homemade food

[ioanna]

I have had my betta for 4 days now and am starting to panick as he hasn't eaten yet. I have been feeding him flake food but after reading through these posts i now realise that he probably doen't like them. I live in Greece, on one of the island and the pet shop is not that well stocked when it comes to food. I was wondering if anybody can give me some clues on what else i can feed my baby on {he hasn't got a name yet}. In the summer i will have an unlimited supply of mosquitos larvae but what can i fed him now? I have read about feeding them garden worms but can i just go a get them straight from the garden? won't they have bugs in? Anybody has any receipes for homemade fish food that i can try???

HELP ME PLEASE!!!!!!

1 male betta
3 zebra danios
4 harliquin fish

 

[ioanna]

P.S can i feed my baby on fish roe?? this is something that the Greeks tend to eat alot and it is widely available?? What about red worms that bury themselves in sand?, we use them as fishing bait usually but again will they be full of nasty things? i don't want to poison him.

I know i should of thought of this before i bought him but he was in a plastic cup in the shop and looked so unhappy.

 

[wuvmybetta]

Hi Joanna
I guess your post was over looked by several of us betta forum frequenter's, so sorry.


How about fruit flies? Can you get a hold of any of those? Usually they appear out of no where if you have rotting bananas ,earthworms/garden worms will work but they'd have to be washed and chopped super tiny (eeeww,have fun with that )
Maybe your lfs has some brine eggs for sale and you can try raising them, from what I understand it's fairly easy to do. Do a search on hatching brine and all kinds of threads should pop up

But for now I'd offer him anything you have handy (perhaps some leftover turkey) or fish roe (not sure what that is but give it a try). I've heard of people feeding their bettas some crazy off the wall things so don't be scared.

Keep us posted and I hope he settles in nicely for you

EDIT: oh,ohhh try some beef heart (again chopped tiny), or a piece of shrimp (I'll probably keep editing as I think of stuff )

 

[canis_lupus]

my bettas eat celery and i think if they get hungry enough they will even eat the flakes

 

[FishHeads]

If you decide to feed home-cultured food to your Betta I STRONGLY recommend that it be cleaned and checked before feeding. You would not want your Betta to succumb to an unknown internal bacterial infection. I have grown to love making up my own foods for my Bettas like Big Blue (the Betta picture that is my Avatar *to the left of the screen*). Big Blue now eats a little beef heart, as Wuvmybetta suggested to you, and he loves finely chopped Zucchini and fruit flies. Bettas really don't like flake food. I only have one that tolerates it because he lives in a 20 gallon with my Gouramis. (and I think that that Betta is a little nuts-o in the head because he was rescued from my LFS out of an Oscar tank...he was pretty beaten.) Anyways, sorry I overlooked this post....as I am a HUGE Betta fan. ]


Good luck!

 

[Inchworm]

Hi ioanna

What kind of fish roe are you talking about? It would probably be an excellent food as long as it was fresh. If it is preserved in salt or oil or something else that would cause problems I wouldn't try it.

Don't panic too quickly because you will see, if you look at some of the other threads in this section, some bettas take a little while to get comfortable and settle in. If he is healthy he will want to eat and live.

Good luck with him. Be sure to let us know how he is doing!

 

[ioanna]

Thanks for your advice. I read in one post that somebody was giving their betta cabbage, so last night i went off to the kitchen and blanched some. HE ATE SOME!!! I couldn't believe it. My husband now thinks i am totally mad {he is blaming my hormones as i am 5 months pregnant} as i now have a banana out to start rotting {thanks wuvmybetta}. I plan on going bug hunting later for him as we still have very few mossies about so i will go look for their larvae.
Before i got my betta i wondered what the fuss was about now i know, i can't believe that i am actually going looking for bugs{ i'm not a bug person}. I will let you know how he gets on.

My danios and harliquin fish ate the cabbage as well is this ok for them???

 

[wuvmybetta]

lol@ your husband blaming your hormones (congrats by the way )


I remember the cabbage thread ,good thinking,I'm glad it worked
It should be fine for your other fish, the wider the variety the healthier the fish

 

[FanOFish]

Ioanna, don't panic mine didn't eat until I had him home for 8 days. Once he started there was no stopping. He now recognizes me as the big thing that drops food in his water and actully rushes to the front of the tank instead of hiding as he did at first. Mine eats the little betta gold pellets.

 

[Inchworm]

Hi Ioanna

I was wondering about the roe. What kind do you have available? Since fish love to eat other fish's eggs (and sometimes even their own!) this should be great food for them.

Since you said that you live on an island I was wondering if you have a supply of fresh roe available to you, and if you do, whether you have tried it with your fish.

 

[ioanna]

I am going to the harbour today to try and get some fresh roe, i can just imagine having to find a fish with it in. I can already here the fisherman muttering about mad english women. I will try this and let you know. My betta {now named Mickey} finally ate some flake food last night but i think this is because he was hungery.

 

[wuvmybetta]

Good,I'm glad he's getting an appetite

Last night I was defrosting some homemade food that my lfs makes, I was giving it to my cichlids but I had a bunch leftover and decided to give it to the bettas (or try them anyway) They LOVED it! It's basically spinach,garlic,ground beef heart, some chicken liver,and fish (?) all processed together and frozen in an envelope.I was surprised to see them slurping up the spinach too,not just the meat. Go nuts and make up some crazy recipe if the roe doesn't work (but it probably will )

 

[Inchworm]

Hi ioanna

I'm glad to learn your betta is eating flakes. At least he is eating something. Don't underestimate the value of flake food for fish. If it is a good brand, it will have a balanced formula that is good basic food for the fish. Even if he won't take anything else, he will be alright on it.


__________
wuvmybetta,

It's interesting to note that the fish food your lfs makes has garlic as an ingredient. I've heard that it's useful in ridding the fish of internal parasites. Have you ever heard that?

 

[wuvmybetta]

Inchworm~
Garlic is amazing and very beneficial to people and animals (and yummy ),I love it
I've heard of the parasite's theory and it also boosts immune systems. I buy a food called Formula 2 that is a frozen algae based food that I feed my cichlids and my para plec and it contains garlic. Hikari Gold betta bites and Hikari's cichlid food also have garlic in them.
I'm just thankful that my lfs makes the food so I don't have to bother ,it's a little pricey but not really if you think about all the ingredients you'd need to buy to make it yourself (not to mention all that chopping)

 

[BettaBoyz]

some Bettas love being melodramatic and worrying their owners for days on end, i'm glad you didn't tear your hair out from panic and that Mickey finally ate some processed food!

as for homemade stuff, i haven't tried it yet, but i do have another idea. if your tank can handle it, pick out a few livebearers (i think Guppies breed best) or get a second tank to stock with Guppies. let them breed, suck up the babies with a turkey baster, and feed them to your Betta! i'm sure he'd appreciate the fine, live food, my Boyz sure loved it when i fed them the few Platy fry who died of shock during the Big Water Change.

if you can't, beef heart & chicken (from your grocery store), earthworms (from a bait shop, i'll assume there's one since you were talking about fishermen), fruit flies (homebred!) and brine shrimp will all work well ^^

good luck!