Oscars and Endlers Tankmates

I have many aquariums in my fishroom. Two of them house lovely adult oscars. They were given to me a year ago by someone who no longer wanted them. The only thing they eat is Cichlid Gold pellets and that really bothers me. I’m the kind of fish keeper who offers a wide variety of food to my fish - I keep various types on hand - live, frozen, freeze dried, flakes, gel, wafers, various pellets, and I even make my own beefheart food for my discus. I’ve tried to expand the Oscars’ their diet by offering fresh or frozen shrimp, freeze dried tubifex cubes, and other bite sized offerings similar to the cichlid gold. No takers. It just rots until I pull it back out. I had an overpopulation of endlers during covid since I cannot take them to my fish club so I dropped a couple In each oscar tank. (I don’t use store bought feeder fish). To my surprise.. the oscars won’t touch them! Now, a month later, I have two more huge communities of endlers happily co-existing with the oscars and I have to feed those tanks two different kinds of food daily to accommodate both inhabitants. Are the endlers just too small for them to bother chasing? Some of the females are pretty big - about the size of a mature tetra and they certainly aren’t faster than the oscars. Why won’t they eat them (or anything else for that matter)?

 

Great looking Oscar! But I don’t see any endlers . No idea why they don’t eat the endlers. Kind of funny. That picture might win the photo contest!! So waiting .

 

To address the not eating I have something the KG tropicals said they used to solve the same problem. I think what they did was feed the fish a different type of food and not the one that they would only eat. Eventually they said the fish will realize that is the only food they were getting and eventually they would eat it if they get hungry enough. Hopefully this works for you!

 

I have many aquariums in my fishroom. Two of them house lovely adult oscars. They were given to me a year ago by someone who no longer wanted them. The only thing they eat is Cichlid Gold pellets and that really bothers me. I’m the kind of fish keeper who offers a wide variety of food to my fish - I keep various types on hand - live, frozen, freeze dried, flakes, gel, wafers, various pellets, and I even make my own beefheart food for my discus. I’ve tried to expand the Oscars’ their diet by offering fresh or frozen shrimp, freeze dried tubifex cubes, and other bite sized offerings similar to the cichlid gold. No takers. It just rots until I pull it back out. I had an overpopulation of endlers during covid since I cannot take them to my fish club so I dropped a couple In each oscar tank. (I don’t use store bought feeder fish). To my surprise.. the oscars won’t touch them! Now, a month later, I have two more huge communities of endlers happily co-existing with the oscars and I have to feed those tanks two different kinds of food daily to accommodate both inhabitants. Are the endlers just too small for them to bother chasing? Some of the females are pretty big - about the size of a mature tetra and they certainly aren’t faster than the oscars. Why won’t they eat them (or anything else for that matter)?

Some oscars are just picky. I think the male endlers are too small for them to care, but the females would be chased and eaten by most oscars, so I’m not sure about that. They won’t even eat frozen bloodworms? If not, that’s crazy. I’ve never had a fish that didn’t like bloodworms. Try a few crickets from a pet store. Those should be irresistible to the oscars. And I agree, that’s a pretty fish.

 

Man, I'm in the opposite, I havent found anything mine wont eat... lol. I agree with TheFISH12 on what they heard from KG Tropicals (I think also heard similar from Prime Time Aquatics), they will eventually figure it out (**NOTE: For Oscars and probably most Cichlids, this is probably not true of all fish - I'm pretty sure Pea Puffers will starve themselves)

 

I have many aquariums in my fishroom. Two of them house lovely adult oscars. They were given to me a year ago by someone who no longer wanted them. The only thing they eat is Cichlid Gold pellets and that really bothers me. I’m the kind of fish keeper who offers a wide variety of food to my fish - I keep various types on hand - live, frozen, freeze dried, flakes, gel, wafers, various pellets, and I even make my own beefheart food for my discus. I’ve tried to expand the Oscars’ their diet by offering fresh or frozen shrimp, freeze dried tubifex cubes, and other bite sized offerings similar to the cichlid gold. No takers. It just rots until I pull it back out. I had an overpopulation of endlers during covid since I cannot take them to my fish club so I dropped a couple In each oscar tank. (I don’t use store bought feeder fish). To my surprise.. the oscars won’t touch them! Now, a month later, I have two more huge communities of endlers happily co-existing with the oscars and I have to feed those tanks two different kinds of food daily to accommodate both inhabitants. Are the endlers just too small for them to bother chasing? Some of the females are pretty big - about the size of a mature tetra and they certainly aren’t faster than the oscars. Why won’t they eat them (or anything else for that matter)?

Great looking Oscar! But I don’t see any endlers . No idea why they don’t eat the endlers. Kind of funny. That picture might win the photo contest!! So waiting .

Oops! Let’s try this pic... upper right corner

 

I keep few Oscars. I got oscars because I wanted something that was going to last a long time in the tank and be more of a fish/pet, than just fish is a tank. Like anyone else I did the homework, and almost didn't get them because of what I read. True to form like any other fish I have kept, I have broken rules on tank makes to keep with them and environment, because what happens in my tank may not happen in your tank, and what happens in your tank may not happen in mine. My Oscars don't eat plants. They don't dig plants up or destroy them. They are very peaceful and don't fight each other and are very tolerable of tank mates. In the department of eating other fish, they think adult guppies and neons are delicious. They leave the 7 or 8 BN plecos alone. They don't give the 6 cory cats any attention. They are not interested in the 6 or so Kribensis in the tank either. For the longest time I had two adult angelfish in there, until I was able to move some of my fry onto a store. The angels were more **** off about the Oscars, the oscars really didn't give a hoot about the angels. The angels were a breeding pair and they even spawned in the tank with the Oscars. The Angels are now in a 50 gallon tank on their own making all sorts of babies.

I had the same issue as you. I was overrun by Krib fry that were about an inch long and all my LFS couldn't take anymore. So I thought I would feed them to my Oscars and my Firemouths. I put 6 in each tank. No dice. They are now tankmates. I thought on sure size alone those Kribensis would have been ended. Not the case.

I find my oscars like bigger morsels of food. Watching and oscar eat brine shrimp or bloodworms looks like hard work. They eat some of it, but it's really for the other fish in the tank. I find frozen krill, frozen jumbo mysis shrimp, and cubes of freeze dried tubiflex worms are a success, along with the same pellets you feed yours. I only feed one type of food per day, once a day.

Have you tried not feeding them for 3 to 5 days and seeing what their attitude is towards food after? There was a study done on wild fish where it was determined larger fish will not expel energy to hunt prey, if the energy the consumed prey provides is less than would be expelled in the hunt. This may explain why your little endlers are alive for now, especially if your oscars are well fed on pellet food. Bigger fish like to eat bigger things, I didn't come up with that, read a paper on it. Not sure what your temp is sitting at, warmer temps will drive up metabolism.

Back to my original point about oscars....what each individual does or likes to do in everyone tank is different for each one. Sorry if I talk to much...love my oscars. I have some that will let you touch them on tank cleaning day, others that lay on the bottom submissive, and ones that if you put your fingers near their mouth your hand is coming out with an oscar on the end of it.