Help With BN Pleco diet issues

So I have an 8 cm bn pleco. It's in 20 gal community tank, Platys, neons, rummy, Congo Tetra ...

I'm try to give it a good diet, I have a bit of algae in the tank, I have a 1 month old driftwood, left over food from other fish.

When I feed him, I give in algae wafers, I tried cucumber, zucchini and lettuce he won't touch it. I've tried putting a part of a wafer on top of zucchini but he grabs it and swims under to rock work. How do I get him to eat his veg? Btw the veg are held down with a tooth pick and a large pebble/stone.

All help is appreciated in advance

 

Hi PeterFishKeepin
I would continue adding a chunk of zucchini around 2 cm from a small zucchini that has no seeds. The small 13 cm zucchini have no seeds. Once a zucchini gets to about 20cm you can scrape seeds out with a teaspoon if you cut the zucchini down the middle. The issue with seed is the float off and make a mess. You can leave zucchini in a tank for a maximum of 24 hours before it begins to fall apart.

It’s not unusual for a shop brought BN to not recognise vegetables as food at first. Keep trying and he / she will stumble on to it at some time.

 

Are you blanching the vegetables and then allowing them to cool before feeding them? Blanching makes veggies much more palatable and easy to digest for fish.

I've also found with Bristlenoses that they often eat better at night, since they're nocturnal. If I'm going to offer them a new vegetable type I usually do it just after lights out, and I leave the veggie near the Bristlenose's favorite cave. It often takes a few hours after the veggie has been left in for the animals to taste it at first, too.

 

Hi all, i put a piece of zucchini into the tank about 30 mins ago, I just saw him sitting on it but only for a couple seconds, I've tried boiled/blanching it and he did the same thing, only touch for a couple seconds then leaves it. I'm going to leave it over night and see if that makes a difference, I haven't feed him 3 days before giving him the zuchinni, the small piece of algae after I put ontop to attract him was gone in a couple seconds so I know he was hungry.
It is near his cave and there is some seeds in the middle I will remove them next time I try this.

 

So I have an 8 cm bn pleco. It's in 20 gal community tank, Platys, neons, rummy, Congo Tetra ...

I'm try to give it a good diet, I have a bit of algae in the tank, I have a 1 month old driftwood, left over food from other fish.

When I feed him, I give in algae wafers, I tried cucumber, zucchini and lettuce he won't touch it. I've tried putting a part of a wafer on top of zucchini but he grabs it and swims under to rock work. How do I get him to eat his veg? Btw the veg are held down with a tooth pick and a large pebble/stone.

All help is appreciated in advance

In all my years I've never fed my bn pleco, I think yours will be fine as long as you are feeding the other inhabitants in the tank

 

so guys its been a couple of hours and I've been seeing him sitting more and more ontop of the zucchini, I think it needed time to soft as it wasn't boiled, I'm not sure why previous times he would eat it but now he has, there are two small missing chunks in the middle of the ring.

I have heard it's good to peel some of the skin off do you do that?
is it better to boil it or just cut and rise?

My first bn pleco (over a year ago) I feed it a ring of cucumber it sat on it for a very short period of time then died later that day, I have been reluctant to feed it to my current bn pleco but it seems he likes it now. have you ever lost a pleco because you feed it vegetables? does veg kill pleco? I'm going to be very upset if I lose this bn to a ring of zucchini I'm my area 1 juvenile common bn pleco costs over $22 Australian dollars.....

 

so guys its been a couple of hours and I've been seeing him sitting more and more ontop of the zucchini, I think it needed time to soft as it wasn't boiled, I'm not sure why previous times he would eat it but now he has, there are two small missing chunks in the middle of the ring.

I have heard it's good to peel some of the skin off do you do that?
is it better to boil it or just cut and rise?

My first bn pleco (over a year ago) I feed it a ring of cucumber it sat on it for a very short period of time then died later that day, I have been reluctant to feed it to my current bn pleco but it seems he likes it now. have you ever lost a pleco because you feed it vegetables? does veg kill pleco? I'm going to be very upset if I lose this bn to a ring of zucchini I'm my area 1 juvenile common bn pleco costs over $22 Australian dollars.....

I dont think cucumber will harm the pleco. They'll eat it if they feel like it. Theyre skittish too, so they may not eat if you are in the room. Just a planted tank with lots of mulm is fine for them.

 

In all my years I've never fed my bn pleco, I think yours will be fine as long as you are feeding the other inhabitants in the tank

I tried feeding mine too, but they also would not eat. They lived for 9 years. Once they matured they stopped eating veggies, and they never ate the sinking pleco food. I tried several brands. Someone in the tank did eradicated the pond snails, but I don't know if it was them or the Rainbow cichlids they lived with. After the snails were gone the HOB filter remained stuffed with snails for years, but never in the tank again.

 

I've had several bn plecos before, and each time when I brought them home from the store, they refused to eat veggies or fish foods. I think a lot of the time they are bred and raised on algae, and so they need to adjust to eating pellets/wafers/veggies. Give it time, make sure it's somewhere they can easily access it, and just keep trying. Eventually they'll figure it out. It usually took me 1-2 weeks of trying before they finally clued in that it was food.