Why Turn Off Pumps During Feeding?

[MarkoD]

i just leave everything on full blast. i just turn off the skimmer when feeding clams.

i make my fish work for their food

[jorjef]

I turn off all flow when I feed mysis. I find that alot gets missed in all the ramdom flow I have and I keep no realistc clean up crew to salvage what gets lost. I will only put in small amouts at a time and make sure it gets eaten before I put more in . Just an easy way to control waste... For floating flake I leave everything on and scoop out anything that the skimmer or fish miss.

[Doug]

Leaving the pumps on is fine, feeding the sump is not. I imagine many turn their return pumps off but leave circulating on. Thats what the feed mode on my controller does. I also use a feeding ring, or should say square as mine is.

[Flash]

feeding my sump is great!!! i have 2 clowns and a damsel down there!! plus crabs and snails! lol!

[Proteus]

Whats a feeding ring

[MarkoD]

i dunno how it is for everyone else.

i feed on the opposite side of my overflow. food doesnt even get a chance to travel half way across the tank before it gets eaten.

i've never seen food touch the sand either

[sphelps]

For the most part people would agree we design our tanks and water flow to keep things suspended and be as efficient as possible at forcing debris and other crap to the overflow so it can filtered out before settling and breaking down in the display.

So with that said it's clear why one might want to consider turning off or at least reducing the flow during feeding times. If you don't you'll likely waste a good portion of food that will get filtered out and depending on what goes on from there the extra food may not be filtered out properly and break down into nutrients.

In addition some peoples livestock might benefit from not having to chase down food at light speed but this depends on what livestock you keep.

If you feel neither of these are issues with your tank then yeah it wouldn't make much sense to shut off pumps.

[burgerchow]

I'm a little curious. Just how much food does everybody feed, that they are worried about "leftover" ? I only feed small amounts a day. It's a feeding frenzy everytime I drop in some pellets. Never have any leftovers.
I think keeping my fish in competition for food is more natural, and it also leads to better water quality.

[tang daddy]

I turn my vortechs down to 10% for half hr during feed mode and not completely off, the food blows around for 1/2 hr and uneaten food hits the sump to be skimmed out or the crabs find it.

[bignose]

I don't turn my pumps off when I feed my tank which is a sps tank. But if I was feeding a lps tank I would turn the pumps off and target feed each coral, I think it would be a waste of food with the pumps on.