Today's Weird Question: Red Flake Food

[Allivymar]

Ok, I have noticed all my fish seem to not like the red colored flake in any flake food I've bought. Its the last color flake eaten, and I've often seen that color flake spit out in preference to other color flakes which are inhaled. Myriam mentioned in another post her fish also seem to not like the red flakes.

Is it just us? Has anyone else noticed this? I don't know whether this is coincidence, or there is something in the red dye that turns the fish off, but I'm not gonna research it until I know its more then just the 2 of us.

 

[possum]

My fish did the same thing. I had african cichlids and they would not touch the red ones. They usually got eaten by the synodontis catfish i had.

 

[dralarms]

My main tank fish will eat anything lol. I mean some of them try and eat other fishes crap. But anyway back to my problem My son bought some Tetra "Bettamin" for his new betta, he stuck his nose up at it, so Itried it on mine, (all 3 of them) and they all passed on it too. it is red flakes. Guess I can use it to start a new tank cycling. I can put a few dried blood worms in there and watch out, they will try and take your finger off.

 

[myriam]

Hmm

Ok, at least I know it's not just me or my picky fish!

Is the red caused by a dye in the food? Or is it a specific ingredient? Hard to tell by just looking at the ingredient list.

It seems impossible to separate the flakes out...is it pretty bad for a lot of that red food to end up in the gravel? Even my piggy Cories don't touch it.

 

[Willie]

My fish usually go for teh lighter colors first, like tans and yellows, then to red. I guess that bettas are suspose to like teh color yellow, but I don;t feed them flakes. But my other fish seem to like yellow, except for teh mollies, the piggish mollies will eat anything!!
Willie

 

[sweetsuvvyb]

Hmm...I just looked on my flakes...looks like it's just good ol' red dye...shouldn't have any flavor...but my guess would be that maybe it has to do with how fish perceive color. It could be that (a) they can't see the red food as easily, or (b) they don't necessarily recognize red as a food color.

These are just guesses....my fish eat pretty much anything, red or no!

 

[Sinuhe]

I have the opposite problem: my danios will eat the red flakes first, and kind of overlook the others, until there are no red ones left, and they turn to any food they can find

 

[Allivymar]

LOL Your fish would do things bass ackwards Sinuhe Seriously tho, what brand are you using? I'm becoming more n more curious about this as there are at least 4 folks here who have noticed the red flake weirdness; can you folks also list the brands?

I don't think its a color issue; mostly because at least in my case, its not as if they ignore it till last; they bite it and spit it out. Yet I see my neons for example, zipping around the tank with the other color flakes in their mouths munching on em. I've noticed this with neons, angelfish and dwarf gouramis...

 

[Guest]

I have noticed this too. I have no explanation for it either, but my cories will eat it.

It can't totally be color, because I also feed Tetramin Color Bits, they are entirely red, and are eaten with much gusto by everyone. this food is not flake, more like little nuggets. I crush up about half of it when feeding, because it is too big for small fish. All fish go nuts for it, except my new puffers.

 

[PlatyLady]

Good observation! My fish go for brown first, and I never really noticed anything after that. But, the flakes that fall to the bottom are red... never noticed before. Today, I crumbled the flakes up smaller than usual, and noticed no difference in preference. Maybe they can't tell colour if it's small.

 

[flamron]

It seems that my cichlids are the opposite as well. They prefer the red flakes over green. I am feeding them omega one. They won't even eat the green flakes. They spit them out and they get sucked in the filter. My other fish don't seem to care at all (55 gallon). One of life's great mysteries I guess.

 

[Madame_X]

Ya know, if it is red dye, its possible that it has a bitter taste they don't like.

Any of you 30-somethings (like me!) remember when they stopped making red M&M's way back when? The pulled all the candy and everything with red dye #5 off the shelf. I think they found out it caused cancer. Ever since then, all the candy with a really red shell has a funny taste.

Suck on a non-red M&M, then try a red one. I think you'll notice a slightly funny taste to the red dye. To me, its kinda "chemical-ly".

 

[Megalofyia]

See and my friends think I'm nuts for saying the different M&M colors taste different.

 

[Sinuhe]

The brand of the flake food I'm using is Tropical Supervit, apparently a Polish brand . You probably don't have that in the Northern America. It's said to have 8 different flakes, but when thrown in the water, I can only tell about 3 different colors, and all the reddish ones are the most popular.

 

[myriam]

Flakey

The one I have is Nutrafin Tropical flakes. I tried what somebody said on this thread, and crushed the flakes all up together--this actually got the fishies eating all the flakes w/o regard to color. But any flakes that are a bit larger--where the redness is more visible--end up floating to the bottom. The cories sniff at it and keep going; once they can't find anything else to eat they come back and eat that.

 

[stew]

My 2 molleys don't like red flakes either, they would go up to them then ether spit em out or turn away. They wouldnt touch em until the settled on the gravel and changed a pinkish white.

I'm still experimenting with food, but its good to know other peoples fish don't like red flakes.

 

[Allivymar]

Ok, so its not just one brand of flake; I've found it to happen with Tetra flakes as well as with Omega One. Curiouser and curiouser...

I may email a coupla companys to see what they say. When I do, and if they respond, I'll let you folks know