5+1 Irwini catfish
- Thread starter thebiggerthebetter
- Start date
Sorry to see it go, but 15 years is still a great accomplishment.
Is there any plant content to the pellets you feed? I've found that even carnivorous catfish eat them with gusto, and I've used them to slim down fish when they've grown too fatty. The "algae wafers" marketed for fish still contain a significant amount of protein and fat, but there are livestock supplements for cows and horses that are essentially pure blocks of algae.
Is there any plant content to the pellets you feed? I've found that even carnivorous catfish eat them with gusto, and I've used them to slim down fish when they've grown too fatty. The "algae wafers" marketed for fish still contain a significant amount of protein and fat, but there are livestock supplements for cows and horses that are essentially pure blocks of algae.
C
Conchonius
It sounds like a nice common sense approach but I didn't understand what exact feed you used to slim down your fish. Was it the algae wafers, which you appear to imply are not devoid enough of protein and fat, or the cattle/horse supplements, or else?
Usually pellets and wafers etc. include or are coated with some processed shrimp or fish flavor to make them more attractive and palatable to fish, so fish do not realize what's inside the pellet - plant or animal matter, aquatic or terrestrial, good, bad or the ugly.
The generalist NLS pellets we use do contain a significant portion of algae. I'll assume by plant content you don't mean terrestrial legumes, wheat, corn, etc. because all cheap pellets are made of those and I assume that's what led to unhealthy fat deposits in our irwini.
Could you possibly please fetch a link or a few to the cattle and horse supplements you mention so we could do some homework?
Usually pellets and wafers etc. include or are coated with some processed shrimp or fish flavor to make them more attractive and palatable to fish, so fish do not realize what's inside the pellet - plant or animal matter, aquatic or terrestrial, good, bad or the ugly.
The generalist NLS pellets we use do contain a significant portion of algae. I'll assume by plant content you don't mean terrestrial legumes, wheat, corn, etc. because all cheap pellets are made of those and I assume that's what led to unhealthy fat deposits in our irwini.
Could you possibly please fetch a link or a few to the cattle and horse supplements you mention so we could do some homework?
I used the human-grade dietary supplement tabs here (link in Turkish but should be easy to understand), which despite not having feed stimulants were taken by assorted plecos (Hypancistrus L201, Hemiancistrus L106, Peckoltia L387), cories and Synodontis eupterus (the target of the "diet"). The tabs are supposedly pure algal biomass with no filler material.
In contrast, the Tetra pleco wafers (for example) list their ingredients as follows: Cereals, vegetable protein extracts, derivatives of vegetable origin, yeasts, oils and fats, algae (Ascophyllum nodosum 3.0%, spirulina 0.9 %), minerals. As you mention, "vegetable derivatives" (possibly crop residues, soybean meal or similar low-quality plant material) are probably not very healthy for fish.
I mentioned the horse and cattle supplements because of the economy of scale: a bottle of tabs (around 120 grams) costs about $25 and lasts for a couple months for my small tanks, but you work with far greater volumes and it might be advantageous to buy the cheaper livestock versions. I have not tried them but they are also primarily algal biomass, or at least advertise themselves as such (e.g. here). I should have clarified this in my initial post.
I feed the supplement tabs alongside frozen foods, artemia eggs/hatchlings, zucchini and Sera spirulina wafers, which have a lower terrestrial plant content (but still have wheat flour in their ingredient list). Of course, part of this is because quality fish food is harder to obtain in my country. If the fish are on high-quality pellets now, there is no such issue and no need to experiment with human- or livestock-grade foods.
