# Vieja maculicauda diet



## Similis (Feb 14, 2007)

I bought a 16" Black belt Cichlid on Thursday and he is a bit of a finicky eater. I know adult fish don`t travel well and can tank time to settle in to a new tank but I am looking for suggestions for
a good quality dried food. He is picking at New life spectrum and Krill but I want him on a more meatier diet. I ran out of Prawns so have not tried them yet.
I might try some Earth worms but I would rather dig them. A friend of mine lost some cracking Pikes last week after feeding Earthworms bought from a fishing tackle shop.
I heard now that these worms are sprayed or fed chemicals to make them harder so they stay on the hook longer.
Has anyone else heard this..

He has also shown very little interest in Discus pellets too.


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## sergey6116 (Aug 2, 2011)

Meatier diet? What the **** are you talkin about. Black Belt cichlids are herbivore fishes, they should be fed mostly herbivorous foods. Take a look here 
http://www.cichlidsworld.net/show/Vieja+Maculicauda+-+Black+Belt+Cichlid.

He *should *be fed live foods but rarely. It is bad for their health to eat much meat.


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## Similis (Feb 14, 2007)

No need to be so f******g rude. I have always respected members of this forum when
I replied to their posts. I expect the same level of respect when I request some information
myself.

Back to my post..
I always believed these fish to be omnivours. Even the profiles on this forum state they are
Omnivorous. The link you gave says they are Herbivores but need live food at least twice a week.
Not really much of a Herbivore then is it. In the wild most Carnivorous/ Piscavorous fish would be lucky to eat fish / flesh twice a week.


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## bernie comeau (Feb 19, 2007)

Similis said:


> He is picking at New life spectrum and Krill but I want him on a more meatier diet.


I would think that NLS would be a fairly 'meaty' diet. If you beleive their literature, they use less grains as binders, so proportionately it should have a higher meat content then most other pellets. Krill and Herring meal are the first two ingredients. Bear in mind that protein levels are always listed as a minimum (not a maximum)......a fish food that is marketed towards rift lake cichlid keepers is likely to show a lower percentage then another brand would.

My black belts will eat pretty much any kind of pellet. I often buy a different brand every time. But they definately prefer NLS and ocean nutrition....they go 'nuts' over it. IME, young growing blackbelts will eat smaller fish, but large adults are not at all inclined to do so. My large female, no longer will eat any frozen foods, even after a week or more with out pellets. She will resort to eating some black brush algae instead. Growing up, all my black belts readily ate frozen fish, frozen shrimp, and frozen krill enthusiastically, but once older and at a larger size, they definately much prefer pellets. But I have yet to have a fish that didn't like earth worms..... so dig them up and give it a try.


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## Similis (Feb 14, 2007)

Thanks for the reply Bernie. This is exactly the reply I was looking for, someone speaking from
experience.
He is now eating Nori from a clip on the glass. Looks great seeing him graze.
I`ll try the Earthworms tomorrow. Hard to dig when you have three bulging discs in your back LOL.

He is in the tank with 3 small Pike cichlids, 2x 4-6 inch Green Terrors, 1x 6inch Veja Argentea,
3x horabagrus brachysoma, 2x Bristle nose and 2x Synos.
I know its not a great mix of fish but I have been keeping fish ( biotopes ) for a long time and I 
just want this tank to chill out and look at while eat meals.
I still have a four foot Mbuna tank.
Should I add another blackbelt or would I be asking for trouble. I kept Centrals at different times
over the years and have found that once you have a pair you are looking for trouble.


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## bernie comeau (Feb 19, 2007)

Similis said:


> Should I add another blackbelt or would I be asking for trouble.


Certainly a pair could get quite aggresive in a community tank. Bred them 3 times, each time in the community tank, though it never proved to be much of a problem. But IME, conspecific aggression is really high with this species. They spend a good amount of time chasing and/or threatening with one another. My large female got her tail split very deep by being bitten by the male when she was younger.....suprisingly after about 2 years of being split, it actually repaired! Currently she bullies the smaller male(her son and grandson!) i house her with....he's actually smaller then he should be for his age, because he is kept down by her. Though IME, fish generally end up growing to a normal size for the species, regardless of how small they may have been at an earlier time period.

IME, they are not aggressive towards small fish....but certainly are to any fish they might view as a competitor.


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## Similis (Feb 14, 2007)

He just swims around without any attitude. In fairness though I reckon he could rip the s**t out of
any of the others if they stepped out of line.

PS. I won`t be breeding them so.


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