Acclimating fish to captivity

[logar]

So recently I accidentally brought home a blacknose dace in some weeds i was collecting to see if I could grow for aquarium use. I didn’t notice Jerry, yes I named him Jerry, until I was taking the weeds out of the bucket and he flopped out onto my floor. He had been sitting in the bucket inside for at least 30 minutes. it was also starting to get dark and you have to climb down a very steep rocky hill that is a borderline cliff at some sections (not the parts I go down). That made putting him back safely, for me or him, not possible. I had recently set up a 5 1/2 gallon so I started acclimating him right away. I left him there for around a day or 2 until I was able to get my hands on a 20 long. He did eat some bloodworms in that time so that was a relief. They are schooling fish and don’t really care what species they school with so after getting my hands on the 20 long I went down to the creek and collected another fish, Moby, as they are schooling fish. When I caught him, I thought Moby was a bluntnose minnow/common shiner as he had a very rounded head but it turns out he is actually a creek chub with a deformed mouth. I couldn’t see that down there as it was extremely rainy, and definitely not safe to be down there. I went down the day after that, Friday I believe, and caught 3 more. Since it is very hard to tell what they are without a clear box and I didn’t want to stress them out, I just kept what I caught if that makes sense. So out of those the only one I am sure of exactly what species is Knuckles, a creek chub with a semi-missing tail. out of the other two, I am pretty sure one is a blacknose dace but not 100% as he hides a lot and the last one is very, very skitish and the smallest so I can’t even tell other than that it is one of the two. They all seem to be doing pretty well but Jerry, Knuckles, and especially Moby are full of personality. They will come to the front of the glass when I enter the room (they don’t usually stay when I get too close ) and even when I woke up on Saturday, I looked over and saw the 3 staring at me. Moby was the only one that stayed and actually got closer when I propped myself up to get a better look at the tank

So anyway, what is the best thing to feed them? I was thinking I would have a staple of bloodworms with an algae waffer once a week and blackworms once a week, if I can find them. Is there anything else I should do for food? that is the biggest thing I am struggling with finding out. I also will probably also feed stuff such as scuds from the creek as I have heard that a lot of fish eat them the wild. Is there anything else I should do?

Thanks for reading such a long post for such a little question

[rdurha1]

Sounds like they have acclimated to your water just fine. I would recommend you look into treating them for parasites, being wild caught, with something like Prazipro or API General Cure. Also now that they have been in captivity dont release them back into the wild. As for food if they are eating bloodworms maybe look into Hikari vibra bites. Other then that they should take to a high quality flake diet eventually I would think. Just make sure to keep up on water changes and testing your tank water regularly and you should be fine!!

[gabonica1]

When I was heavy into fish, I would bring buckets of swamp water home and put them in cattle troughs. Then top up with rain water from the gutters. Add a handful or two of sheep/goat/deer manure and let them mature in a partly shaded area outside. Then carefully select several similar organisms like daphnia or bosmina and transfer to another trough. Start a pure culture of bugs you know are safe. Research. DO Not feed indiscriminately from the original culture as there will be nasty things living in it, like hydra or water tigers or worse.
Another trick I learned is to put a teaspoon of vanilla icecream or mashed potato in a quart of distilled water and set in a sunny window. After a few days you will notice growth. Chlorella from icecream, infusorians from potato. These can then be used to start larger pure cultures. Different bugs will thrive on different organics. Using clean water and dry grass will give rise to a tiny round bug, no idea what, that makes great chow for tiny fry like white clouds or danios as well as the adults.
Fyi, any wild fish I have ever attempted to acclimate has taken commercial fish food. Most fish will mouth anything they find in the water and eat it if edible.