My Angels

Question
I am from India.I am new to this hobby but very interested.I have many questions regarding fishes.

1.How long can a fish like an Angel stay without food?

2.My Angels are not eating pellets from the day I bought them.How can I make them eat the pellets?What else can I feed them?(Earlier I fed them live worms which I cannot find now)

3.How can a male fish be distinguished from a female?

4.Is it true that adding common salt to aquarium can prevent infections up to a certain extent?

Answer
Hi Chandan,

Asking questions is a good thing, but make sure you are also using the marvels of the internet to make your fishkeeping life easier. Here's a few websites I use all the time:
http://www.wetwebmedia.com
http://www.cichlid-forum.com

1. It depends on how well-fed they are to start with, and what there is to forage on, but a healthy, well-fed fish can last for weeks without food in a planted tank. In a non-planted tank, I would say a week or so. Angelfish are very prone to eating small fish like neon tetras if hungry.

2. Try New Life Spectrum pellets, these are very nutritious:
http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/pfk/pages/show_article.php?article_id=605
You can try putting a few drops of garlic oil on the pellets, garlic is an attractant to fish. By the way, NLS pellets contain garlic. Here's a list of other foods fish eat:
http://fish.mongabay.com/food.htm

3. Angelfish are nearly impossible to sex. The way to do it is to get several, and watch for a pair to develop.
If you go to google.com and type:
angelfish sexing
You'll get a better idea, but the only reliable way to sex angelfish is to wait for a pair to spawn together, and then removing the others when they are ready to...since angelfish, like most cichlids, are very aggressive and territorial when they are spawning.

4. I would not add salt to a freshwater aquarium. This is very "old school" thinking. People rarely changed water in the old days, using carbon to take the yellow out of the aged water and salt to keep the fish from becoming poisoned by their own waste. Before, it was believed that aged water was healthier for the fish than fresh, new water. Well, we know better now! New water is better than old, stale water, of course - so, you should change a considerable amount of water every week. 50% is what I usually recommend.

Some species, such as mollies, do very well in brackish water. But brackish water is marine salt mix + fresh water, and marine salt mix has other things such as pH buffers, that make the water hard and alkaline, and more stable. Aquarium salt is just common salt, as you say, and it doesn't do much except help fish deal with being in dirty water. It encourages slime coat to some extent. And in very large quantities, it can be used to combat ich parasites.

However, some fish do not like salt at all, such as most catfish, neon tetras, and angelfish...so avoid the salt.

I hope that helps! Take care.
Nicole