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Best fish food

Sirkavu

Sirkavu

Member
Joined
15 Apr 2018
Messages
212
Location
London
Hey everyone,

I have been wondering lately, what is the best option for fish food.

Initially, I was feeding all my fish with Tetra Flakes. I had 1 Golden Gourami, 2 Zebra Danios, 7 Cardinal Tetra, 1 Otto, and 5 Amano Shrimp. All was good UNTIL I added 2 Juvenile Discus.

I started by adding Prime Granules and, once a day, bloodworms, mainly for the Discus. My Gourami became good friends with the Discus and they hang around quite a lot, peacefully. With this, my Gourami doesn't run to eat the Tetra Flakes anymore (something the Discus do not eat at all. The Gourami and the Discus do enjoy the Prima Granules, but they will eat it through the day unlike the bloodworms - the three of them do go around eating the worm - happily.

So, in order to make sure I am feeding all fish well and enough, I was thinking about what the best food and brands would be for the fish I currently have - and do note I will be adding some Corys this Friday.

Thank you for the help - I have added a picture of the food I have and my Trio too 🙂

Journal -https://www.ukaps.org/forum/threads/renovated-dragon-rock-tank.77051/
 

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Stick with the granules, if they’ll eat that. You could also try bug bites from Fluval. Your corys will need something that sinks to the bottom.

Be careful with the bloodworm that you don’t overfeed. Fish do not need to be fed daily, and bloodworm everyday produces a lot of organic waste in the tank. Feeding every 2-3 days will suffice.
 
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I looked after a Discus fish house for two weeks ,the owner gave feeding instructions occasionally Aquarian flakes ,every day granules might have been Tetra , the fish were in excellent condition
 
You might consider foods that use soldier fly larvae meal (or another insect based meal) or crustacean based meal (krill, etc.) over the majority that rely on fish meal.

Checking for higher quality ingredients is a bit more difficult with European brands because European labelling is different than that in North America. European labels don’t list every ingredient by name as North American labels do.

There are a couple of excellent reasons to favour insect based meals over fish based ones. Practically speaking, they’re a lot cheaper to produce & as production volume increases prices may come down.

Nutritionally speaking, insects & crustaceans are biologically appropriate protein sources for the great majority of the freshwater fish that are typically kept, because they are not piscivores & do eat plenty of insects in varying life stages, along with other invertebrates.

Cereal ingredients should be as low on the ingredient list as possible.

Fish don’t have much use for complex carbohydrates as they preferentially utilize protein & fats for energy, not carbohydrates like we do. They can digest carbohydrates but any caloric excess will be stored as fat & excessive carbohydrates can cause health problems.

Generally speaking, foods containing complex carbohydrates are relatively scarce underwater so they aren’t a class of nutrient that fish evolved to use, though certainly some species eat seeds & fruit when they are available, but their availability is seasonal.

Worms are high in protein & generally high in fat - great for raising fry, not so much as a dietary staple for adult fish with the exception of the few vermivorous species.

Bloodworms are insect larvae of course and it isn’t clear why they pose problems for some species - most fish love them. But for certain fish (Dario, Badis, some anabantids) they seem to lead to obesity if fed in any great amount. They aren’t all that fatty so why this is the case is not well understood.

It’s too bad that the labels don’t specify which types of algae were included because kelp is the very best source for some vital nutrients such as beta carotene, which is a critically important nutrient for immune system function (not just for fish either) & secondarily for enhancement of colouring. Spirulina is good also.

Crustaceans provide a lot of other important carotenoids like astaxanthin & its relatives as well.

Fact is that fish meals are becoming more & more expensive & less & less sustainable.

They require the addition of antioxidants so they won’t spontaneously combust if transported by sea. Though Europe no longer permits the use of the questionable antioxidant Ethoxyquin, which is still used over here, I’m not sure what is used in its place.

Rosemary extract is a much better replacement but is more costly & unfortunately such specific details about ingredients in fish foods are often not disclosed.

Manmade dry foods cannot be manufactured without a certain percentage of complex carbohydrates, which are what allow an extrudable or flakeable dough to be created & one that will have a long enough shelf life. So cereals are a necessary component of dry foods for any species.

Personally, I prefer to offer fish as much live food, be it prey based or algae or plant based, as I possibly can & use manmade foods as a supplement rather than a staple.

I know that doing so isn’t practical for a lot of keepers but when dry foods are the staple diet, I think it’s worthwhile to get the ones with the best & highest quality ingredients possible.
 
