In goldfish breeding, one of the most frequent causes of premature death among goldfish is incorrect feeding. Goldfish eggs and goldfish sexing are other important issues to understand and master if you are interested in goldfish breeding. And offering goldfish for sale can be a lucrative side-line or even a full-fledged business if you want to pursue that path.
Goldfish Breeding – What Do They Eat?
Overfeeding is one of the beginner’s worst mistakes in goldfish care. It is something the uninformed can’t seem to resist. And with so many different goldfish types, each with unique needs, you can easily get confused and overwhelmed.
Goldfish eat less than one expects. If given more than the goldfish can immediately eat, the food will sink to the bottom of the goldfish aquarium and pollute the water. So take care not to overload your tank with food.
Floating feeding rings are available that retain floating food in a restricted area so that uneaten goldfish food will fall within a small area and can be cleaned easily.
As a general rule, avoid giving goldfish more than they can consume in 10 minutes. Also, give them pieces of food that they can easily find and comfortably swallow, avoiding too big and too small particles.
Goldfish Care – What Food Is Best?
Many excellent brands of dried goldfish food containing a completely balanced diet for goldfish are available on the market. They are sold in various forms, such as flakes, compressed tablets, and powders. All are designed for various types of fish, including goldfish food.
These goldfish food brands contain the correct proportion of carbohydrates, proteins, fats, vitamins, and minerals. All these are required to keep the goldfish in prime condition. Goldfish breeding is easier with these solutions.
It is well to vary goldfish food by as much as possible so that your goldfish get an assortment. ‘All purpose’ fish food may be supplemented with animal matter such as tubifex worms, shrimps, and ants’ eggs.
Goldfish have been known to live for years on a diet of dried food. But they cannot grow, or have as bright colorful fins, as other goldfish whose diet has been supplemented with live food.
Goldfish Love ‘live’ Food
Unlike koi breeding or guppy breeding, the value of live food for goldfish should not be underestimated. It is worth the extra trouble of procuring various suitable invertebrate live goldfish food for this purpose. Feeder fish breeding is an industry in itself.
Some live foods like tubifex, daphnia, and brine shrimp are usually available in pet shops and the small quantities your goldfish will consume won’t cost much. Earthworms are one of the most valuable live foods, especially during goldfish breeding season. They are almost always available. While earthworms are usually too big for all but the large pond goldfish to consume. They must be chopped into smaller pieces.
Microworms or ‘white worms’ are another valuable goldfish food, especially for the smaller goldfish. Cultures of these can be purchased.
Breeding Goldfish – What About Cold Temperature?
As goldfish are cold-blooded creatures, their rate of metabolism decreases at low temperatures and they require little food. In fact, if the temperature is below 10 C, they will not feed at all. Smaller quantities of food should be given during the cold spells and in the outdoor goldfish pond, they need not be fed at all in the winter.
Foods containing a high percentage of fats should not be fed to goldfish in cold weather because they require considerable digestion and the metabolism of the goldfish will not be able to cope with them.
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