feeding technique for community tank

[venzi]

Hi.  I own a 20g tank with a few 4 female bettas and 6platies (10 fish total).  I was seeking advice on how to feed the fish so that there's an even distribution of food for the fish.  I've noticed the platies have quick reaction times (and even amongst the platies there's one or two that are able to get a disproportionate amount of the food).   I can drop pellets right next to the bettas and a platy will quickly grab the food even though it was several inches away.  

[nabokovfan87]

Definitely a difficult puzzle.

I would try to feed the platies first and then on the opposite side of the tank use something like a worm cone or a feeding ring for the Bettas. They should opt for floating pellets and the like and it might be easier to train them to hand feed (and eventually just use the ring) as opposed to trying to corral all of the platies.

I would feed the platies the Xtreme flake mix, community crave (it's a blend of the krill flake with spirulina flake).  You would feed them off on one side and then try to train the Bettas to eat the Betta food or just to eat on the other side of the tank. Hand feeding just the Bettas at first with tongs or something would be a start, but I'm uncertain on how to get to the end goal.

Edited May 15, 2023 by nabokovfan87

[Lennie]

I keep multiple bettas, both in community tanks and species tanks.

What works for me is, crushing pellets or feeding very small fry food for my endlers for example so rather than having 10 pellets on the surface open for competitions, the whole surface is covered with small food particles amounting to that many pellets in total, so they constantly eat around the surface, and handfeed normal sized pellets on the surface for my bettas

[venzi]

quick update: i've been having success with using a feeding ring. the platies generally roam around frantically but the bettas stay in a particular area waiting.  So when I put the pellets down for the bettas, the feeding ring "hides/breaks the line of sight" for the platies and the pellets.   So the bettas can easily have their share.  It's pretty cool to see the different feeding habits.

[Alix7]

On 5/23/2023 at 7:32 PM, venzi said:

quick update: i've been having success with using a feeding ring. the platies generally roam around frantically but the bettas stay in a particular area waiting.  So when I put the pellets down for the bettas, the feeding ring "hides/breaks the line of sight" for the platies and the pellets.   So the bettas can easily have their share.  It's pretty cool to see the different feeding habits.

That's a really clever solution.