# Oscar live foods



## dprUsh83 (Oct 5, 2006)

How frequently can you feed an oscar live feed while still remaining healthy? Not that this is his primary source of food, but is it okay to give a couple feeder fish/crickets/whatever per week?


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## PetMax (Jun 18, 2005)

dprUsh83 said:


> How frequently can you feed an oscar live feed while still remaining healthy? Not that this is his primary source of food, but is it okay to give a couple feeder fish/crickets/whatever per week?


I just keep a few goldies in their tank until they gobble them up.


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## dprUsh83 (Oct 5, 2006)

So they'll kind of regulate the amount that they're able to have....I can't "overdo" it?


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## HybridS130 (Aug 27, 2006)

Oh they'll definitely overdo it if you give them a chance. I had a blue channel catfish once that eight 10 feeder guppies in one night. I think the best thing to do would be to buy a small holding tank. A 5 or 10 should work fine and you could keep several feeders in there at once until you're ready to feed your oscar.


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## Puffer Pita (Jun 16, 2006)

Goldfish and rosy reds are not good feeder fish for any fish. Livebearers such as mollies and guppies are much healthier. As one scientist/expert told me:

_Rosy red minnows and goldfish are very popular with people who like to use feeder fish, but they're actually the worst possible choice. They contain a lot of thiaminase, an enzyme that breaks down vitamin B1. Livebearers don't have thiaminase, and so are safer to use. Incidentally, prawns also have a lot of thiaminase, as do most oily fish, such as anchovies. Mussels and snails don't have thiaminase, making them both (yet again) perfect pufferfish foods. 

Another factor is nutritional balance: predators of all types depend on the gut contents of their prey for essential vitamins. That's why cats eat the guts and livers of birds they catch before they eat the bits that seem nicer to us, the muscles. Livebearers are again ideal because they are herbivorous and easily fattened up with algae wafers and softened greens such as lettuce or frozen peas. 

The fattiness issue is a bit unclear. Yes, it is true that too much fat is bad. Anything from a warm-blooded animal, such as cheese or chicken meat, will contain oils that will harden into fat inside the relatively cool body of a fish. That much is certain. But the fattiness issue with regard to cold blooded animals is more ambiguous to me. Ordinary fish food flake, made from fish meal, is 12.5% oil (at least the pot of Aquarian flake sitting here is). Not many fish are likely to be that fatty. Moreover, the oils in fish are rather different to the ones that cause problems in human arteries. So while I've read the goldfish are too fatty thing repeatedly, I'm far from convinced. 

The main problem with feeders (as I see it) is that many of the people who think it fun to use them don't care to breed and feed their own feeders. This makes those aquarists much less reliable in terms of keeping their predatory fish healthy, because they're dependent on cheap goldfish or whatever. By contrast, someone weaning their predator onto dead foods can much more easily ensure the food given to their pet is clean, nutritious, and varied. _


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## flamingo (Nov 5, 2005)

When I had an oscar, once or twice a week it would get a feeder. Minnows, etc..no goldfish and the like though.

And yes, oscar's will overdo themselves. Mine would try and eat feeders the same size of it even after it had already ate 5 smaller ones...


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## dudemac (Jun 25, 2006)

I usually do about 15 mollies once a month. In the time there are still fish in the tank i do not feed them thier regular food. Judge the size of feeders to the size of the oscars mouth, try and get a good size fit but smaller is always better. If you see after a few days there are still a couple of feeders left you might want to feed half the normal ammount and see if he eats. If so, those feeders left might be fast, but the oscar will get them sooner or later.

Personally, I try and do feeders as a treat more than a staple. Once a month. Using a good food like Cichlid Gold (also getting the right sized pellets for the oscar)


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