I think I saw this before, but I can't find the thread. I've been raising a few LM and a SM bass (all around 3 inches big) in my aquarium. The first thing they did was eat all of my other fish....which was sort of cool and I expected it to happen. However, after they cleaned out my aquarium, I started feeding them feeder goldfish. The 3 bass that I have eat approx 30 goldfish a week. They are getting a bit expensive to feed.

I heard that they will eat Ciclid pellets. I bought some, but they will not touch the stuff (even if I starve them). Has anyone had any luck getting bass to eat dried flakes or pellets, or any other dried foods?

Thanks..

Greg C

hey, i really want to do that too. where did you get your fish? im sure its illegal to get bass that small.

That's awesome man! I so want to do that now!!

I'd love to find a LEGAL way to do this. Anyone know where I can get fingerlings?

The site below is based in Africa but they buy fingerlings from the US. Several sources are listed for both northern strain and florida strain fingerlings.

http://www.bigbass.0catch.com/id8.htm

I think the cheapest thing to do would be to buy a worm bin from your local farm supply company or whatever and just feed them the worms. I feed my fish the redworms and he loves em, but i still get the goldfish as a treat everyonce in a while, i think he has fun chasing them down! The bin is like 40 bucks, but every so often the worms regenerate and you are left with twice as many worms, plus you get some gardening compost and worms for fishing for panfish if you enjoy that at all.

Joel

I have a few 8-9 inch bass in my small backyard pond. I've raised them since they were about as long as yours. The cheapest way to feed them is to start a compost pile. put grass clippings in the pile and in a few months you should be able to bet thirty to fourty worms out of it a couple of times a week. good luck!
George

Your fish look nice, but they will not be liking that tank for long- is it a hex? They need some room to swim, don't stop feeding them feeders, either- only problem is those goldfish are dirty, lots of waste ends up in the substrate which those cool little bass will find unappealing. Four 3-4" bass need a 100 gallon tank at least to be happy, and that is still cramping their style. I know it is illegal in most states (for sure in CA) to keep game fish and such, but I can't help myself. Just make sure you take real good care of them, the fact that you are asking here is cool. They will probably eat frozen brine shrimp, you might try it. My calico loves them, when I can't get him guppies. Plus a little variety in their diet is good. Worms are probably a really good staple diet, as others mentioned. And crickets, if you got 'em. Probably not cheese sandwiches, mine hated those. They made the water cloudy too. What is the water temp you have, curious about the smallie- I would love to have a smallie in a tank. LIttlel dads can be found in almost any bit of water, not sure where you are located, but the little dads would be epic for your bass- I have a red tail cat, amazon style, he can't get enough dads.

i had a 2 or 3 inch bass. it was in a 50 gal tank and would not eat anything besides dried bloodworms. It was cool until my cat got in the tank and ate it.

Thanks for all of the info...I'll start the worm farm ASAP. As for space, I am currently using a 30 gallon Hex. Yeah, probably too small for 3 bass. I'm thinking of releasing the LM and just raising the smallie, (the smallie beats the hell out of the other bass anyways). Smallie has bright red eyes too.

For temps, I read that cooler water is better for smallies I have turned off my heaters as the summer weather keeps the water at approx 68-75.

In the winter I'll keep the water around 62-65. It's interesting to study their behavior....how they are territorial, how they ambush prey, etc...

In the mean time, gotta make a trip to the pet store for more feeder goldfish....they ate 38 of them in the last week.

Because Bass are oppurtunity feeders (eat when ever the oppurtunity presents itself) they will eat as many feeders as you put in the tank. I raised a LM bass from 4" to 18" feeding it 10 feeders a week. Crawdads are also a good option. One cool way to raise a "game" fish legaly is to go to a tropical fish store and se if you can find a Peacock Bass. They are cool but you need a large tank. Mine outgrew the 100gal tank that I had him in in a little over a year. I gave him to a friend that has a 360gal tank and he is doing great I would say he is between five and seven pounds now.

I used to keep largemouths in a tank for years but have moved over to the legal way to do it with a Peacock Bass I got at a local Aquarium shop.

The only way I ever got my bass to eat something that was not alive (pellets) was to have something else in the tank (that the bass could not kill) that would eat the pellets. In my case it was a small red-ear turtle. The bass watched the turtle eat the pellets and learned that they were food. I have tried it many times before and since without a turtle and the bass wouldn't touch the stuff.

Be careful, I was also only able to ever keep one bass in the tank at a time - they will eventually kill and/or eat eachother.