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Hi all,
@Fishfur, that is a good, informative, post.
Fishfur said:
You might consider foods that use soldier fly larvae meal ........ Nutritionally speaking, insects & crustaceans are biologically appropriate protein sources for the great majority of the freshwater fish that are typically kept, because they are not piscivores & do eat plenty of insects in varying life stages, along with other invertebrates.
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I think that is part of the reason that fish do well on (and enjoy) "Repashy" gels - <"Repashy Soylent Green"> and Bug Bites - <"https://fluvalaquatics.com/uk/shop/product/bug-bites"> - <"Experienced fish keepers: What are you feeding your fish?">.
Fishfur said:
Personally, I prefer to offer fish as much live food, be it prey based or algae or plant based, as I possibly can & use manmade foods as a supplement rather than a staple.
Click to expand...
<"Same for me">.

cheers Darrel
 
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Thank you all so much for the input!! 😀 There is So much great information here!!!

Following up on some advise, I am going to buy the below food:
-Bug Bites Tropical Flakes
-Stick On Glass Tablets - Spirulina (for my Otto)
-Original Cubed Just Blackworm from TA Aquaculture

I think this would be the base of feeding all my fish. I am thinking of doing Bloodworm every Monday; Blackworm every Thursday and then a daily dose of Bug bites flakes.
Every Friday I will buy some live food from the nearest AFS and feed them to the fish on Saturdays.

Fishfur said:
Checking for higher quality ingredients is a bit more difficult with European brands because European labelling is different than that in North America. European labels don’t list every ingredient by name as North American labels do.
Click to expand...
Good and interesting to know that. But thank you for the whole information. I will make sure to always read on labels now and try to get a high-protein food, which I hope the above is great.
Regarding live food, tomorrow I will check at my local AFS and see what they sell and hopefully, they have a good range of live food so I can keep my fish happy and with good and nutritional food.
 
hypnogogia said:
Stock with the granules, if they’ll eat that. You could also try bug bites from Fluval. Your corys will need something that sinks to the bottom.

Be careful with the bloodworm that you don’t overfeed. Fish do not need to be fed daily, and bloodworm everyday produces a lot of organic waste in the tank. Feeding every 2-3 days will suffice.
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Thank you. I will do that regarding to bloodworms 😀
dw1305 said:
I think that is part of the reason that fish do well on (and enjoy) "Repashy" gels - <"Repashy Soylent Green"> and Bug Bites - <"https://fluvalaquatics.com/uk/shop/product/bug-bites"> - <"Experienced fish keepers: What are you feeding your fish?">.
Click to expand...
Thank you again Darrel - Will have a look at the Repashy Soylent Green one as well and see if I can get it in my local AFS.
 
Hi all,
Sirkavu said:
Will have a look at the Repashy Soylent Green one as well and see if I can get it in my local AFS
Click to expand...
I'm not sure what will happen with the "<"tariff wars">" (and before that <"Brexit">- <"Show us your Maintenance Cart!">), it is an American product. I'll be honest <"I'm too mean"> to have ever tried any of his (<"Allen Repashy">) products.
dw1305 said:
....... Old fashioned scientific <"spirit thermometers"> are the way forward. A cheap product with one moving part, no electronics and good for all of eternity. In fact it might be a product for my <"luddite range of aquarium tat"> ......
Click to expand...

Also "Soylent" should be "Soilent" in <"Repashy Soylent Green">, I think you can still get them online a the moment - <"Fish Products Archives">?

cheers Darrel
 
While on the topic of best fish food, is it possible to feed our fish a diet of entirely live/whole foods? I have been converting my fish to a primarily live foods diet, but I wonder how will I know when I have added enough variety to meet all their nutritional needs? Perhaps I underestimate the variety they get in the wild. Currently I am culturing, blackworms, microfex, moina, daphnia, and fruit flies. I plan on adding more cultures, next on my list are springtails and scuds. But I suppose I can technically gut load some of these live foods with fish food.
 
Hi all,
RickyV said:
While on the topic of best fish food, is it possible to feed our fish a diet of entirely live/whole foods?
Click to expand...
It is, but you need a range of food types available. At one point I only fed the fish live food, but it meant maintaining a <"vestigial winged Drosophila melanogaster"> culture etc.

The problem I've had is that in the winter I've been <"worm heavy"> and I'm pretty sure this hasn't been good for some of the fish. When I go down the <"Dicrossus / Apistogramma"> route again, they are going to get a lot more Crangonyx - <"Crangonyx as an algae eater"> in their diet.

I think most people who keep Dwarf Cichlids etc., and feed mainly live food, feed Baby Brine Shrimp <"What dry food should I feed my Apistos?"> as a staple.

cheers Darrel
 
Yeah, I can still order some online but didn't find on my local AFS. I did get some Daphnia, and next week I will get some Brine - live food. I have been thinking about culture some Daphnia, I read that it is not as difficult? My Gourami really loves them and the Discus not as much haha
I have ordered the Bug bites, FD blackworm and the stick-on glass spirulina for my Otto.
My corys and cherry shrimp were also added today
 
nijat11 said:
I use tetramin flakes, tetramin granules, hikari vibra bites flual bug bites and some algae wafers for plecos. So far so good.
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You might want to reconsider those Hikari Vibra Bites. Assuming the formula in Europe is the same as in North America, they are not great quality.

