Feeding time

[Carolina79]

Hi good morning! I have 2 clowns, 6 blue legged hermits in a 10g (eventually moving to a 25g in 2months) how long do I turn off my pump for during feeding time. I like to watch them eat and when it’s gone I turn back in. Is that good?

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

whatever your like, there are no rules. Sometimes I dont turn my pumps off. When I do turn off my pumps, my system is on a 2 minute feeding timer. If I feed corals then my pumps are off for 20 minutes. i've left my pumps off for hours sometimes while fidgeting in the tank. Its all good

 

[glency]

Some of my fish don’t eat with the pumps off.

 

[blaxsun]

Some of my fish don’t eat with the pumps off.

They'll learn to when they get hungry and watch all the other fish eat.

In response to the Op, I agree with @LordofCinder - it's really personal preference. Most of the time you turn your pumps off to prevent food from just being sucked into the overflow.

With my system I ramp the pump speed down to decrease the flow into the overflow (dropping the water level), which has the same effect as turning off the pumps without draining back into the sump. My fish get auto fed 4x daily so this works really well.

 

[FiddlersReef]

It's totally up to you. I think a lot of people turn the return pump off simply to prevent food getting pulled through the overflow and into the sump. For circulation pumps, I have mine set to drop to 40% power, so it still makes the food blow around, but not extreme.

I shut them down to 1% when feeding corals because it becomes too hard to target feed them otherwise.

Personally mine are off 30 minutes for fish feeding, and 15 minutes for coral.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I don’t know what you are feeding, but if it’s flakes, for example, you will probably get a better feeding response if you use some tongs to place them down under the water and release them into some flow, rather than just sprinkle them on top of the water and have them float on the surface.

 

[rmorris_14]

Agree its personal preference.
I shut my return, powerhead and skimmer all off at first. ( I like to make sure my watchman is able to get a few good bites before blowing everything around.
I then turn on my power head to get the food back into the water column for the other fish. I let that run for about 20 minutes while I add my phyto. Then I turn the return pump and the skimmer back on

I feed frozen food.