jack11

Can you feed gbrs normal tropical fish food or should i get some cichlid flakes/pellets or is there something else that is good as the main staple of their diet?

Jack

Chief_waterchanger

The flake is fine, as are small pellets.

In the wild they eat a lot of small insects and inverts.

Butterfly

They love Blood worms also
Carol

Tom

I started mine off with frozen bloodworms and now they eat just about anything I put in the tank.
Tom

Jacko

It depends, wild GBR's need to be acclimated more so start them out on bloodworms, then go from BW to BW+flake, and after you notice they eat the flakes you should be able to cut them to flakes only, though they always benifit from frozen bloodworms.

Farm and tank raised GBR's should readily accept flake or pellets, but also enjoy the snack of Frozen BW from time to time (say, once a week)

jack11

Ok thanks evreryone, i'm defiantly going to have to get some sinking food because my dwarf gourami snap up everything before it can sink to the bottom

Jack

neverendingninja

I never found my blue rams to like eating from the surface much, and even now, my keyholes and bolivians don't enjoy it much either. I usually soak the hikari pellets in tank water for about an hour or so to water log them, then they readily sink to the bottom for everyone to enjoy.

Jacko

Try shrimp pellets, the type you give cories. My GBR pair would gaurd these little pellets like it is the biggest treasure in the world. Pileing them together and keeping all but the cories away, it was like a secret agreement.

Enjoy!

cuteusagi

I've had quite an ordeal with my Bolivian Ram's eating habits. While it's not a GBR, I would imagine the eating habits would be similar. Mine is particularly picky, I guess, and on a daily basis eats frozen brine shrimp and for treats a few times a week gets some frozen bloodworms (and loves them!). He consistently spits out flakes as well as soaked hikari cichlid pellets. Our new African Butterfly eats freeze dried plankton on a daily basis, so I'll have to see if our little ram is brave enough to get near the butterfly and try some freeze dried plankton. Our angel was not successful in getting any today....maybe tomorrow!!!

Tom

Some fish, like discus, get used to certain food and won't accept any other food. I think that that has happened with your rams. Could I see a pic of the African Butterfly?
Tom

Tom

Never mind, I read another post and know what you mean now. It is the African Butterfly fish.
Tom