One of the common household foods you can feed to your pet fish, shrimps and snails is the carrot.
You can check out this guide at Aquarium Blueprints to see how you can prepare this vegetable for your aquatic pets.
What carrots can you use to feed fish, shrimps and snails?
You can use any organic carrots to feed your fish or shrimps.
If you want to do less work when it comes to food preparations then we recommend getting baby carrots that have already been peeled or sliced.
How much carrots should you feed your pet fish, shrimps and snails?
If you are feeding carrots for the first time, then we recommend trying a small portion to see if they are interested.
Otherwise, you can try feeding carrots as much as your fish, shrimps and/or snails are willing to eat for several minutes.
How often should you feed carrots to your aquatic pets?
We recommend using carrots as snacks that you should feed to your pet fish, shrimps and snails once in a while.
The primary meal for your aquatic pets should be specialized flakes, pellets and other products that are designed to deliver proper nutrition.
How to prepare carrots to feed your fish, shrimps and snails
In order to prepare carrots for your fish and shrimps, we recommend taking the following steps:
1. If the carrot hasn’t been peeled yet, then may sure you peel off the outer skin.
2. Next, you will need to boil the carrot.
You can either boil it the traditional way over a stove or use a microwave by adding the carrot to a bowl with water and then covering the bowl with a plastic wrap (make sure you leave a small opening).
If you are using tap water to boil, then we recommend adding a drop of water dechlorinator, such as Seachem Prime, to remove chlorine and chloramine so that these chemical compounds won’t get into your tank water.
3. Boil the carrot until it softens up. You can use a fork to test if the carrot can be penetrated without using much force.
If the carrot is still tough, then you need to boil it some more until it eventually softens. Otherwise, your pet fish, shrimp and snail may have a hard time trying to pick off the carrot piece.
4. Once the carrot has soften, you can stop boiling it.
5. Next, you can remove the carrot from the water.
6. We then recommend waiting for the carrot to cool down for a few minutes.
7. After waiting for the carrot to cool down, you should be safely able to drop it into the tank for your pet fish, shrimps and snails to consume.
8. After dropping the carrot, observe to see if your aquatic pets are interested in the vegetable. If they are eating it up quickly, then you can add more the next time you feed.
If they aren’t too interested, then you can add less carrots during the next feeding time.
9. If you see come carrot pieces are aren’t being eaten after around 10 minutes, then we recommend removing the food from your fish tank.
Otherwise, the uneaten pieces will end up decomposing, which will cause water quality issue in your aquarium.
How to get your fish, shrimps and snails interested in eating carrots
If you pet fish, shrimps and snails aren’t showing any interests in eating carrots, then you can try to make sure that the carrot has been peeled, softened and cooled properly before you drop the vegetable in the tank.
You should also try fasting your aquatic pets for at least 24 hours before feeding the carrots. With an empty stomach, they should be more willing to eat carrots.
Recap
You should be able to feed carrots as a snack for your pet fish, shrimps and snails once in a while. You should feed specialized flakes or pellets catered to your aquatic pets as their main meals.
Before feeding a carrot piece, make sure you peel the outer skin, boil it until the texture softens and then cool it down before dropping the vegetable into your fish tank. Remove any uneaten pieces after around 10 minutes.
If your pets aren’t showing any interested in eating carrots, you can try fasting them for at least 24 hours beforehand.