Lionhead Progress (2nd Month)

This month (exactly 30 days) I basically did the same feeding method as the previous month, the only thing that really changed at first was 1 week I had started giving them a cube of Hikari's tubifex worms once a day, as well as a small piece of Omega One freeze-dried brine shrimp (personally I do like Hikari's freeze-dried brine shrimp better) although I ran out of tubifex worms the last week or two. On Halloween I did give my fish a thick slice of boiled squash which my bristlenose did seem to enjoy. So, the lionhead have initially been given more food this month and I have added in a few new variables compared to the previous month.

Another thing I did was add in some of McCormick's organic ground garlic into the bag of nori I was giving them because before it seemed like they enjoyed pulling it apart more than eating it so, I wanted to see if this would make it more palatable for them (which it didn't seem to make a huge difference). Keep in mind that the garlic powder does not really stick to the dry nori in the bag, but garlic being strong in scent I figured after a few weeks the odor would add to the flavor of the nori regardless. Garlic also gets added to a lot of fish food in general to make it more palatable for fish which is how I figured it would be okay for them.

During the last 2 weeks I wasn't too impressed with the visual size of my goldfish and I also managed to drop my FishMate feeder into the aquarium which initially broke the device and delayed regular feedings from happening for my fish, but I am glad I kept an eye on the device after that to see that it was no longer feeding my fish due to the water damage. That being said the past 4 days I decided to double their pellet food and brine shrimp intake just to see if I could plump them up a bit more before weigh day, and also to see if they were capable of eating more as they have been increasing in size as we saw the past month and they have been looking a bit hungrier lately (which is also why I have been giving them an increased amount of Earthworm Flakes as a treat this month).

One more thing I changed was purchasing some Omega One Goldfish pellets, so for the past 2 weeks or so I have replaced half of their pellet food mix with the Omega One as I am hoping this stuff can help increase head-growth (and oddly enough my bristlenose also likes these and she rarely eats anything other than Tetra Veggie wafers and some vegetables on occasion).

Sumo, Ramen, and Pocky (left to right)

A surprising turn of events happened in terms of my lionheads weight during this month. Sumo is at 24g now (a 12g gain since a month ago) which means he doubled in weight, while Ramen was barely reaching 25g this month making it a near tie-breaker with lil Sumo (only an 8g gain since a month ago), and Pocky surprisingly surpassed Ramen in terms of weight at 28g (with the same 12g as Sumo) although didn't quite double in weight this month as with Sumo. This means on average my fish have gained 0.86g a day this month, which puts Ramen closest to the average amount gained. Last month the lionhead averaged 0.34g a month, which means with a slight food increase and some changes in food the lionhead gained an extra 0.52g.

Future Plans...
I want to see if an increase in water changes and the amount of water changed actually has a significant effect on the size/weight/growth of goldfish, and try to compare that to these past two months of growth.