I am taking a biology class this semester as part of my core requirement classes, and for the lab, we have to do a research paper on something biology-related over the course of the semester. Since I'm not interested in turtles (which is what all of my professors have grants to study) and I don't want to study something to do with plants because that's kind of boring, I decided to do something on the Oscar fish. The stipulations are kind of strict with regards to working with animals because of the whole animal cruelty thing and everything, but I think I found a topic that will be fine. I still have to get the okay from my professor, but what I wanted to do was "study" the different behaviors Oscars display to different types of food (i.e. live food, pellets, frozen, etc. You get the idea.) My only problem is that I only have one tank and one Oscar, and I can't really get another of either of those at the moment. So, what I was hoping was that several of the members here would be kind enough to feed the their oscars the different foods like mealworms and then pellets and video record the oscar responding to the food stimuli and reacting to it. I'm hoping to prove that live food such as worms or crickets elicit a more active, primal response from the oscar because they move than pellets and frozen food do. Of course, since some of the members here love to feed their Oscars a varied diet (like I do) I'm also wondering if the Oscar will just respond differently to certain foods because he recognizes it and likes it better than the alternative.

Anyway, I'd REALLY, REALLY appreciate it if even just a couple of you guys could help me out with this. I don't know any other way to do this experiment, since I don't have any friends around here with Oscars. In fact, I would venture to say, with the exception of one of my friend's boyfriends, I'm probably the only person I know (IRL) with a fish!

Thanks in advance!

Yes, sure thing, I'm sure that we try and help you. I'll have a little think and put something on the forum later.

ill post a video of my oscar eating pellets for you if youd like me to

A good thing to include is when an oscars stops eating for some reason, often live foods like worms etc can tempt an oscar where dried food like pellets fail

some difficulties you will find are that lots of oscars are pigs and go mad for any food

Its may also be of interest that when an oscar goes of a particular type of food its often pellets, they tend not to stop eating worms etc

Okay, I talked to my biology professor and he okay-ed it, even though the rules say that for live animals you cannot inject them with anything or make them ingest anything. Since this is their normal diet and should not cause any problems, he saw no reason why I shouldn't be able to do it. YAY!

Here's what he said about it:
I need to have a set amount of time that the Oscars are fed in each video for each type of food, and I also need to have 1 or 2 fish that eat nothing but "ordinary diet", which he seemed to be implying pellets.

Since everything you ever read about feeding fish says to "feed them as much as they can eat in two minutes and then remove the excess food," I figured that would be the good standard for how long the fish needs to be fed in each video. Also, I'd like it if I could get about 30 seconds of how the fish is acting before being presented with the food and then 30 seconds after the food.

It's no rush to get these videos done immediately. I have at least a month before I need them, but if any of you guys want to do it right away, by all means, feel free! I have to have the first draft written in like a month and a half. The final draft has to be turned in the first of December.

THANKS SO MUCH TO EVERYONE WHO IS WILLING TO HELP OUT!

i recently experimented with a garlic additive and found that my os attacked the garlic soaked krill more than the ones that were not. maybe that would be something you can show with only your one o

i also suggest that you should consider timely feeding..... because an oscar
that is not feed for a day or two will react differently with foods. hunger
makes them changes their mood with foods...

They are really strict when it comes to what you are allowed to do with live animals. I'm surprised I was allowed to do my paper on an animal at all! LOL I think I should probably just stick with the idea I have since my teacher fully understood it and approved it, as he might not be happy if he found out I was with-holding food or adding something to food.

My hypothesis is that Oscars react with a more primal, livelier response to live food stimuli than they do to frozen food and pellet food.

That is all that I have been okay-ed to test out. I don't want to try anything else and risk a failing grade because I didn't stay within the "regulations" of the biology department when it comes to research done on live animals. I hope you can all understand that. It's not that I don't love all the ideas you are throwing out there, I just don't think they are feasible with the stringent guidelines I have to follow for this project since it happens to be alive.

okey then..that is understandable... my point is... there are times in the wild
that foods become scarce, thus oscar will react differently in any foods that
comes along ... just an idea to be more realistic... unless you are focus on
captive oscar in the tank

It is the understanding that all of the Oscars used for this project will be captive in mine and other peoples' tanks. He also told me to disregard the fact that Oscars may react livelier to their favorite foods. He said to just pretend like that isn't a factor for this project. Kind of like K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid!) I'm just so happy that I'm allowed to do a project on something I actually give a shit about! LOL I really didn't want to do it on a potato plant!

please do share the final draft with us! i would love to see it

JennyTmouh wrote:


Is this just a like an intro/hypothesis and obervation/test paper or do you have to do an abstract?
You mentioned that the prof told you to disregard changes in behavior due to differing foods so what exactly are you going to base the observations on?