You can usually leave healthy adults over the weekend with no problems. You must figure they have no guarantee of food on a regular basis in the wild. You might take some zucchini slices, parch them and place them in the tank before you leave and if they get very hungry they can munch on the zucchini over the weekend. The only real exclusion to this rule is fry. Baby fish need more food on a regular basis to survive. Being the fish you have are known for reproduction like rabbits, you might have to find another method of feeding over the weekends when this happens. I've heard the automatic feeders don't really help much but have never used one. the weekend feeder stones are up in the air to me. I tried some but my snails or pleco's just ate them before they could even do the job and I'm not sure how well they could feed the fish being concentrated like they are. I think vegetables are a better choice. Just feed them real well before the weekend and you should be fine. Kyle
i think dooing the veggie thing would be the best plan. i dont know how small the tank is.. but regardless of the size, you're still going to need a way to feed the fish on the weekend.
the best way of doing that would be the veggies, IMO. the weekend feeders are OK, but after a while will really "gunk up" the aquarium. more trouble than they're worth.
I have two tanks at my office - an angelfish/tetra tank and a Rift Lake tank. I never feed the fish over the weekend. They are healthy, happy to see me and thriving. Most fish in captivity eat considerably more regularly than they would in the wild.
Under no circumstances would I consider using a 'feeder block' because of their potential to mess up your water chemistry and foul the water. I also would think twice about leaving a hunk of food (e.g., veggie) in the tank. What if the fish, for whatever reason, didn't eat it? You'd have a chunk of whatever sitting the tank rotting over the weekend. Not in my fish tank...
If your fish are healthy adults, weekends without food are problem at all. In fact, many accomplished aquarists regularly withhold food a day or two per week from their fish.
I'd forget feeding them on the weekends altogether. It is not damaging to fish in any way to not have food for a few days. It is very unlike humans that if they aren't eating they aren't getting any nutrition. Fish feed off of mircoplancton and microsopic beings that exist in any tank. They will suffer no ill fate or health because of not being fed for a few days. The only problem Id have with leaving the veggies in the tank would be the vegitables might sour and change your tanks water quality negitively, and these cahnges can kill fish. I'd say it's extra work that you don't need to do!
Correcto! Leave the chuncks of veges out of the aquarium... that is asking for trouble. I hope it works out for you. One thing is, make sure the office doesn't drastically change the temperature at night or on the weekends. Some places do that, and not even a heater can always keep the temperature stable. Just a thought to ponder.
As aquariumfishguy said, make sure the temp's all okay and you (and the fish!) will be fine over the weekend.
As mentioned by the other posters, fish don't need as much food as we give them. They will certainly eat it, because fish are like dogs - food is important and they can't concieve that they have a steady supply, bu the excess leaves unprocessed in waste. Most fish eat way more than they would in the wild. Plus fish being cold blooded need far less food than we do.
Additionally, if you're keeping males and females fry are a pretty good food source. If you leave them alone and they're in good health, they will breed, and often. As long as you have enough water/filtration so that the fry don't break the bio-load of the tank, doing nothing and letting most of them get eaten might help out. Heavily planting the tank, with fake or real plants, will give them a sporting chance and you might be suprised when a few of them make it to maturity.
