Loaches Online Forum

Hi,

Almost 2 decades ago (I'm getting old ), I bought two large loaches that were over 30cm long from a local pet store. They would only eat live earthworms that I had to buy from a local bait store. Fresh out of college, I couldn't afford this for long and tried giving them various other foods such as frozen/dried shrimp, shrimp pellets, etc. They simply refused to eat them and I had to constantly take the food out for fear they would foul the water. They didn't last long . I have since been quite successful keeping and even breeding cichlids. I still dream of stumbling into some large ones.

So, my question for those of you that have large ones (over 25cm long), what do you feed them?

Thank you very much for your help!

Mine are not that big, but they eat a full range of foods:
Almost Natural Tropical Fish Foods products, which are food grade fish and shellfish with algae and vegetables. The recipes vary for example the shrimp pellets are very high in shrimp. The vegetable/algae wafers are just that: plant based. No fish meals, no grains.
Fresh and lightly cooked foods from the kitchen such as cucumber, zucchini, broccoli stems, yams, squash...
Snails from the garden. (I heard somewhere that the authentic escargots snails got loose in this area MANY years ago- maybe)
Earthworms from the garden.
Frozen foods like bloodworms, mosquito larvae, brine shrimp and a lot more.
Freeze dried foods. Long list.

I cannot say that I have actually seen the Loaches eating every one of these. But no matter what I put in the tank they are right there with the rest of the fish swimming around and grabbing stuff.