Clown feeding advise

[dschwartz]

I have two smaller clowns (1-1.5") in a 30g. How much often should I be feeding. The LFS says " couple flakes each once or twice a day"
This seems like a lot, no? What would you recommend for these clowns as far as flake food (TetraMarine Saltwater Flakes)?
I've also tried feeding some frozen Marine Cuisine but have not yet figured out a good process for not causing a snowstorm of defrosted food 'bits' that eventually cause nitrate and phosphate spikes, etc. Seems like the frozen foods, even when defrosted, rinsed, etc. still are so small more gets deposited on the bottom than eaten?
David.

 

[invertcrazy]

Flake food may be ok once in a while but i wouldn't feed every day. If you are feeding frozen cubes take a knife and cut the cubes into quarters while still frozen. Vary their diet. Marine cuisine has some big chunks of meat , maybe too big for clowns as small as yours to eat. When you thaw the marine cuisine, thaw it in a cup with a little tank water and if you see any big chunks take a knife and try to cut it into smaller pieces. Cyclopeeze or baby brine is also small enough for the small clowns. Everyone has different feeding amounts for their tank, some feed once or twice a day and some feed once every two or three days, so you will have to decide which is best for your tank This should be done by checking water parameters and viewing your tank for uneaten food. Don't know if you have a cuc but with only 2 fish it will be very easy to over feed. A quarter cube should be enough to feed 2 or 3 times a day . Cut cube smaller if you think quarters are too big.
hope this helps and as always this is only my opinion and i'm sure others will add their .02

 

[dschwartz]

Thanks Invert, I've tried varying with the frozen but that always left me with a snow storm due to the pieces being so small. I think I'll try defrosting more, taking out the largest chunks of food and cutting into smaller pieces as needed. I think a good portion of that frozen food appears to be so small the fish would not even see it in time before it was either sucked up by filter or eventually settling on the bottom somewhere.
Maybe I should just chop up some raw shrimp/clams and feed them a bit of that instead?

 

[invertcrazy]

Yes making your own food is better and alot cheaper. Alot of us make our own food. It gives the fish a variety every time you feed them. Like I said earlier just be careful to not over feed because it will mess your tank up real fast.
IMO it's better to under feed than over feed.

 

[uneverno]

Wow! Your clowns are HUGE compared to mine
I have a baby perc that might be 3/4" all stretched out. He's just starting to develop his mid body stripe.
Anyway, I alternate between frozen mysis, mega marine and arctipods. W/ the mysis and mega I soak the cubes in a little condiment container (like you'd get ketchup in at the burger joint) with some RO water mixed with a tiny bit of freshly crushed garlic. My clown has decided to "host" the upper left corner of my tank, so I can target feed him a tiny bit after feeding the other greedy little pigs I have in the tank.
I feed maybe an 1/8 of a cube total to the whole tank (20gal) every other day - no more than my critters can consume in a minute or so.
Personally, I don't like flake. I know my CUC will pick up the remnants, but flakes tend to be higher in phosphates than frozen foods.

 

[reeftanker84]

mysis shrip are pretty big so your clown will see it in the tank,baby brine shrimp not a good idea,not much nutrition value,i take one cube and thaw in some tank water the mix in some phytoplankton and a drip of zooplankton but i dont add it all to the tank at the same time,should keep refrigerated for about a week and still be good,and feed a 1/4 to 1 tsp depending on the amount of critters you have,the phyto is for feeding corals if no corals dont worry about phyto