The
PAROSPHROMENUS PROJECT

The
PAROSPHROMENUS
PROJECT

P. nagyi diary of M.Kotzulla, Leipzig, Germany

#6173
Michael Kotzulla
Participant

FEEDING…

After only a few days, I was sure that at six P. nagyi were less challenging than expected at least regarding feeding (and that my water conditions seem to fit).

In my opinion, the right food is one of the main issues to keep our fish healthy over a long time and hopefully make them spawn. So where other fish do not necessarily need it, for my Bettas and Paros I entirely rely on living food.

Having a garden, a balcony, and a cellar and with some fishless ponds nearby, this doesn’t mean a real effort. It’s more like doing a small harvest every now and then. 🙂

    At the moment I maintaine cultures of

  • Enchytraeus
  • – which are great as a ‘power-food’ during winter times and before spawning; In my cultures, this species often goes alogn with what I think is

  • Panagrellus
  • – or micro-worms: some sort of ‘spaghetti’ for fish babies, and

  • springtails
  • – which my Betta like to pick from the water surface.

    In ponds in our local botanical garden I discoverd rich ‘hunting grounds’ of the following ‘specialties’, that are able endure in coldest water or even under an ice layer:

  • Asellus aquaticus
  • – with a size between 3 and 10mm you have to sort out a little bit. But they wont hunt after fry anyway, feeding from decaying foliage etc.

  • larvae of day flies
  • – no idea which species, but a rather small one

  • white mosquito larvae
  • In addition, in the summertime, my son and I make it an adventure to go through the rain barrells of our garden colony to catch

  • black mosquito larvae
  • and collecting their raft-like clutches, which then release smallest (2mm long?) larvae to my tanks, plus some

  • Cyclops
  • and

  • small Daphnia

// to be continued! //