North American labels are supposed to list ingredients in order of quantity by weight.

The ingredient list -

Fish meal, krill meal, wheat flour, flaked corn, brewers dried yeast, cuttlefish meal, wheat germ meal, wheat gluten meal, fish oil, whole crushed silkworm pupae, hydrolyzed vegetable sucrose polyesters, ｍealworm, astaxanthin, ...

Vibra Bites have a LOT of cereals - wheat flour, gluten & germ meal plus flaked corn. The separated grain fractions make it possible to conceal high levels of cereals, as if the ‘wheat ingredients’ were listed as a single entry, then wheat might end up first on the list & that looks bad & is bad for fish.

The better sounding ingredients, like silk worm pupae, mealworm, & cuttlefish meal are so low on the list the actual content is pretty much negligible.

Additionally, this food, as do some others by Hikari, contain an ingredient that bugs me personally. The ingredient? - hydrolyzed vegetable sucrose polyesters - aka Olestra.

Ever hear of Olestra? It’s a synthetic fat. It was originally created in a lab somewhere.

Olestra was meant to make low or no fat snack foods possible, (among other things), for the fat & calorie conscious - notably potato chips.

But if the snacker eats too much of anything made with Olestra (which is all too common for so many of us) digestive distress that’s reportedly extremely unpleasant ensues.

Olestra is 100% unabsorbable & indigestible for humans (possibly not for some other species, such as chickens). In fish food & cosmetics among other products, HVSP serves as an emulsifier.

There are plenty of perfectly good non-synthetic emulsifiers out there so I’m afraid I fail to understand why this stuff still exists.

Perhaps it’s not so bad as an emulsifier, but the entire concept of its manufacture just gives me the creeps.

Regardless of the HVSP, there are vastly better quality fish foods out there than Vibra Bites.
 
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Fishfur said:
You might want to reconsider those Hikari Vibra Bites. Assuming the formula in Europe is the same as in North America, they are not great quality.

North American labels are supposed to list ingredients in order of quantity by weight.

The ingredient list -

Fish meal, krill meal, wheat flour, flaked corn, brewers dried yeast, cuttlefish meal, wheat germ meal, wheat gluten meal, fish oil, whole crushed silkworm pupae, hydrolyzed vegetable sucrose polyesters, ｍealworm, astaxanthin, ...

Vibra Bites have a LOT of cereals - wheat flour, gluten & germ meal plus flaked corn. The separated grain fractions make it possible to conceal high levels of cereals, as if the ‘wheat ingredients’ were listed as a single entry, then wheat might end up first on the list & that looks bad & is bad for fish.

The better sounding ingredients, like silk worm pupae, mealworm, & cuttlefish meal are so low on the list the actual content is pretty much negligible.

Additionally , this food, as do some others by Hikari, contain an ingredient that bugs me personally. The ingredient - hydrolyzed vegetable sucrose polyesters - aka Olestra.

Ever hear of Olestra? It’s a synthetic fat. It was originally created in a lab somewhere.

Olestra was meant to make low or no fat snack foods possible, (among other things), for the fat & calorie conscious - notably potato chips.

But if the snacker eats too much of anything made with Olestra (which is all too common for so many of us) digestive distress that’s reportedly extremely unpleasant ensues.

Olestra is 100% unabsorbable & indigestible for humans (possibly not for some other species, such as chickens). In fish food & cosmetics among other products, HVSP serves as an emulsifier.

There are plenty of perfectly good non-synthetic emulsifiers out there so I’m afraid I fail to understand why this stuff still exists.

Perhaps it’s not so bad as an emulsifier, but the entire concept of its manufacture just gives me the creeps.

Regardless of the HVSP, there are vastly better quality fish foods out there than Vibra Bites.
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Thank you for the detailed information. I will stop feeding this one.
 
Onoma1 said:
Soilent Green is still available on-line: Soilent Green
Rather expensive but my experience has been that it is a superb food or ottos and other algae eaters. Other nano fish also pick up the bits spread around as the ottos eat it.
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Noice! Thank you - I got some and will see how it works.

It's incredible how much we learn and how every small detail makes a different
 
I started buying from Herons Pet World foods a while ago online. As was looking for alternatives to the Price of Tetra Crispa and vibra bites etc.
And have been using them for over a year now. I can buy all the foods i prefer without the cost of branded names.
I buy the Premium Flake Mix, Cichlid Granules, Discus & Crisps and then mix it in a tub for feed.
 
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