Flowerhorn food

[RD.]

My FH lifespan varied, but I think that the longest lived one was 6 years or so? So after that I shifted to non designer fish, and raised this male midas from a 3" juvie, to his current 13-14" TL. His father was a creamsicle from Don Conkel, and his mother a red specimen from Jeff Rapps. No line breeding involved. He is now almost 8 yrs of age, and no sign of slowing down. He still acts like he's in his prime. Raised exclusively on pellets, and no high protein foods! lol

 

[Ruturaj]

My FH lifespan varied, but I think that the longest lived one was 6 years or so? So after that I shifted to non designer fish, and raised this male midas from a 3" juvie, to his current 13-14" TL. His father was a creamsicle from Don Conkel, and his mother a red specimen from Jeff Rapps. No line breeding involved. He is now almost 8 yrs of age, and no sign of slowing down. He still acts like he's in his prime. Raised exclusively on pellets, and no high protein foods! lol

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6 years in your care is definitely short. This guy is lovely and huge, I don't think I ever saw 13-14 inch cichlid except in Georgia aquarium, I really liked your red texas too. I think health is most neglected factor in flowerhorn keepers, don't know why everyone is fixated on hump size. Just got this comment on reddit on my flowerhorn picture

"beautiful colors, but not a big head, i like ones that have bgg ig nuchal humps, looks like a king kamfa to me"

I think a hump size a midas or vieja cichlid will naturally, not the ones which are selectively bred, get is a right sized hump, that's just my opinion though. I wonder how long the craze would last.

 

[Ruturaj]

Found this awesome paper that conducted a study on protein requirements of Cichlasoma Synspilum. Since one of this that was used to make blood parrot (which were used to make flowehorns) and is used to make kamfas is Cichlasoma Synspilum/Redhead cichlid/Vieja melanura the fish is very similar to a flowerhorn biologically. You might be already familiar with the paper already but thought it might be a good share with everyone on forum and share what I understood from it.

Here's what I took from it:
Looking at the protein efficiency ratio, most of the protein above 40% was not actually used by fish and I assume the weight gain was from lipids. The survival rate is significantly lower on foods with more than 40% protein and I would not sacrifice that for faster growth, as you have said

IMO this hobby is all about patience, and measuring success in years, not weeks, or months.

Attaching the screenshots of the research paper The dietary protein requirements of Cichlasoma synspilum Hubbs, 1935 (Pisces: Cichlidae) fry.

Reference: Olevera-Novoa MA, Gasca-Leyva E, Martinez-Palacios CA. The dietary protein requirements of Cichlasoma synspilum Hubbs, 1935 (Pisces: Cichlidae) fry. Aquacult Res 1996; 27(3):167-173.