How much is overfeeding

[BertieBones]

Might seem like a stupid question, I am suffering badly with GHA and high phosphates, How do you judge if you're overfeeding? I'm always worried that I'm starving my fish

 

[Mr. Experience]

Might seem like a stupid question, I am suffering badly with GHA and high phosphates, How do you judge if you're overfeeding? I'm always worried that I'm starving my fish

Although it pretty much depends on how much livestock is in your tank, how big your tank is, your clean up crew, and how everything is setup, your fish truly only need a few pellets or flakes to survive substantially. If you notice that a majority or the food you put in is wasted or sinks to the bottom to rot, its best to cut down a bit and this is most likely your tanks phosphate problem specifically (although easily fixable through water changes). But there are many solutions to this problem out there in case you are worried not all your fish are being fed equally or properly including a hang on magnet that you can clip your food onto that the fish swim up to before you pull it out or nothing is left, a ring that you put at the top of the water if you have floating food that keeps it within the circle, or simply a bigger cuc to make up for the excess that makes its way down there anyways. I've even heard of people using droppers to pinpoint their smaller fish first before their larger fish attack. Whatever you do just don't purchase one of those automatic fish feeders (they can tend to over perform and dump huge quantities of food in the water and you won't even be there to observe what happens or fix it). Good luck! And by the way not a stupid question at all, better safe than sorry