I recently put an oscar and a endlciheri bichir in a 125 together, along with a few other cichlids. All of the other cichlids in the tank atm eat live black worms and shrimp, while i feed my Oscar and Bichir Silversides. Now the problem. My Oscar Never stops eating! After I give him a fish to eat, I go ahead and feed my bichir a fish, but before the bichir comes even close to eating it, the oscar is already digesting it. My bichir has no time to eat t before the oscar comes along and grabs it. Is there any way I could stop him from eating my bicirs food? I've tried distracting him with pellets, but he'd just eat the pellets then swim over and grab bichirs fish. What do I do?
It's always going to be a problem when you mix fish with different eating characteristics. Oscars should be fed a quality pellet food as their main food.
Well i feed my oscar these pellets, but I don't know if the bichir will eat them, because before he has time too oscar eats it. This is also the tool i use to put the food in front of my bichir and a tool to push away oscar from bichirs food (dosent work, oscar pushed the tool right outta the way) Meanwhile the bichir would rather use the pellet as a head rest ( Oscar almost bit bichirs head off getting that pellet right after this pic was taken) 
Though I mainly use the pellets as distraction for the oscar when i'm trying to get bichir to eat his fish.
Like the others have mentioned get the oscar on a pellets. Im not telling you to rehome one but this could turn into the norm for you.
I have a pearsei thats very similar in personality to an oscar and to say its been a headache when feeding my bichirs or plecos is an understatement. Ive tried keeping him away with a pvc pipe, target feeding with tongs, target feeding with a pipe and feeding after lights out.
The least success was with feeding with a pipe, after a while it becomes a dinner bell and they just patiently wait for the food to come.
My only saving grace is the pearsei is mainly a herbivore and wont touch cut up tilapia im guessing the oscar wont have an issue eating tilapia so what i would do is totally discontinue feeding the silversides and start feeding small chopped pieces of tilapia with tongs (i got mine from amazon was under 10 bucks)
You only have one bichir so it shouldnt be that hard. It will take time but the endli will get used to it.
My fear is the oscar will quickly grow while the endli wont since its not eating atm and become and oscar snack.
Btw tilapia is super cheap. Found in the frozen section of your super market....good luck and let us know how it goes
I have a pearsei thats very similar in personality to an oscar and to say its been a headache when feeding my bichirs or plecos is an understatement. Ive tried keeping him away with a pvc pipe, target feeding with tongs, target feeding with a pipe and feeding after lights out.
The least success was with feeding with a pipe, after a while it becomes a dinner bell and they just patiently wait for the food to come.
My only saving grace is the pearsei is mainly a herbivore and wont touch cut up tilapia im guessing the oscar wont have an issue eating tilapia so what i would do is totally discontinue feeding the silversides and start feeding small chopped pieces of tilapia with tongs (i got mine from amazon was under 10 bucks)
You only have one bichir so it shouldnt be that hard. It will take time but the endli will get used to it.
My fear is the oscar will quickly grow while the endli wont since its not eating atm and become and oscar snack.
Btw tilapia is super cheap. Found in the frozen section of your super market....good luck and let us know how it goes
What's wrong with the silversides? I have a big tub of them that can last me over a year and both oscar and Bichir like eating them. Why change to tilapia? I have tongs, would it work if i only fed my oscar pellets and kept feeding the bichir silversides, and eventually get him on the pellets as well? and keep the fish as a treat.
