Can a salt water fish do ok with a week of no food?

[Whiskey]

Ok stupid question I need to go out of town for a week and the only person I can have look after my tanks killed all his fish. I now own his 30G tall tank and he sold all but a 40G to other people. I got my Oscars from him and my tang and others because they were laying on the bottom of the tank and not moving. After much work they are ok and living happily in my tanks. Last time I had him care for them I came home after a week and my nitrate in all tanks went from 5 ppm or less to over 135 ppm (even the Oscar tank never gets above 10 ppm) and my food was almost gone for every tank. Now my salt has coral in it and I don't think it could take this anymore. So if I could cut the timer for the lights back to a couple of hours per day, and be sure the fish would live I think I would feel better than leaving them in his care. I know the F/W fish will be ok but I am worried about the salt tank.

Fish are 1 yellow tail damsel 1 yellow tang 2 clowns and 5 turbo snails 3 burrowing snails 1 coral banded shrimp and 5 hermit crabs.

What do you think?????

Thanks,
Whiskey

[miztahphong2]

no they wont be okay. they might die, get very sick, or turn very aggressive. theres also a lot of other reasons why not feeding them for a week is a bad idea.

[Blitzkrieg]

:hmm2: Your what they call skrewed. I seriously doubt anything will die, atleast not for starvation :badgrin: . Yellow tang would be my most worry.
These are all small at the moment right? Thats why a YT is in 30g(or do you mean 50) and not a 75. The Tang police have arrived :?


Just ask this "friend" to ONLY feed a pinch of food a couple of times a day and show him what a pinch is and where the flakes are kept. Less is better than none.

[Whiskey]

You don't understand this friend. He thinks he knows best and will feed what he wants when he wants. He will tell me that my fish were starving with a pinch of food so he gave them a cup.

The tang is in a 50 G tank and was given to me from this friend bairly alive and went into a Q tank for 2 weeks before I could even get him to swim!!! I have other friends that would do EXACTALLY as I say but none of them would want to take the responcability.... No matter how much I say don't worry about ferts and power outages just feed them, the responce would be "but what if something goes wrong?"

Maybe I should work on that angle more.

The tang police can KMA!! better in a small tank than dead! I don't have A/C in my car and I do plan to take him to a LFS when the temps get below 110 deg F (I live in Phoenix) I don't have the cash for a 75G tank and equiptment required I never ment to have a fish like this cramped in my small tank. The rest of the fish are ok in a 20G tank so the 50 G should be great. This is how I usually set up my tanks with double the size people say they require. I am sorry I felt I had no choice any LFS would have let him die in the condition he was in. At the moment he is 2 3/4 inches long.

Thanks,
Whiskey

[gman0526]

Here's an idea, how about freezing your food in ice cube buckets with salwater. That would give you the opportunity to prepare the food to your liking and all whoever feeds them has to do is go to the fridge get x amount of food ("ice cubes") for each tank and be on their way.

[SaltyDawg]

First off this is a peaceable forum and we don't need folks getting testy with one another. So please be polite with each other or don't bother to post. There are better ways to get you point across without calling someone names. If it keeps up this post will be locked.

With that said I like Gman0526, 's suggestion, that way you know what they get.

As for fish living for a week without food that should be no problem at all. If you are really worried buy yourself one of those automatic fish food dispensers just for that time period.

If you do plan on leaving the fish I would suggest that you go to the LFS and buy a battery powered air pump just in your power goes off. I have one that plugs into the wall and only comes on when the power goes off. It cost me about $12.00. Living in Hurricane alley has taught me that this is a must.

Wayne

[cich1]

i agree with the auto feeder i've seen them at walmart for $10-15 i think, i could go a week without eating but i sure wouldn't enjoy it :wink:

[Aquaman]

I just went to Hawaii for a week and I left my fish alone without feeding and they did fine. I was more worried that my cat might decide to go for a swim in the tank but all was well when I got back. You should haven't much of a problem. I fed my fish the night before I left and then again early in the morning.

[Whiskey]

I am sorry for the comment, I was drinking :chuggin: and had just got ROYALLY REAMED by a LFS for having this fish. The guy at the store really made me feel stupid and he recommended trading him in for a Trigger if I want a big fish because they don't need much room.

Groan, I seem to attract people like this. It seems a trigger needs an even bigger tank than a yellow tang (which made me feel even stupider for not knowing this right off) and there is some question as too how reef safe they are. I really need to stop going there, this is the same place that said that snails and such don't need acclimation.

I did not get the trigger by the way. I felt I needed more than one persons word, good thing.

Anyway this is not an excuse just, Sorry :( .

Whiskey

[sweetmisery]

Fed your fishes a cup? LOL! C'mon, for sure you can instruct him or someone else the proper way to feed...

Anyways, I hope you can resolve that dilemma of yours... Good luck!

[cich1]

when i leave for a couple of days i put food in those little plastic medicine cups for each day and mark which cup is for which tank then my 8 year old just adds the food to each tank everyday, maybe you could premeasure your food like that and have a friend feed just what you measure out

[Puffy]

surely if an 8 year old can follow that then a grown man can, if not hes a poor excuse of a man. Anyways whenever i go along ways away i do what cich1 does

[cich1]

i think my 8 year old is the only one in my family that will help :roll:

[tepelus]

my husband knows a guy that only feeds his fw fish only once every two or three weeks, and when we asked him to come feed our sw fish when we went away for four days(cause he lives nearby us), he was like, well, mine only get fed every two weeks, and they are alive, why can't your fish go without eating for four days? I thought to myself, I don't know how your fish survive, but would you like it if you only got fed once every two weeks? Eeesh! You should try the automatic feeder if you don't have anyone to feed them, at least they be fed and fed a reasonable amount, verses a cup a day or no food at all.

[LenandTracy]

If I thought I were close enough I would come by and feed them for you, but I have no idea where you are. I am in Southern CA.

By the way, you have it kinda easy. When I take the family on vacation I have to find someone to not only take care of the fish, but also the two dogs, the two cats and the 3 rats. The rats seem to be the problem.....

Good Luck

Len

[coral_diver]

I love rats smart animals but sorry LenandTracy my father in in central CA so I couldnt watch them even if I was in CA. :lol:

I would go with the auto feeder I was thinking about this myself for when I go camping some this summer. I surely do not trust my mother or stepfather to feed the tank! She cant manage her 15H she is a "cup" feeder too "they are hungry just look at them" and the stepfather well lets just say he takes the gutters off the house pulling his expensive boat around the driveway and even hit my car once so to trust him with somthing of this magnitude.....I can totally relate to the incompitent friend/family.