Feeding fry ?

[Eugeneg]

I have not had any problems in spawning but it is the feeding of fry and the preperation of a pond for fry that has given me trouble . Help would be appreciated
Regards
Eugene

[ranskye]

add water, fertiliser and sunlight and youll get some live food for them to feed on. then supplement that with some other stuff.

[Eugeneg]

What I am intrested in knowing is whether to use chicken manure or kow manure . The length of time before spawning beds should be prepared .
I was thinking of making a liner pond 20x 40 ft for first try about 4ft deep .
Should I put some clay or sand at the bottom . How much manure would I put down in a pond this size . How much water would I need covering the manure . would it be necessary to cover this pond with netting so that dragonfly do not breed . How much temperature flunctuation will fry tolerate is it necessary to use a cover at night . In a small pond will I need filtration or if I can do a complete water change from my mud pond be sufficient . My female is 27in Sanke but will not be 4 yr at spawning time should I wait another year . What about the hatch should I put it all into the fry pond am I risking overcrowding and starvation . These are but a few questions going through my mind
Regards
Eugene

[dizzyfish]

"In one of your threads way back when there was a description of the process of developing a zooplankton bloom in the pond. You start with a drained pond and add lawn fertilizer and chicken feed (crumbles, not scratch) as it is being filled. Depending on the temperature and local conditions, there will be plenty of little live things for the fry to eat in one to two weeks. In three to four weeks the plankton will not be much good any more and the predators will have moved in so you have to start the process all over. The obvious problem is that you need to be able to predict when the fish will spawn to make this work."

-steve[/quote]

[bekko]

The word "manure" has a somewhat different meaning in agriculture than it does in street usage. Any organic fertilizer is manure whether or not it is composed of animal feces.

Chicken manure is very "hot" in that it contains a lot of nitrogen and reacts quickly. You have to be careful using chicken manure. Cow manure has a somewhat higher carbon:nitrogen ratio.

Personally, I would use a combination of inorganic (chemical) fertilizer and organic fertilizer. This works as well as animal manure without the unpleasantness. Miracle Grow is a convenient, but somewhat expensive, inorganic fertilizer for small ponds because it dissolves instantly. For larger volumes you can use a lawn fertilizer, a combination of prilled urea and superphosphate, or the liquid fertilizer made just for ponds. The inorganic fertilizer is great for promoting development of green water which in turn drives the rest of the food chain. However, green water takes a few weeks to develop so you can-jump start the development of zooplankton by also adding an organic fertilizer. Choose an organic fertilizer which will break down into small particles quickly. Cotton seed meal or alfalfa pellets (rabbit pellets) work well. You can also use fish food.

Ideally you will give the pond plankton 10 to 20 days to mature before the fish are ready to feed. The optimum time depends on local conditions and how fast things like dragon flys move in. In an ideal situation, there would only be about 10 fry per square foot (100/sq.meter). At this density, there is plenty to eat and water quality does not deteriorate. However, very few people have the will power to use that low density when pond space is limited. When conditions are more crowded, supplemental feeding with prepared formulations and water exchange or bio-filtration are needed and the growth rate is never as good.

-ste veh