Food Suggestion

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insecurity

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Aug 16, 2012
Messages
125
Location
Eastern Ontario
Ok- so since my Flake Fiasco of September, I've been feeding my fishes freeze dried blood worms, and supplementing it with lettuce. I've been lucky with the lettuce, as a buddy of mine is a manager at Subway, so he breaks off a few pieces for me before they dice up the entire head.

But even with the lettuce and blood worms, I'm concerned that they aren't getting enough. (nutirent wise) Am I wrong or right? If I'm right- what do you suggest? My fish go nuts over the blood worms- even the danio, though I'm pretty sure danios are herbivores, in which case I may have the world's only carnivorous zebra danio.

I'm never going back to flakes- makes too much of a mess, and it provides too much room for error when you have other people feed the fish.
 
Feeding Your Fish

Hello in...

You can't go wrong feeding a combination of frozen food to your fish. I feed twice a week and keep several kinds of frozen. Here's my list: Brine shrimp, mysis shrimp, bloodworms, krill and plankton.

Check the ingredients on the package. At most there should be the frozen animal and water (moisture). There might be one vitamin supplement, but if there's more than that, I don't feed it to my fish.

The reason is simple, processing requires additives. Your fishes' body is a finely tuned system that understands how to digest pure animal products. It's body doesn't understand digesting an additive. It's like an apple and a fast food french fry. The apple lasts maybe a few days on the shelf, because there's nothing to preserve it. The french fry put on the shelf will be the same now and a year from now. The reason, preservatives. I think I'd chose the apple.

Pretty simple.

Feed the real thing and your fish will live a long and healthy life.

B
 
Lettuce really doesn't have any nutritional valve and freeze dried bloodworms doesn't have much either as they are lost during the freeze drying process. I have found New Life spectrum Thera-a is a great food that brings out fish colors and helps boost immune systems. It is a pellet and fish really seem to like it once they get used to the food change. I suppliment this with frozen brine shrimp once a week and give the fish a few soften, deshelled, smushed peas a couple times a week.
 
I would offer more of a variety. If you are not willing to go with flakes again I would be sure to offer more than just 2 options.

As mentioned freeze dried doesn't offer a lot of nutrition when compared to the fresh or frozen counter parts. Feeding just freeze dried and lettuce is not likely to offer all the nutrition your fish needs, they are more like treats. See if you can get your hands on frozen or live options. Offer a mix like brine shrimp, blood worms, tubifex worms. Add in other veggies like peas, carrots and brocolli. The bigger the mix of options the better chance you have of meeting their needs.

Why not consider a high quality pellet food? These are pretty easy to control the amount that is fed. Especially if you are able to tell someone to feed X number of pellets. This would make a great staple for your fish and then supplementing in with other fresh veggies, and frozen or live foods would be great.

To my knowledge danios are omnivores as are the rest of your fish. I don't think there are too many true herbivores out there. Even Plecos and other algae eaters need an amount of protein in their diets.
 
What was the flake fiasco exactly?

I agree, danios are likely insectivores but I haven't looked into it.


I know a lot of people recommend lots of variety but honestly if you have a good staple pellet or flake it has all of the nutrition they need, they are formulated for that purpose. There are exceptions, like when one wants to help induce breeding or conditioning, but generally speaking people feed variety for themselves, not for the fish. By that I mean people think that since we like eating various things, so do the fish, or in the case of feeders they just enjoy watching their fish eat other living things.
 
i feed live BLACK worms. i have a community tank and all the fish (and shrimp) go crazy when they get the worms. i also feed a variety of flake and pellets. i feed live ever other day. unlike frozen food, black worms that aren't eaten will not foul your tank. the worms do take care however. they need to be rinsed every day with treated water. you also have to be careful not to feed any worms that have turned white. you must store them in the refrigerator. live food brings out the colors in your fish and helps them reach their full potential as far as growth. i get mine at" that fish place, that pet place" in lancaster,pa.
 
What was the flake fiasco exactly?

I agree, danios are likely insectivores but I haven't looked into it.


I know a lot of people recommend lots of variety but honestly if you have a good staple pellet or flake it has all of the nutrition they need, they are formulated for that purpose. There are exceptions, like when one wants to help induce breeding or conditioning, but generally speaking people feed variety for themselves, not for the fish. By that I mean people think that since we like eating various things, so do the fish, or in the case of feeders they just enjoy watching their fish eat other living things.

The flake fiasco was when my young cousin asked if she could feed the fish, and like an idiot, I agreed. She proceeded to dump proper sized amount of food in, but of course, as fate would have it- the entire canister fell in. Thankfully none of my fish died in that fiasco.

I'll look into pellets. Any recommended brands?
 
i feed hikari micro wafers. hikari has really great food and my fish love it.
 
New Life Spectrum Thera-A pellets and the make micro pellets for small mouth fish which I use with the larger Thera-A pellets. All my fish love them.
 
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