Feeding Platies Egg yolk...

[M.Butler]

Just out of curiosity.. but can you feed grown platies cooked egg
yolk? I'd like to suppliment their diet with something so that
they're not just getting flake food.

Also, I was curious as to normal platy size. I have one male that I
purchased from wal-mart (yes I know.. but I honestly didn't expect him
to live.. but the's the only one that has survived my newbie
blunders), and three females that I purchased from my local fish
store. When I compare the females to Bartholomew (tee hee), it's like
'Attack of the 50 Foot Women'. When I got him (December of 2003) he
was old enough to be sexed and he hasn't grown at all. When I went to
the fish store I noticed that the male platies that they had were
substantially larger than Bartholomew. Is his size normal? He's
maybe only about 1.5 inches long, where the females are about 2 1/4
inches long.

[Mean_Chlorine]

Thusly (M.Butler) Spake Unto All:

>Just out of curiosity.. but can you feed grown platies cooked egg
>yolk? I'd like to suppliment their diet with something so that
>they're not just getting flake food.

Yes, but you'd be better off varying the food with chopped shrimp
meat, fish meat, or frozen foods such as bloodworms, daphnia, calanus
and other foodstuffs of suitable size. Egg yolk isn't a bad food, but
it's high in fat and dissolves into tiny particles, and therefore
tends to cloud the water.

>substantially larger than Bartholomew. Is his size normal? He's
>maybe only about 1.5 inches long, where the females are about 2 1/4
>inches long.

Fairly normal. The ones at the store had presumably been given more
varied and/or higher protein food. Or they were simply older. Plus not
all cultivars of platy grow to the same size, some stay small whatever
you do.