Suggestions for flake food

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Vague

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Nov 12, 2014
Messages
102
Location
Idaho
Just wondered what others are using as far as flake food for their reef system or is flake just not the way to go? I have used it off and on over the years but lately have seen an increase in algae etc.
 
I have a Spanish hogfish, 2 yellowtail damsels, a maroon clown, 2 engineer gobies, and a lawnmower blenny. I currently am just feeding frozen brine. Any thoughts on another addition to the diet for that lineup?
 
Brine shrimp have no nutritious value at all. As mentioned above mysis shrimp are much better for your fish. Some companies sell vitamin fortified brine shrimp but mysis is still better.
 
New life spectrum has the best flake food imo. My fish love it. I do feed My fish brine shrimp ones a week cause they go crazy for it.
 
I have a Spanish hogfish, 2 yellowtail damsels, a maroon clown, 2 engineer gobies, and a lawnmower blenny. I currently am just feeding frozen brine. Any thoughts on another addition to the diet for that lineup?

I use frozen mysis , frozen clams on the 1/2 shell , frozen mussels , frozen squid , live feeder minnows and live mysis shrimp and veggie cubes a wide variety of nutritious foods

if I remember correct don't you have a 40g your going to need a lot more room for that stock sometime down the line

hogfish 10 inch
maroon clown up to 6 inch depending on which type
engineer gobie 16 inch

just wanted to give you a heads up for any future plans
 
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I like Omega One. I believe it to be a premium brand. I use the flake food as the staple diet, and freeze dried blood worms, and brine shrimp to supplement and as a treat because they seriously LOVE it, especially the brine shrimp. But yes, I believe flake food is the way to go generally speaking.

I may not know something others here know...but I think brine shrimp is perfectly nutritious...in the freeze dried cube form. I still use flake food because I know it is manufactured with just about everything the fish needs, meat, kelp, etc, and is LESS LIKELY to cause algae.

I rarely feed frozen foods , like the cube form (brine shrimp blood worms etc,) simply because THOSE don't have much nutritional value. They are mostly water and have very little protein, fat etc... you would need to feed much more often to be adequate.

All in all, flake would be the best option if you want a single food source. Other types of food will certainly cause algae, maybe you're over feeding? Or have other problems going on? But yeah if you think you're having algae problems with your flake food, then it'll be worse with other methods of feeding. Premium brands of anything are also less likely to pollute the water, generally and comparatively that is.
I also do FW tanks, but I believe feeding and stuff is relatively the same. I think most foods can go both ways but wanted to point out that I deal with FW. I also don't have years and years of experience like others, just adding my two cents.
 
I have a Spanish hogfish, 2 yellowtail damsels, a maroon clown, 2 engineer gobies, and a lawnmower blenny. I currently am just feeding frozen brine. Any thoughts on another addition to the diet for that lineup?



Again, frozen brine is nowhere near enough. That has basically no nutritional value. The above statement is correct, I didn't realize they were talking about frozen brine. Go for flake food, and get freeze dried cubes of brine shrimp as treats. You could even use the brine as the staple if you desire, but flake may be better and brine will cause more algae if you think the food is already causing it. Freeze dried brine shrimp is messy and basically dissolves in the water. Much more nutritious than frozen though, (Just compare the analysis' of each. Your frozen brine is probably at least 92% water. I think any common/premium brands of food are all good. I'm unfamiliar with SW fish so I don't know what they would personally like [emoji16].

Me..I have a whole drawer of different foods Hahaha! Including frozen that I feed rarely. I feed two different kinds of flake food, one standard, meaty flakes and the other is more of a veggie flake, though it is mostly marketing, because they are very very similar in ingredients. They have the same ingredients but for example, the veggie flakes have more "fresh kelp" than whole fish (or whatever.) they even use a green dye to make it look more like veggies...marketing strategies. I also feed freeze dried tubifex worms, pacific plankton, blood worms, veggie pellets that are supposed to be for SW tanks, sinking hikari wafers and even algae wafers that keep them busy for 2 hours as my fish nibble away on it.
 
Personally I like to go to a store ( I find mine at a Spanish grocery) and get a bag of frozen seafood mix has shrimp, mussels, and squid I put in my food processor and add garlic cloves and some nori then chop it up and pour into zip lock bags and freeze it into flat packs.
The fish love it and the corals eat it also ( directly feed my torch , frogspawn and nems...) and it costs about $4 for a bag (either a lb. or 12oz don't remember)
While they eat it I try to avoid the stuff with the fake crab in it because it has food coloring, wine and other hard to pronounce stuff in it...
 
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