How Do you Feed Your Clams????

[Bemmer]

I recently purchased two 3" clams from Barry. He talks about taking his clams out of the tank every few days and putting them in a bowl of sw with DT. Then removing them when the water is clear. Do I have to do that with a 3" clam or can't I just pour in 2 TBS of DT into my 120 gallon tank to feed the clams and all the others that benefit from DT? Do I need to target feed the clams?

Just curious as to how you feed your clams.

Thanks

 

[pecan2phat]

Most of my clams (7) are either 3" or larger with the exception of a 2.5" Crocea.
I've never target fed my clams due to 1) the 2.5" Crocea is attached to a good sized piece of live rock. If I bump into this piece, let alone pull it out for target feeding, I would probably dislodge a whole lot of other corals. 2) I simply do not like to constantly handle the clams. They seem to "settle" into their comfort zone position & here comes the giant hand to pull them out of the water.
I do feed the tank though with alternating DT's (5ml per 15g of tank water) & Knop's Koral Vit F (1ml per 22g of tank water) twice in a 7 day period. I only dose the recommended dosage even though DT's recommends slowly doubling the dosage for clams. I don't know if the clams are getting enough of the live phyto from the DT's or enough yeast based formula from the Knop's but I tend to think that 90% of their intake is from the lighting. Although this might not be true for clams under 3", my 2.5" Crocea has been doing well for 8 months without target feeding every other day.
Even with the twice feeding per 7 days, I do have some nussiance algae build up. I suspect this might be from the DT's, I've heard other reefers complain about this and eventually stop feeding all together. I did not have a nussiance algae problem prior to feeding the tank. I'm sure my SPS & zoos are taking in the nutrition too. I'll test the theory as I'm about to run out of DT's phyto, I'll continue with the Knop's Koral Vit F & see if the nussiance algae goes away.

Of course this is my own opinion and it has worked well for me, others will probably disagree. Actually, in all this time that I have been "feeding the tank", I can't even tell if the clams are taking in any of the food sources, they really don't seem to react differently when being fed.

 

[Barry N.]

He talks about taking his clams out of the tank every few days and putting them in a bowl of sw with DT. Then removing them when the water is clear.

That works and did that for a long time but I found that was hard to do all the time so now we keep the smaller one in a much smaller tank and just feed the tank.

Have heard that some people target feed with a plactic sota bottle that the large end was cut off and inject some DT's through the small opeing. Never have tried it myself but people seems to think it works.

 

[pecan2phat]

Hey Hi Barry,
Wish your store had some clams left. Just so happens that my sister is staying @ the Manchester Grand Hyatt in Diego through Sat. morning. Would have been sweet to buy some clams & save on the shipping. Oh well...............

 

[Scuba Dog]

I directly feed my tank twice a week with DT's and frozen cyclopseeze, the corals may eat the cyclops thats up to debate but my clowns go crazy over the stuff, well back on the subject, I 5 clams total, 3 croacias.....I directly feed the tank to feed the larger clams and to feed my pods.......but my baby max about an inch total in size i diretly feed it once a week, by the bowl method, after doing more reasearch ill directly feed it twice a week......basicly the feeding sechedual is mondays and fridays i directly feed the tank, and wensdays and saturdays i target feed the baby max.......