He's nice. And that's a yellow tail cuda too btw.
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Feeding Red-Tail Barracuda
- Thread starter brendon7358
- Start date
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Well the people that sold it to you were kinda right. It wont really get past 12 inches unless water is pristine. These fish in the wild easily get to 24 inches but in a general home aquarium with the presence of ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate it stunts them apparently. So even if you have a 24 inch wide tank they only really get to 12 inches fully grown.
I would do the starve it or die method. The fiish will eat when its ready, my most stubborn fish is a jardini took around 7 weeks to get onto pellets, (only cause i wussed out and threw in some blood worms from time to time). But starve it for 3-4 days, throw a shrimp in or a piece of market fish, if he doesnt take it, take it out and try every two days and I'm sure he'll break within 2 weeks.
I would do the starve it or die method. The fiish will eat when its ready, my most stubborn fish is a jardini took around 7 weeks to get onto pellets, (only cause i wussed out and threw in some blood worms from time to time). But starve it for 3-4 days, throw a shrimp in or a piece of market fish, if he doesnt take it, take it out and try every two days and I'm sure he'll break within 2 weeks.
I had luck weaning mine onto chopped market shrimp. I threaded the shrimp onto a piece of string and then jerked it around in the water to make it look like it was alive. Took a few tries but it worked eventually.
Two other pieces of advice on these guys:
1) Make sure you have a good lid on your tank - they will jump out if given the oppurtunity
2) They are quite susceptible to fin rot so make sure that there are no aggressive tankmates.
Two other pieces of advice on these guys:
1) Make sure you have a good lid on your tank - they will jump out if given the oppurtunity
2) They are quite susceptible to fin rot so make sure that there are no aggressive tankmates.
I don't know which route you are going to choose, but as you can see, prepped foods and pellets are the only advice you'll get on here most of the time haha.
If you want to try live feeders, I have had the best luck/least parasites or disease from baitshop fathead minnows. I have 2 redfin pickerels and I honestly have no intentions of starving them off live as they are predators. I QT a dozen minnows at a time, and treat them with prazi pro, and paraguard. That takes care of 99.9% of any problems. I leave them QT'd for 2 weeks give or take, and I haven't had any problems with them carrying disease to my other tanks.
I have had parasite problems with my pickerels, but the first time came from feeding rosey reds that brought a mild case of ich from the lfs because I had no QT'd minnows at the time, and the other was when I left on vacation, dumped 4 minnows into the tank, and one of them died in the tank while I was away, growing a pretty nasty fungus in the tank, which of course spread to my pickerel.
If you take the time and precautions with live food, there is no reason why you should run into the nasty problems a lot of people have with feeders.
If you want to try live feeders, I have had the best luck/least parasites or disease from baitshop fathead minnows. I have 2 redfin pickerels and I honestly have no intentions of starving them off live as they are predators. I QT a dozen minnows at a time, and treat them with prazi pro, and paraguard. That takes care of 99.9% of any problems. I leave them QT'd for 2 weeks give or take, and I haven't had any problems with them carrying disease to my other tanks.
I have had parasite problems with my pickerels, but the first time came from feeding rosey reds that brought a mild case of ich from the lfs because I had no QT'd minnows at the time, and the other was when I left on vacation, dumped 4 minnows into the tank, and one of them died in the tank while I was away, growing a pretty nasty fungus in the tank, which of course spread to my pickerel.
If you take the time and precautions with live food, there is no reason why you should run into the nasty problems a lot of people have with feeders.
Fathead minnows are rosy red's just a different strain. What I think I'm going to do is stock the 40 gal tank with rosy red's, white cloud's, platies, maybe ghost shrimp, and maybe some neon tetra's. That should provide him with sufficient variety.
Good luck with whatever path you choose to take. These fish have a well deserved reputation as being difficult to feed. Do note that I didn't specify that that only getting them off of live...
Moved to Other Characins
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Moved to Other Characins
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You've gotten about all the advice I think you need from the others here, I just wanted to comment that you have a very cool fish there! I would love to find one of those to school with my two red tails. They get a bit larger than the red tails, and have a more impressive display of teeth as they get older. Keep us updated, and best of luck with whichever route you choose.