Once it gets bigger (10 - 13 inch range) try feeding it a mouse - very cool if you like that sort of thing. Hits it like a buzzbait then takes it down for the count.

Be careful guys, you need a special permit to keep any game fish of
any kind. Had a bud that got popped big time for having lobster
in a tank.

RD

Didn't the red-ear turtle eventually went after the bass?
I know when I had turtles, they ate anything that moved in the water no matter the size.

Nope. They were buds.

hey i wondering how to get started in this stuff....i dont want to buy a tank because i dont have that much money...i was told that a cut in half barrel of some sort would be good for one or two small bass of panfish. help me out.

Grom, wish you would have asked earlier, my buddy just moved to North Carolina and was giving away a 125 with stand, nice tank. I didn't have room for it or I would have set up another tank. I have a 30 gallon tank with a stand and most of the stuff you need, it's dirty and needs a hard cleaning but if you want it it's yours- let me know.

Grom, or anyone looking for a perfect tank for the job, please reply... I have a 80 gallon, (cust. stand, cust. canopy) complete w/ lighting, mud filters, penguin's and the whole nine, thick diamond edge glass, if anyone is interested, let me know...

GO JOHN MURRAY!!!

Nose Hook email me I'm interested in the tank

scott@xcellentfx.com

How much you want for the 80 gallon tank?

Hey leapin, Can you get the peacocks at most aquarium stores. Where did you get yours? I don't want to sweat the DFG raiding my living room, but peacocks legally would be really cool!

this is not any little starter tank, I would do everything, (extra filters, chemicals, penguins, the whole 9) for $200 even.

Tempting offer... where are you located nosehook?

I WORK IN IRVINE, AND LIVE IN RANCHO SANTA MARGARITA

Too far for me to pick up. If you can deliver I'll take it

NO TIME FOR THAT BRO, WORK, WORK, WORK!!!!!

Come on guy, you spent more time on the Charmin grouper pond then you did working!! At least you weighed in a hefty limit, those things can be nasty! How was the old skool skate vid?

Where you located at, if it's close to me it's a done deal. I live in Northridge

Too far for me to pick up. If you can deliver I'll take it

I got them at a local aquarium shop in early spring (I guess that's the only time when you can get them). Check with a few local shops and keep checking at the beginning of the year.

They are called "Peacock Bass" and "Oscillarus Cichlids" - not "Peacock Cichlids" as that is a different fish.

You need to pay more attention to the tank than with the largemouths. Water changes once a month are mandatory and use all those "fishy drugs" that you're supposed to (Nov-Aqua, Aquari-sol, etc.). They don't seem to be as tolerant to crappy water like LMs.

So far the Peacock is pretty cool but he's definetely less aggressive than the largemouth. The largemouth would great you at the glass when you walked up, attack anything you threw in the water or even at the tank. The peacock seems to know he is the only preditor in the tank and waits for the food to come to him.

The peacock looks better but I like the personality of the largemouths I've had in the past better. Maybe the PC will get better with age.

Of course then there's the legal factor.

Peacocks will live with eachother. I originally had four of them but didn't realize the water change/clean tank thing until it was too late.

Largemouths/smallmouths will eventually kill every other thing in the tank including other LMs/SMs.

Thanks for all the info!! I used to raise African cichlids, so I think I'm up for the peacocks.

hmm thats pretty nice to offer.....how big is 30 gallons?

find a small creek and use a trout net to catch all the little guppies in there. then separate the bass from the guppies(don't stick them in one tank). raise the guppies and feed them to the bass.

I have a baby Largemouth that I've had since it was 4'' and now is 12''. I feed it goldfish, nightcrawlers, crawdads, baby bluegills I catch, dead anchovies, and stripes of rainbow trout. The bass will strike the food out of your hand very hard. Sometimes bites my fingers too. I used to have about 5 bass years ago and I put them with one bluegill. The bluegill would eat a piece of cooked turkey or ham that I put in. Little by the little the bass would too. I know it's weird but they ate it. I did that many other times. The bass I have now won't eat that stuff because it's too big now and used to other food but you can train it to eat whatever you want at a young age, they will get hungery.
Anthony

great bunch of messages, I want to do it too, u all sound so cute, "Well, my bass is 5 lb's now,", "My Bass is 5, and I have had him for 2 years." so silly sounding, it makes we want to train a Bass to eat certain things, grow worms, and all that jazz.
Really
great posts : )
xsk8rgrl

I just got 4 new Peacock's to go with the one left over from my initial purchase so I guess you can still get them this time of year.

This time I plan to keep up on the tank maintenance and maybe they won't die!