Preping the tank for a 4 week vacation

[vic622]

Been thinking about autofeeders ... I found out a couple of things when I went away at Christmas.

I use the Nutrafin autofeeders on three of my tanks, 2xFW & the other is on the reef tank.

I like these and have them running all the time - keeps me from forgetting to feed and gives the tanks a consistent feeding amount and feeding time every day. I can't recommend them enough, but I echo the comments about setting them up before hand and having them run for a week to make sure they dispense the amount you want.

They work perfectly on the FW tanks, but I have run into a couple of problems I've run into on the Reef tank.
This is a battery operated feeder. That's not a problem, just make sure you've put in fresh batteries before you head out - They seem to last for months.

The problem is that I have a hood on the reef tank and two things happened:
1. The dry food (flakes & pellets) picked up the humidity from the tank and gummed up inside the feeder in about 1-2 wks. The only way to solve this would be to try the Eheim autofeeder that has some way of drying the food in the container - I've got one on order to try it out.

2. Salt water evaporation + battery connections = corrosion. In order to fix this, I think I'll need to solder extensions to the wires and put the battery holder outside the cover.

[Albertan22]

Good point Vic, I hadn't considered the effect of long term humidity on the autofeeder...

[vic622]

Originally Posted by Albertan22

Good point Vic, I hadn't considered the effect of long term humidity on the autofeeder...

Just so you don't get the idea that humidity is always a problem, the other two feeders that are above the glass and drop through a hole, have no humidity problems at all. I've had food in them for months at a time without any clumping.

[Albertan22]

My tank has a canopy over it which the feeder would have to be inside of. I did run it for a week at Christmas without issue, but wasn't confident that it actually did anything for the fish. The feeder I have does have an "anti humidity door" on it, but the battery connections corroding isn't something that I had considered. I think the best thing to do is to just set it up and let it run for a couple of weeks before I leave and see how things do.