Three reasons that come straight to mind:
1) My grow out tank fish are fed twice a day (at least) with heaps of livefood
included in their diet. The fish in my community tanks are fed once a day six
days a week. They receive live and/or frozen food every other day.
2) The temperature of my grow out tanks are slightly higher than my community
tanks. There has been a recent discussion on this one.
3) Fish in the grow out tanks are roughly the same size and therefore they are
not outcompeted for food by larger fish.
>Does the slower growth of the community tank fishes mean
>they will also reach a smaller overall size, or just get to the same
>size in a longer period of time?
Same size over a longer period of time.
>But, this is certainly a long term experiment (having to wait for my juvies to
get big) and don't >thing I am willing to sacrifice the long term growth of my
juvies.
I have noticed in the past that with *some* rainbow species there is no problem
putting smaller fish with adult fish of the same species. I recently put some
1.5" M. duboulayi in a tank containing 4in male M. duboulayi and there was not
a problem. The small 'bows won't grow as fast but it's a display tank and I
don't care about fast growth.
Cheers.
Scott Hunt
rainbowfish-owner#064#pcug.org.au - SMTPGATE at WT400 on 01/05/97 12:39:12 AM
To: rainbowfish#064#pcug.org.au - SMTPGATE at WT400
cc:
Subject: Re: [RML] New Question
I'm interested in this concept of having fish in a grow out tank soon
overtaking the size of same batch fish in a community tank that includes
larger fishes...Does the slower growth of the community tank fishes mean
they will also reach a smaller overall size, or just get to the same
size in a longer period of time? I am wondering about this because I am
still undecided about whether or not to leave any adults in a tank I am
converting to privately bred fish. i.e. I have three rather large store
bought Goyders (~4 inches BL) and was curious about comparing their
quality to that of the Goyders I have coming from Roy in a couple of
weeks. But, this is certainly a long term experiment (having to wait
for my juvies to get big) and don't thing I am willing to sacrifice the
long term growth of my juvies. Hell, I've probably answered my own
question. :-)
Jim