Settling on doing 20 gallon changes at least once a week for now. I draw water off into 5 gallon containers, so the process is rather slow. Filling is easy, long thin tube we can run all the way to a broom closet with a tap and drain. If only we could get the suction attachment to fit on that line. Test strips for proper water monitoring are the next priority, followed by a sized heater.
Proper feeding and care of a Black Pacu
- Thread starter BobDinosaur
- Start date
I feed my red-bellied pacu Hikari algae wafers on a daily basis. They're generally recommended for mostly herbivorous fish, a category which pacu fall into.
Ask your boss or convince them to buy new tank, that tank size is nothing for a pacu
feeding it easy enough cause it will eat anything you throw in its tank but refer mostly green base food.Ask your boss or convince them to buy new tank, that tank size is nothing for a pacu
New tank is not happening. The installation technically belongs to a salesman who plopped it there, with a variety of fish. Pacu is the only one remaining. Salesman would like the tank "back" when Bubba dies, but I doubt he realized how large the fish get or how long they can live.
Checked in the filter, it seems to be mostly sponge material. I have a bag that seems to contain compressed coral beads, should I slap it in or favor a carbon filter bag? pacu mom, what did/do you feed your pacu? This guy gets a mostly frozen/fresh vegetable diet, but I want to make sure there is sufficient variety to keep him healthy.
I believe in an earlier thread of mine Pacu Mom said she fed her pacu these,
"cobalt algae wafers in bulk"
I feed my pacu the kens fish version of the algae wafers "veggie wafers" as well as hikari.
Mine also snags some hikari massivore, some tilapia, and some shrimp occasionally from my other fish which is great for the omnivorous diet they need.
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"cobalt algae wafers in bulk"
I feed my pacu the kens fish version of the algae wafers "veggie wafers" as well as hikari.
Mine also snags some hikari massivore, some tilapia, and some shrimp occasionally from my other fish which is great for the omnivorous diet they need.
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Maybe u can talk to your boss and get him a replacement fish. Then get the pacu to a pond, tank, or another lfs. Just let him know he won't get the tank back for some time.
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Twenty gallons a weeks isn't even close to what needs to be changed out. Test strips are horribly inaccurate, but I guess better than nothing. A freshwater master test kit is much more accurate. Twenty gallon water changes every day should result in a gradual reduction of nitrates, which I am sure are sky high in that tank. Skip the carbon filter--it's great for removing chemicals like medicines.
Pacu are long lived fish and can live 30+ years in the right environment. They also can die suddenly at around 2 years of age when kept in small tanks (75 gallons). I am assuming that the high nitrates is what does the pacu in. Stunting, failure to thrive, sudden death are what can happen when the poor fish live in high nitrate conditions.
Our pacu are fed an exclusive diet of algae wafers. For many years they were fed pond pellets, but the floating pellets were getting into our overflow boxes. We had fun feeding our pacu slices of raw potato, whole carrots and other food, but stopped a long time ago. The problem with this type of food is that pacu are messy eaters, which results in lots of food debris in the water. For us, it is all about trying to maintain pristine water conditions, and food particles can raise the nitrates exponentially, so we stopped feeding fruit/veggies. Our silly pacu will inhale whole almonds without taking a single bite.
Here's old video taken when our pacu were much smaller.
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You can see how "dirty" the water becomes with all the potato particles
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Very limited number of places accepting fish this big. Will consider it if the tank conditions are not controllable. I believe food waste is fairly minimal, the veggies he eats are already bite size and
are inhaled without leftovers.
Finally got some water quality numbers. Nitrate at 200+ ppm, nitrite at 0 ppm, ammonia at 0.5, pH at 6.5. Got a heater, airstone and large quantity of dechlor for all the water changes I will be doing. Will be adjusting temperature by 1 degree every other day to give him time to acclimate.
