Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding what size fish feeder is needed

I am trying to decide how big a feeder that we will need to feed 300 channel catfish up to 2 1/2 ponds and 300 hybrid perch.

Plan on using floating feed and would like to fill the feeder every 4 to 5 weeks.

It is my understanding that a 400 pound feeder for corn will only handle 200 pounds of floating feed.

Thanks so much.

Charles

I have a 250 pound feeder it will hold 3 bags of game fish chow (50 Pounds a bag) This will last me around 2 to 3 weeks.

You might start out with a 400 pound feeder.
It will be close to what you should need in the long run.

Keep in mind if you are stocking the catfish from scratch, they will not eat as much when they are small but will gradualy eat more as they grow larger.

You should only feed them as much as they can eat in 15 min., so you will have to watch them eat their food from time to time and adjust the timer on your feeder to match their rate of food consumption.

Sounds like a good project to me. Good Luck to ya

Don

Hi Charles,

I can tell you that the output on our directional feeders using Game Fish Chow is approximately 2.5 pounds on a 10 second feed duration. We offer our feeders in two capacities:

70 lbs. (designed so it doesn't have to be empty to fill with a new 50 lbs. bag) or

215 lbs. - a larger capacity you won't have to fill as often.

Hope this info helps you in calculating what size to purchased based on the amount you need to feed.

THP, I am having a problem on setting my timer on my Texas Hunter, but it sure doesn't put out any 2.5 pounds of AQMX 600 in a 10 second feed duration.
I love the feed pattern but I need to experiment on the amount of feed per second, and measure volume of feed over a specific amount of time.

I would appreciate info on your method of determining amount of feed/second.

I was looking forward to a response from the Texas Hunter rep for a discussion on timers and feed cycles.

I love my Texas Hunter feeder - it throws the best feed pattern anyone can wish for, but since it is new product on the market, I would appreciate feed-back from other users.

My first experience when I put into use last fall, was that I had to increase my feeding time by a factor of ~10 to feed the approximate amount of feed from my old Stren – IIRC was ~.7 #/sec.

My TH feeder was turned back on last weekend on a 10 second feed time, the motors would run for 10 seconds, but feed was minimal and erratic.
The feeder was full of feed and idle for about 6 weeks, and perhaps it needed cleaning.
Perhaps it had accumulated moisture in the feed, but did not appear so,
I’ll do some more experimenting tomorrow.

The way I measure amount of feed/second is to mark the inside of feeder bin, and put a weighed amount of feed above the mark and observe how long it takes to reach the mark. Calculate average feeding time/second for timer setting.

I would appreciate if THP would reply as to how TH measures the feed /second for various sizes of Purina AQMX, and tell me what I am doing wrong.

Hi Charles,

Thanks for the comments on the disbursement pattern. We engineered the spread so that all the fish get a chance at the feed, not just the dominant ones.

The approx 2.5 lbs output (per 10 seconds) is based on Purina's Game Fish Chow.

With the larger Aquamax 600 pellet, the feeder will dispense less feed, approx 1.5 lbs (1.6 to be exact) in our testing. We captured the actual feed that was dispensed after each 10 second feed event and weighed the feed to arrive at the estimated output for the different fish diets.

Here's the link to the details on our fish feeders. If you click on one of the two feeders available, the output is listed in the key features section under each feeder. Since our patented blower system is the same for each capacity feeder (DF125 or DF425) the output should be the same no matter which size feeder you have. http://www.texashunterproducts.com/difife1.html

Hope that helps determine approximately how much time you'll need to dispense the amount that your fish population requires. And remember, if you see feed still floating after about 10 minutes, you are feeding too much (as a general rule). If they consume all of the feed in just a few minutes, add another second or two to give them a little more until you arrive at the pefect feed duration.

Should you have any other questions about fish feeders, feel free to call us directly anytime - that's what we're here for! (800) 969-3337 or you can email info@TexasHunterProducts.com

Good Fishing!

Thanks much for the clarification between feed/sec amount of GFC vs AQMX 600 pellets.
I'm acustomed to 1.4#'s per 2 seconds on AquaPro feeder for AQMX 600 vs. 1.6#'s per 10 seconds for TH.
Thanks, this info saves me a lot of time to avoid experimeting with my new TH.

I love the reliability of TH, but most of all the feed pattern.