Oscar diet

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violatorjf

AC Members
Mar 5, 2005
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Hi everyone,

XXXXXXI have a 5" Red Tiger Oscar, currently residing in a 40 gallon long tank. So far, his diet has consisted of all live foods - crickets, assorted worms, and feeder fish. After doing some research, I have discovered that a diet of ALL live foods may not be the best choice. For extra nutrition, I thought I would introduce some pellets to him and see how he liked them. I ended up buying some Tetra Sticks, the big kind that says "An alternative to live foods". A little background first...the fish I feed him are generally rosie reds from the local pet store, whom I buy maybe 10 or 20 of and put them in one of those circular tupperware bins with the rope handles on each side. I make sure they live for atleast a week before I feed any to him, in hopes of lessening the chances of him catching a disease from one of them. Anyways, his general diet varied from 3 or 4 fish a day, to 1 or 2 fish and some crickets or worms, or basically any other mixture you can think of. When I tried putting a couple of the Tetra sticks on the water, he came up to the top and ate one...but not really. You see, when he eats a cricket, worm or fish (mainly fish), he tends to shoot some of the food out through his gills, which I have read is normal. The problem is, when he ate this stick, he ended up shooting practically ALL of it out his gills. It polluted the water pretty nicely for about 15 minutes. So I guess my question is, will I ever be able to get him to actually eat dry foods in collaboration with live, or will he always just favor the live and disregard the pellets/sticks? Thanks for any comments,

John

P.S. - I am fully aware that I will need to buy a larger tank for my buddy :rolleyes:
 
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First off, welcome to Aquaria Central violatorjf! I hope you enjoy learning with the rest of us, off of each other's experiences.

Now let's get down to it. The problem is, that your oscar is conditioned to live foods, but it's not irreversable. Just stop feeding live foods, and start feeding him a variety of other foods to see what entices him to feed. Most fish that are conditioned to live food will go for quite some time before they accept prepared food, but having eaten one stick is a good step for your oscar. Remember, Oscars need a diet that is high in protein and low in moisture.

Some frozen foods you should try are bloodworms, and mysid shrimp.

Also try dry foods like pellets (I use Dishi color enhancing pellets for my oscars, they really like that stuff), freeze dried bloodworms, freeze dried krill, etc...

Oscars are very very messy eaters, and you're correct; shooting food out of their gills is normal. I like to think of it as a baby eating spaghetti and most of it ending up on the floor, the chair, or the baby's face, lol. This is why Oscars need EXCELLENT mechanical filtration and water movement. Weekly to biweekly water changes are a must. (I do a weekly 50% changes).

Live foods are okay to feed your oscar as a treat once in a while. Every other week, my oscars either get feeder goldfish, shrimp, or live worms.

Eventually your oscar will get hungry enough to accept prepared foods, just be patient with him. Good luck and enjoy your oscar! :)


HTH,
Serg
 
Don't completely give up live food, just give less of it...maybe every week or so give em some feeders and mix in cichlid pellets and frozen beef heart and what SoCal suggested
 
Mine gets hikari cichlid pellets, spirulina sticks (no I'm not Kidding) and even some flake food. of the three, the flake food causes the least floating debris. He also gets snails (easy to raise) shrimp (live and frozen) and guppies (home grown) Under no circumstance do any of my Oscars ever get Goldfish. I just don't like them, and don't think they serve much of a purpose as food.

As said the trick is to train them to accept what you give. I would withhold all but the prepared food until your oscar eats them well (may take two days, may take two weeks), and then revert back to live treats once a week or so. I have adopted a few Oscars over the years, that would not eat anything but live fish. Trust me. If you are steadfast, they will come around. I've never seen an Oscar that would starve to death when there was food in the tank.
Dave
 
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