Vortech Feed Mode Question

tonight was the first time with feeding with the vortech on. I changed the mode from reef crest to feed, and i am thinking the feed mode is to fast for my fish. They are used to no flow for about half an hour for feedings. I feed once every three days so i am worried that some may go hungry with not being able to catch the food.

Would it be ok if i unplug the vortech while i feed? im also worried about my cleaner shrimp not getting any of the food, look like he was struggling some.

 

There would be no problem with unplugging it. It should restart automatically in the same mode.

 

hmm ok i noticed there is another mode, night mode that is 40% less power im not sure if that speed would be even less than feed mode, because if it is i may try that but if not ill just shut the thing off

 

I don't think I would worry about it. It may take them some time to get used to chasing food but it's probably a bit more natural for them to chase it anyway, the ocean doesn't have a pause button for feeding.

If your fish are well established in the tank anyway, if they are new to the tank then I would do everything to make it as easy as possible for them to eat. Once they have been in the tank a week or so and are eating well I wouldn't worry about it.

Also your shrimp should be fine. They can swim pretty well when they want to and if they are hungry they can chase down food in the current too even in heavy flow all SPS tanks.

I would actually be more concerned about only feeding every three days, that's not a lot of food. Keep an eye on them and make sure all your fish are not getting thin, different fish store fat in different areas of their body so you may need to figure out what a healthy fish looks like first depending on the type.

JMO

 

Thanks for the info, these fish are established but next week i will be getting 2-3 more new fish so i will probably have to turn the pump off for them, hopeully it wont take to long for my fish to learn to chase their food.

And as far as feeding goes, i've been playing around with how much i feed them. I started off with feeding once every other day for a while, i figured that it may be to much, so then i switched to once every other day for about a month, now i'm trying out once every three das, i'm still undecided on which feeding method to stick with. I make sure i slightly overfeed when feeding once every other day. They get a mixture of frozen brine, ocean nutrition formula one flames, and a hint of bloodworms all soaked in garlic.

 

This might not be an issue but just to mention it. If you can, make sure the frozen brine is enriched somehow. Adult brine shrimp themselves are not very nutritious. If you have the option for mysis shrimp they are much more nutritious.

I know there are systems setup that feed heavily every day and don't have nutrient problems so I know it's possible, but finding the right amount of food for your filtration to handle can be tricky.

It might be worth waiting on adding more fish until you make sure your filtration can handle the bioload you have currently. If you're still experimenting with your current feeding amount adding more fish is going to make it even trickier. Cutting back feeding to every 3 days and then adding more fish seems kind of counterproductive.

Something to think about anyways.

 

I do not turn my powerheads off most of the time when I feed and all the fish and critters including the 4 shrimp all catch food in the tank. I have a ton of circulation in the tank but I feed daily also but have alot of fish and critters. I change the foods daily live brine one day, mysis one day with a couple krill, clams and veggies another day. The fish find there food and are actually I was thinking a few of them were actually looking fat haha. Dont sweat it they will get there food. I have tried every other or few days but there stomaches started looking thin.

 

Just a quick comment about looking fat, and not necessarily being a bad thing.

I think if you look at a lot of pictures of fish in the wild a lot of fish really actually do look fat. It's not a sign of being unhealthy necessarily, unless it's extreme, but I think they use their fat stores to get through slow periods in food availability for whatever reason. It's a safety net that most humans don't have to deal with due to most people, at least those that are reading this forum, being above the poverty line and not really ever having to go to the lengths to have to rely on fat reserves for survival.

So fat really has a completely different meaning to humans and fish, and I'm comfortable not being grouped in with fish in that regard.

 

i have a vortech and everytime it loses power it forgets the night mode time...

 

Night mode goes for 10 hours and starts at the same time each day once you set it. Is that what you really want?