java fern
Long-horned catfish eat cucumber Photo: Moritz Hertel
Young catfish can be fed with artemia nauplii. The boys will get them.
At the latest when the nauplii sink to the bottom, because they don’t survive long in fresh water.
Young catfish also like to eat cucumbers.
Medium-sized juvenile catfish eat cyclopse and green fodder.
Antennae catfish primarily eat vegetable food. Algae, plants, green fodder tablets, etc. are suitable.
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Suitable vegetables:
- salad
- raw cucumber slices
- raw potato slices
- crushed peas
- boiled carrots
- scalded spinach
- pieces of pepper
- zucchini
- boiled potatoes mixed with peeled peas and carrots or spinach and frozen
Male catfish eats cucumber Photo: Moritz Hertel
Vegetable slices that do not remain on the ground but rise up can be attached to the ground with a toothpick. Alternatively, pieces of vegetables can be attached to a disc with a suction cup.
Vegetables that are not eaten after 1 to 2 days must be removed from the aquarium to prevent them from rotting. Raw potato slices are removed as soon as small bubbles rise from the slices.
Vegetables can be frozen in portions in ice cube trays and fed like frozen food from the shops.
Catfish on a food tablet Photo: Moritz Hertel Long-tailed catfish (mouth) Photo: Philippe Coulon
If there is not enough algae in the aquarium, algae can be grown relatively easily. A bowl of water and some larger stones is placed in the sun. The stones grow algae quickly and can then be placed in the aquarium with the catfish. However, catfish prefer to eat plants than algae. They also get used to food tablets quickly. It should therefore not be expected that bow-tie catfish eat a lot of algae.
In addition to the vegetables, food algae leaves from Dennerle can be given.
Catfish also eat Artemia. Artemia die after some time in fresh water. At the latest, the dead Artemia are eaten by the antennae catfish.
Every now and then mosquito larvae can be given.
Rodent catfish eat plants
Plant damage caused by eating Photo: Frank Mersch
If bow-tie catfish are not given enough vegetable food, they often eat plant leaves. Amazon sword plants are z. B. likes to be grated. Feeding them vegetables often helps. However, there are also reports that plants have been eaten despite being fed plenty of vegetables. Young plant and leaf shoots in particular are often eaten, although green fodder is given in abundance.
Antenna catfish mouth Photo: Ralf Fischer
Vallisneria, java fern and java moss are mostly left alone. These seem to have bitter substances or are too hard.
It is unclear whether all catfish species eat plants under certain conditions, because due to the unclear naming it is often not known which species of catfish are actually kept. Sometimes catfish feed on plants when they are older.
At least some catfish feed mainly on the emersed leaves of newly planted Amazon sword plants, which die off anyway. They hardly go to new submerged leaves. The leaves are only sucked out and skeletonized during the dying process. Perhaps the tissue of the leaves is of different firmness.
Apparently every catfish has its own preferences when it comes to eating plants. Once the animals have gotten a taste for it, you can only try to keep the damage as low as possible by feeding them green fodder.
Antennae catfish eat Chinese cabbage:
Rodent catfish eat pork:
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