Need advice on feeding fish while vacation

[arivas_f1]

Hi, I am going on a week vacation soon and I was wondering what other members do when they have to be away from home. In the past I have used aquachef to feed dry food but last time didn't gave me good results because when I returned the fish were very stressed. I would prefer to continue feeding them cyclopeze & frozen foods, I am not sure if somebody has had good results feeding this type of food automatically.

 

Any advice/insight will be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Adan

[Chad]

I have a regular dog walking service... over the course of the guy walking my dogs I have gotten him aquainted with my setup, what to look at daily and how to feed.

 

I have the dog walking service do a pet sit every day or every other day when I am gone. It has worked well for me although I am really specific in my instructions and premeasuring of food in labeled plastic cups.

 

Fur get me not does my dog walking if that helps at all.

[Jon Lazar]

I modified an Eheim feeder to respond to my Aquacontroller. The AQ turns off the return pump, waits a few minutes, then dispenses flake and pellet food. The AQ waits 15 minutes for the fish to eat, then turns the return pump back on. I do this twice a day in addition to feeding frozen foods.

 

The Eheim mod was pretty easy. The feeder is programmable, but also has a button you can press to manually dispense food. I drilled two small holes on the circuit board; one on either side of the switch and through the conductive material on the circuit board. I soldered a wire in each hole and ran the wires back to an X10 relay. When the AQ sends the right code the relay closes momentarily, and the feeder thinks someone pressed the manual feed button. I've been using this system for about 5 years now, and couldn't be happier.

[Coral Hind]

^ That's a pretty smart DIY.

 

 

If I was to leave for that long I would want someone to stop by at least every other day. Not just to feed the fish but to make sure everything was running correctly. Are there any local reefers or a friend that can stop in while you are out?

 

PSA on the aquachef: The stock batteries that come with the units are cheap and can fail pushing the carbon rod inside out of the end of the battery. This pops the battery cover off and the battery ends up in the tank. It happened to me and DerABT. I would replace the batteries with a brand name you trust.

[ErikS]

^ That's a pretty smart DIY.

Absolutely - darn clever!

 

Generally I do a complete maintenance of all equipment.........about 1 month before vacation. This lets you see if anything is going to fail due to cleaning. Just let the computer run things from there.

 

I've had one vacation related failure (JBJ ATO).........and that was because I did maintenance just prior to leaving.

[Origami]

Wow, Jon. Pretty neat mod.

 

Arivas, I'm not sure that I've ever heard of a way or seen a commercial product that allowed you to automatically dispense frozen food while on vacation.

 

If I'm gone for a few days, I normally will just feed the big tank well in the days running up to the break, and leave the fish to fend for themselves while I'm gone. If it's more than just a few days, I'll set up my Eheim feeder which dispenses dry (flake and pellet) food. I have the dry food drop into a feeding ring, allowing it to wet and sink so that most of it goes into the tank and not into the overflow. For my wife's smaller tank, I pre-measure food into little disposable cups, labeling each with the day of the week and set them out for my young daughter to feed. If we're all gone, I can normally get a neighbor to do it.

 

If you must feed frozen while you're gone, the best option you have may be to enlist the help of a neighbor or a fellow reefer. It's nice to have a second set of eyes that can look over your system and make sure it's running smoothly anyway.

[Brian Ward]

I generally have a neighbor feed the tank with a fellow reefer on standby in case of a problem. I also have 2 reefers not far from my house that I have had do the feeding in the past.

[John]

+1 for Eheim Feeder, but I like what Origami said about using the feeding ring to let the food disolve and sink...I did not use such a ring and came home to my goby on the floor...kind of ruined the vacation in a way.

[paul b]

I use an automatic feeder but I only put some flakes and fish oil soaked pellets in there. Most of my fish won't eat that anyway so I have to get a neighbor to come in every other day. I have pre measured film containers of frozen food in the freezer. In the tank I set up a small powerhead on the front glass facing the tank.

On the outflow tube of the powerhead is a small empty container with 1/4" holes in it. The neighbor just has to dump a film container of frozen food into the container attached to the powerhead and it melts in there and gets dispersed all through the tank.

[Coral Hind]

+1 for Eheim Feeder, but I like what Origami said about using the feeding ring to let the food disolve and sink...I did not use such a ring and came home to my goby on the floor...kind of ruined the vacation in a way.

 

How would a feeding ring keep your goby from jumping?

[arivas_f1]

Thanks everyone for your thoughtful advice. Jon that is a smart modification of the Eheim.

 

Luckily I was able to get a neighbor to feed the fish, I will follow the advice to have the food already mixed in film containers and labeled inside the fridge.

 

In the future I will look into the Eheim modification; it would be nice if we can install a web cam and a feeder interface to an iPhone/smartphone application.

 

Thanks,

 

Adan

[Der ABT]

I really like the ehiem mod, especially if you could power it with something besides a battery.

As CoralHind said i lost approx 80% of my sps due to that stupid freaking battery. Ive now used the metal tape and 2 other types of tape to ensure the back battery plate cannot come off. I still have the orig batter (Desay) as a reminder haha i see it all the time and grit my teeth, i was close to getting out of the hobby because of it.

 

But there has to be a few out there in ashburn/friend or neighbor...Very good idea having them come over once or twice (buy them food/drinks) so they can be familier with your routine and what things should look and sound like,

Think about emergencies and what they would have to do, aka what to unplug, how to fix a return/powerhead, what to do if the water leve is low and either write up something with pics in an email or just walk em thru it. a week isnt that bad but things always seem to go wrong for me when im gone for more then 3 or 4 days

[Origami]

Arivas, it appears that I'm not all that far from you (a few miles). Feel free to call on me if I can help.

[Jon Lazar]

I really like the ehiem mod, especially if you could power it with something besides a battery.

 

That's a great idea. It shouldn't be hard to rewire it with an old DC power supply wart and take the batteries out completely.

 

I agree that having someone come look at the tank provides additional safety in case something goes wrong. I always recommend folks get one of those label makers and go nuts labeling everying...outlets, plugs, pipes, ball valves, equipment, sump water level, etc. It's much easier to work with someone over the phone, even an experienced reefer, when they can tell the "DT feed pump shutoff valve" from the "Refugium feed pump shutoff valve".

Edited December 13, 2010 by Jon Lazar