pooping fish

[attiladahun]

every time i come into my room and look at my tank, my swordtails that i've only had for about 24 hours are pooping. same thing with the platies i had long ago. why do they crap so much?

also, do swordtails eat algae? since i've had them, i've seen a significant reduction in the algae on the rock in my tank. does this possibly have a connection to the pooping?

 

[tmtpowers]

Umm, well don't you poo too? Yeah, what goes in one side, must come out the other. As for the algae, yes, they may eat at it. You may want to find out why you have so much algae though so you can get it under control before you have a bloom.

 

[Needeles]

How many times a day do you feed and roughly how much. As stated what they eat will come out. Cutting back alittle on feedings will help with this problem if it is making the tank to dirty.

I myself have noticed that if you feed fish cheaper foods that have fillers in them they will tend to poo poo more. What type of foods do you feed your fish?

 

[khombre]

Swordtails in my end do tend to peck on algae most of the day. And yeah they poop a lot too. It might be related because everytime i look into the pond they are almost/always trying to peck on something to munch on. More food more poop right? :

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Swords are omnivores. They do eat algae as well as some plants.

 

[yourchoice]

get a gravel cleaner.not very expensive and will suck up poop and debrie when you change the water.

 

[attiladahun]

i feed them wardley brand total tropical flakes and shrimp pellets, each once a day, about a pinch of flakes and 2-3 pellets. the other inhabitants of the tank are 2 zebra danios, 2 julii leopard corys, 5 lemon tetras, and the 3 swordtails in question.

also, what exactly makes a gravel cleaner different than a siphon for water changes that you stir up the gravel with and suck out stuff?

 

[paku]

is your tank cycled? Try feeding them once every 2 days for a while and see if that changes things.

 

[attiladahun]

my tank is cycled, and i've only been having this problem with the swordtails i've just introduced. now, 2 of them are pooing at the same time and the strings of poo are so long that other fish are biting at them and playing with them and the aquarium floor is littered with pieces of new swordtail poop

 

[TheZoo]

also, what exactly makes a gravel cleaner different than a siphon for water changes that you stir up the gravel with and suck out stuff?

nothing. A gravel vac is just a siphon, sometimes with a piece of stiffer, wider diameter tubing on the end. Are you using one already? Use it for the duration of every water change.
Try feeding a bit less for awhile, it wont hurt the fish. And yeah, some fish just enjoy algae!