The Planted Tank Forum banner

Universal Invert. Food Ideas

4K views 15 replies 6 participants last post by  mistergreen 
#1 ·
I was wondering what you people of the community do for feeding your community tanks. I keep snails and shrimps together and even though they eat the minimal amount of food that is dropped I like to feed them once a week. For the most part I toss in some NLS small fish formula for the shrimp to find (Amanos) since they eat algae all day some meaty fatty food is good for their diet once a week or even less but I am not sure if they get everything they need from NLS...fish do so why not? The snails however I am not so sure find the NLS in the gravel, so I feed zucchini and this is especially for the Apple/Mystery snails that are larger and eat less algae than Nerites. I assume it is nutritious enough for them but they seem to be more interested in the skin then the stringy center part, they always leave the skin stripped and I bet a lot of the nutrients are in the skin as well! The Amano shrimp do not show much interest in the zucchini the way they hoard NLS.

I have heard of "snail jello" and I am thinking about making some but how safe is it for my snails and shrimp to be eating gelatin? The idea would be to drop one thing for everything to get what they need from it once a week and this seemed like a great idea without the mess. I have several things I had in mind including the fresh leafy greens, NLS, as well as frozen San Francisco Bay foods which I already have but do not feed. I have the freshwater multi-pack that contains Freshwater Frenzy, Emerald Entree, Bloodworms, and Spirulina Brine Shrimp. I wanted to mix it all together with the leafy greens, some of the frozen food contains greens I forget which one.

I can use a feeding cone for shrimp but the snails are a bit harder so I want something that sinks, I will drop it in front of a snail and let it feed on it before the Amano shrimp drag it away they can be real jackashes when it comes to feeding so I target the snails and do not worry about the shrimp...they find everything but my car keys.
 
See less See more
#2 ·
I bit the bullet and started on some invert food. I have Nerite snails, Ivory mystery apples, Amano shrimp, Ghost shrimp, and red cherry shrimp...all of which need calcium, I read the more calcium in red cherry shrimps diet the more colorful they get too. I started with fresh mostly organic greens: Kale, Collard, Broccoli, and a pinch of Carrot but it's mostly sugar I think. This will be the majority of their diet, I will add it to the Magic Bullet along with my baby food "base". I have 3 other ingredients to add: crushed Tums (calcium carbonate), 4 types of SanFran frozen food (Freshwater Frenzy-Emerald Entree-Spirulina Brine Shrimp-Bloodworms), and crushed algae wafers.




The baby food base I found was spinach, zucchini & peas. Perfect! The back is low on sodium and sugar, yet extremely high in calcium @ 8% which is higher than the 6% that you normally find. This jello seems to work well for people and keeps their tank clean, if I could have bought it on eBay I would have. I may start selling it if this works out.

 
#3 ·
I just use a variety of fish food pellets to feed my snails so your way ahead of me
on better nutrition for them.
I found that shrimp seem to really like esparagus much more than any other veggy
that I tried in their tank. You might want to try some to see if you might add it to your
list which goes into that brew.
 
#6 ·
Hey mistergreen! I guess really "no more bow ties"? :)

Haha, anyways, just wanted to ask if you happened to have a Homemade/DIY fish food formula/recipe you wouldn't mind sharing?
For whatever type of diet (omnivore, carnivore, herbivore, etc.)
I might finally whip up a batch of homemade food.
 
#15 ·
I did add the garlic but I ended up using Knox instead of Agar, this is the final product and it smells horrible! They sink very well, but my shrimp are more interested in it than my snails are. It may just be that the shrimp eat it too fast for my snails to get a chance but the pieces of greens do not get eaten by the shrimp they leave them but luckily they do not float so chances are the snails will eat the scraps of green. Possibly the Agar will help the snails interest. I am selling dipping cups on eBay for $10 shipped, if people want to try it on their tanks before they spend the time to make it themselves.

 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top