies faster than they reproduce, not to mention the cool predator prey relationship you would be albe to witness.

 

[TearsTurnToAshes]

im surprised your gar hasnt attacked the pther fish in your tank! mine was vicious, he even attacked a pacu that was twice his size. but as to the guppies, i wouldnt do it. unless you go buy another filter able to handle 50/g i wouldnt even put fifty guppies in the tank. with all the waste they would be producing, you would be running a high risk of all your fish dying from amonia poisening. but of course, there your fish

 

[CFC]

im surprised your gar hasnt attacked the pther fish in your tank! mine was vicious, he even attacked a pacu that was twice his size.

Which species of gar are we talking about here TTA, needle nose gars (xenentodon cancilla) rarely exceed 10" in captivity and only grow to 12" in the wild. They are peaceful to anything that is too big to fit into their mouths and can be kept with equal sized and larger fish.

 

[ste2k3]

the gar would initially "stuff itself" but when it realises that there is constantly food available, it would probably settly for a couple of guppys every day of so. I would advise that you make an effort to try and get the gar onto dead frozen food rather than guppys. this is for two reasons:

1/ it isn't really fair on the guppys

2/ the most important, guppys are bred, shiped and held in bad conditions. often, they will be carrying parasites, diseases or infections. all of these could be passed to your gar and any other of your fish for that matter.

 

[TearsTurnToAshes]

In response to CFC
when i bought it i was told that it was a baby needlenose gar(6in) but quickly after a few months it had already reached a foot, and i had to move it to a 40/g by it self. it got to a foot and a half before i had to give it to a local fishstore. i thought that it was a different species but it held true to all the markings of the needlenose gar. and to it attacking the other fish, i had a pleco that was 8in, and a pacu that was a foot in the tank. soon after a month the gar attacked both the pacu and the pleco