How to Feed Cleaner Shrimp

Feeder shrimp keep fish and fish owners happy by chowing down on biofilm that covers aquariums and their inhabitants. This small aquatic creature acts happiest when surrounded with companions and tends to become a wallflower if occupying a tank without fellow members of its kind. Groups of feeder shrimp will keep a tank so clean that they may run out of food for themselves. Feeding your shrimp involves observation of their eating habits and careful attention to their response to food.

Things You'll Need

  • Shrimp food
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Instructions

    • 1

      Select a type of food appropriate for your feeder shrimp. These animals enjoy frozen meat food for fish, crab, shrimp food and flake fish food.

    • 2

      Break down food into small quantities. Cleaner shrimp will not consume food that is too large for their small bodies to handle. Use small flakes of food or break larger pieces into tiny bites.

    • 3

      Add a small amount of food to the tank. Drop the food into the water, and observe the behavior of your shrimp. Remove the food if the shrimp do not consume it in a few hours. Feeder shrimp only need enough food to supplement their diets of biofilm, so you must test various food quantities to see how much your shrimp require.

    • 4

      Increase the portion of food that you feed your shrimp if they eat all of their food within a few hours. Increase food incrementally by small amounts.

    • 5

      Continue to increase or decrease the amount of food that your shrimp eat by offering them more food until they begin to leave food uneaten after a few hours. This process requires observing your shrimp over multiple feedings.

    • 6

      Feed your shrimp daily with the amount of food you determine they will consume. Remember that this amount may change if you bring new fish into the aquarium or change the number of shrimp in the tank.