How do you target feed a feather duster without scaring it back into its tube???

[Jlobo]

:rolleye1: Dumb question, I know, but it's my first duster.

[reeftanker3295]

I never fed mine. They will filter tiny particles out of the water. Just let it be and it should be fine.

[Jlobo]

I never fed mine. They will filter tiny particles out of the water. Just let it be and it should be fine.

Really? How big were yours?

[Lazcar45]

Im not an expert but i dont think you need to spot feed a feather duster, they are a filter feeder, they eat nutrients out of the water colum, you could always add some phytoplankton.

[bnumair]

i have cocoa worm and been there for 5 yrs now i have never fed mine. its filter feeder and will absorb food out of water.

[reeftanker3295]

Really? How big were yours?

Anywhere from pinky finger nail to a full sized colored feather duster. The only thing small enough that we can feed them would probably be phyto and it's really not needed.

[Jlobo]

Oh, okay well I bought Kent phytoplankton to feed my purple & white dwarf duster but maybe I didn't need to do that.

[SushiGirl]

I feed mine with a turkey baster. It's been very tolerant up until 2 days ago when I added more corals & kept sticking my hand in the tank over there. Now it's a little touchy & closes up more LOL. I just wait until it opens again, and GENTLY squirt from the turkey baster...it wiggles a little like it likes it heheheh.

[pentrix2]

Im not an expert but i dont think you need to spot feed a feather duster, they are a filter feeder, they eat nutrients out of the water colum, you could always add some phytoplankton.

+1 on phyto. i put some in the tank every 2-3 days.

[greenbean36191]

Large featherdusters feed almost exclusively on phytoplankton and bacterioplankton (with a few species eating some small zooplankton). They do not simply absorb nutrients from the water and won't eat left over fish food, detritus, or most zooplankton. Their crowns are designed to selectively sort particles just the right size and "taste" and reject everything else in psuedofeces. Since there's very little phytoplankton in most tanks, they have to be fed or they will enter a cycle of continually shedding their crown and growing a new, smaller one until they finally starve to death.

To feed them use a turkey baster to squirt a cloud of phyto behind their crown. Don't try to shoot it down the middle of the crown like most hobbyists do. If you do that, you're not only more likely to make them close up, but you're also putting the food on the downstream side of their filter.

[b0bab0ey]

+2 on the phytoplankton. And not just for your feather dusters, your clams/corals will absorb it too! The stuff can be kinda expensive so I just use it once a week. Make sure you turn off your protein skimmer for 2-3 hours after you put it in.

[Jlobo]

Thank you greenbean! Now I know how to feed it properly. :D