Why my serpae tetra and tiger barb turn pale??

[NikkiY]

I have some problem with excess staghorn algae. The water tested good. For a lack of any other solutions, I change the auto-feed to just once a day instead of two times a day. This started 2 days ago. Today, I notice tht some of the tiger barbs turn pale. It is like the color being washed away. Also, for some of the serpae tetra, they become more colorless and see through than previously. Could this be an indication of not enough food?

Nikki.

 

[snowyangel]

Fish will be fine being fed once a day, but i find they prefer if you feed them 2x a day but in smaller amounts imo. Whats the temp in their tank? Do you notice any uneaten food that stays in the tank from the feeder(does it feed them too much)? When your fish are eating, do all the fish get food ?

 

[NikkiY]

I use the this auto feeder . The food are flakes and I crushed them to roughly 1~2 mm^2 in size. The portion size set on the feeder is around the 4/10 position and this usually gives enough flakes to cover the top part of the thumb. All my fish are around 1 to 1.5 inches long (my forum profile has a complete list of my fish). Is this too much or too little? I used to feed 2x but I temporary set it to 1x to see if this will affect the spread of staghorn algae in my tank.

My fish devour the food very quickly within a min. or so. Sometimes they will nip at the alage or seach the bottom for leftover.

This morning, I checked the fish and their color are all vibrant again. Could the problem simply because I turned on the light after it had been off for a few hours?

Nikki

 

[dragoon459]

i dont know what the problem is, but i don't know why you feed your fish crushed flake food if they're full grown

 

[NikkiY]

i dont know what the problem is, but i don't know why you feed your fish crushed flake food if they're full grown

I crushed the flakes so the aut feeder will delivery a more even amount of food each time.

Nikki

 

[dragoon459]

oh, cool
never worked with an auto feeder, so i wouldn't know

 

[NikkiY]

oh, cool
never worked with an auto feeder, so i wouldn't know

and the best part of having one is to stop me from feeding too much manually

 

[dragoon459]

yeah... i might get one now, cause i can never tell if im overfeeding or not

 

[digital_run]

If all they get is flake then i would mix up their diet...add some veggies and bloodworms/brine shrimp once in awhile and theyll show their gratitude. Fish are cold blooded so they can go days without feeding with no adverse affects....i feed my fish 5 out of 7 days in a week..HIH a little.

 

[NikkiY]

If all they get is flake then i would mix up their diet...add some veggies and bloodworms/brine shrimp once in awhile and theyll show their gratitude. Fish are cold blooded so they can go days without feeding with no adverse affects....i feed my fish 5 out of 7 days in a week..HIH a little.

Agreed. I acutally mixed a bit of shrimp pallet with the flakes too. Usually, my treats are bloodworms and tublifex worms. I also feed them frozen peas too (of course, they are crushed).

Nikki