red princess feeding tips

[shirinyan]

So I finally picked up my red princess from the airport. Now I am not sure what the best food is to give them. Am i not supposed to ever give live black worms? Flake food, I am thinking is ok. But what are some of the combos that have worked for some of you Red Princess pros?

Please let em now.

[Thomas Andersen]

Hi Shirinyan,

I'm not so familiar with the types of live-food used in the States, but I know that Mark Smith feeds his fish with some sort of live worms with great success, but I can't recall their name. Mark, maybe you can shed some light on this?

I feed mine frozen black mosquitolarvae, cyclops, chopped up mysis and newly hatched artemia. In my group some of the fishes will take flakes, while others will not, so I've stopped feeding them flakes as I don't want to have any left-overs. In the spring/summertime I have a barrel outside filled with water, where all sort of insects lay their eggs, and I collect the larvae to feed the fishes. They really love all this tasty crible-crable

Good luck with them!

Thomas

[Mark Smith]

Hi all

Thomas, the worms I feed, and for which you can see at the bottom of my photo of the male Trematocara marginatum, are called by a couple of names here in America. California blackworms or aquatic brownworms. They are similar to tubifex, but are 2 to 3 times larger, and hardier/longer living while being stored in the refrigerator, and do not smell as badly as to tubifex worms. Strangley, a new generation of hobbyists here has taken to calling them blood worms, a live food (an insect larvae, actually) completely different that these aquatic worms.

Truly, any small, soft bodied live food is usually going to be the best food for our fishes and there is nothing like it to condition fish to spawn. Hope this helps!

[shirinyan]

Thanks so much. This helps ans clears up some things.