[DIY] Cichla Food : Cheap, fast and simple way. [FIXED]

[DEVIANT NATION]

Just wanted to report the success of this method.

I've been using this for about 1 month now and the fish loves it. I feel better about this method because,
1. I know for sure what is going in to the fish food.
2. It is cheaper than the branded fish food.
3. Fish eat it without a fuss.
4. I can add a huge variety of stuff with this approach. When I was feeding them frozen the fish would only get used to a couple of varieties and won't take anything else. In a typical batch I add at least 5 varieties of fish fillets and it keeps on changing depending on what I buy for our home consumption in a given week.

I thought of putting some pictures of the process. It is pretty much same as Lucas showed.

1. What goes in. Shrimp is there every time, others can vary from batch to batch.
View attachment 995487

2. After the blender. I figured that if I make it too fine in the blender, the water will get cloudy when fish eat it. With grinding to a lesser extent the clouding problem is reduced.
View attachment 995491

3. After adding the gelatin mix.
View attachment 995493

4. Ready to go in to the freezer.
View attachment 995494

Sometimes I add pieces of massivore in to the mix. I have two bags on Kens fish food arriving this week. I am not very sure whether this is needed though.
I add small whole fish and fish fillets in to the mix. I am also not sure whether I need to add vitamins and greens to the mixture too.

I have to admit that the pellets are super convenient though, just get them out of the tin and put them in. With this I have to make it myself but 15 minutes, once in two weeks is nothing to complain about.

Thanks Lucas for suggesting this.

So do you put that whole fish in and blend it up head and all? And I am guessing that you peel the shrimp, is this true?

 

[cpm6t]

So do you put that whole fish in and blend it up head and all? And I am guessing that you peel the shrimp, is this true?

The smaller fish go in as whole in to the blender (head, tail, whatever inside etc). The shrimp also goes in with shell as shown in the picture. (only the head is taken off). I thought that would be closer to how they would eat in wild (rather than taking parts off)

 

[Chizzle]

Nice work and your kelberi are gorgeous, though I prefer MonsterPeacock's method. His is a dry pellet and therefore no need to keep it frozen. It also holds up very well and even floats.

 

[cpm6t]

Nice work and your kelberi are gorgeous, though I prefer MonsterPeacock's method. His is a dry pellet and therefore no need to keep it frozen. It also holds up very well and even floats.

Thanks for pointing the dry method too. I didn't know about that, just read it fully. I think it is worth trying out too, since it has the "dry pellet convenience" factor.

There were several concerns about nutrition value holding up during drying/baking raised in that thread. I wonder whether the same concerns are present in the gelatin based method too? Can somebody please share the opinion?

 

[DEVIANT NATION]

The smaller fish go in as whole in to the blender (head, tail, whatever inside etc). The shrimp also goes in with shell as shown in the picture. (only the head is taken off). I thought that would be closer to how they would eat in wild (rather than taking parts off)

Good to know, thanks for the info. I really want to try this.

 

[Lucas Fontenele]

I dont really know the amount of vitamin loss in the baking method. But I agree it's more water quality friendly. Anyway I'd rather do this gelatin method because it's faster and easier for the small amount of time I have, my fish love this soft sinking pellet (they hate dry/hard pellets and take hours to swallow it) and I also have small fish density and high water change rates.

Thanks for the compliments Chizzle. Thank you too for giving a try, Cpmt.