NLS ingredient change ?

[RD.]

Kmuda, with all due respect, you are living in a fantasy world. The "whole" thing is a complete farce. It's become nothing more than a marketing tool, to fool the ignorant. The only liability issues come down to a guy in a lab wearing a white coat, who is testing for crude protein content. Not "whole" fish meal. LOL Fish meal quality is based on a number of factors, the key ones being the crude protein content, and the amino acid break down. A premium "fish meal" could very easily be of much higher nutrient content compared to a "whole fish" meal. Very easy to manipulate numbers. Ash content isn't even required on a tropical fish food container. There is no argument here, those are the facts. So as you said, you either trust the manufacturer, or you start taking samples to a qualified lab to determine or compare the analysis of the product.

And AAFCO is only part of the equation, for manufacturers shipping to various overseas destinations, including the EU, one has to also have their items APHIS approved. Whole nuther can of worms, but "whole" fish meal is again not a term used, or a requirement by any governing body. Most insects are probably not APHIS approved, or considered GRAS. (generally recognized as safe)

Things are not always as simplistic as they seem on the internet ......

 

[jaws7777]

I have a request, everyone that feeds nls should come back to the thread and post what the first few ingredients are (also include the formula) when the buy new containers. That way we can all compare to see if the changes are on a broader scale. Maybe i should just start a new thread

 

[kmuda]

That's part of the problem, isn't it? Ingredient lists are being utilized for marketing purposes instead defining simple fact. A result of piss-poor guidance along with a desire, in my opinion, by the industry, to keep it that way. To hide inferior product.

Regardless, I can assure you that the way I am interpreting the wording is how the knowledgeable dog food world interprets the wording. While there is very little to no involvement by the fish food consuming public, there is tremendous involvement in the dog world. And when I started down this task all I had was the guidance from that world.

Just because "Whole Salmon Meal" is not defined by AAFCO does not mean it cannot have it's application. Just because AAFCO does not designate a difference between "Herring Meal" and "Whole Herring Meal" does not mean there is not a difference.

But I will agree, and I thought I did specify such earlier, that one companies "Fish Meal" may be a better product that another companies "Whole Herring Meal". The quality of the initial ingredients means everything. But nothing in AAFCO definitions allows for designation of the difference.

And as a general statement, if we took the best possible outcomes, the best possible "Whole Herring Meal" will be a better product that the best "Fish Meal".

 

[joe jaskot]

The whole process of labeling fish food is a farce. I pulled out two containers of NLS - goldfish formula and premium goldfish food. One has a minimum of 34% protein and one has a minimum of 35% protein. Which is better? Here are the top 10 ingredients:
NLS goldfish formula - krill meal, fish meal, wheat flour, amino acids, algae meal, soybean meal, fish oil, beta carotene, spirulina, and vitamins (34% protein min).
NLS premium goldfish formula - Wheat, wheat germ, krill meal, soybean meal, fish oil, fish meal, feather meal, blood meal, spirulina, beta carotene, and marigold pigment (35% protein min.)
Who has fish that eat wheat? soybeans? feathers? blood from land animals? It's all crap, and yet the fish survive.
The amazing part is that the premium food has more crappy ingredients than the ordinary formula. LOL!

 

[pops]

unless you make your own fish food, the way you like it, and not depend on some company to do it, you make a good educated guess and go with it. you will never see USDA stamped on your pellets, they are not for human consumption and are not regulated as such. I like the fish food I feed, and so do my fish.

 

[RD.]

Frank, that won't work too well either, as label changes take a LONG time to reach the masses. Trust me, as a former distributor I used to cringe every time that a change was made.


Joe - soybean meal hasn't been used by New Life in over 15 years. Also, the fact that a fish doesn't eat the exact same thing in the wild, doesn't mean that they can't utilize those ingredients in captivity. Many decades of science has proven this to be true. It's all about balance.

Kmuda, I cut my teeth on dog nutrition 30+ years ago, that's why fish nutrition comes so easily to me. Much of the science can be extrapolated across the board, the difference being is that cat and dog people tend to be fanatical about EVERYTHING involving their pets, fish people not so much. It's understandable, fish can't interact with their human owners in the same manner as say a dog, or a cat.

Most fish owners are more concerned with cost, over quality. I'm referring to the average fish owner/consumer, not those sharpening their skills on fish forums. The average consumer looks at the pretty fish photo on the front of the label, and then the price. Done deal.

The average dog owner probably spends at least some time comparing various brands/formulas, and their ingredients, and then the price. There is a massive world between the two consumers.

Regarding the manufacture and labelling of products, the big difference between the two worlds, is that fish food manufacturers have pretty much had a free pass for a very long time, dog and cat owners not so much. Still, how someone interprets something on a fish food label, has no bearing on what may or may not be taking place behind the scenes. Your interpretation can be just as misleading as what some manufacturers have done, because you are making huge assumptions when you critique many of these foods. I have told you this in the past, it is never safe to assume.

Personally I rely on my many years of experience reading a label, from there it goes to my sense of smell , sometimes taste, then I see how things play out in my tanks with regards to overall digestibility. Then over a longer period I look at growth, color, breeding, overall health & immune response, etc. I am the original sceptic, and everything has to prove itself to me over the long haul, before I start handing out compliments.

One thing that I have learned over the years is that most fish are as tough as nails, even when fed very low quality feed they can often still live for far longer than they would in their native habitat, eating natural foods.

 

[RD.]

Manufacturing plants in the USA are indeed USDA approved, those shipping overseas are required to also be APHIS approved. Just to import food from these facilities (to Canada) the food required a CFIA DVM to inspect it for approval. I posted the following several years ago. http://monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/threads/canadian-food-inspection-regs.306445/#post-3868844

And this .....

Most people have no idea what type of red tape, regulations, and inspections are involved when actually manufacturing pet food, it can be an absolute nightmare for a US based company that has to not only deal with federal regulations, but also each state individually.

In the USA this involves not only the FDA, but also the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), Veterinary Services (VS), and AAFCO.

In many cases these regulations change on a frequent basis. It's gotten to the point that probably the less info one places on their label, the better, or you'll be updating your labels every 6 months. These changes cost $, for larger companies lots of $$$$ , and someone has to eat the cost of outdated labels, and yet another run of new updated labels.

As an example, most states allow Vitamin C to be listed on a pet food label, but all it takes is one overly anal state inspector to decide that it must be listed as ascorbic acid, and you are forced to either remove that listing from your label, or play by their new rules. Even if the vitamin C you are listing is the total content, most comprised from the raw ingredients themselves, not from some vitamin premix. One wrong word or term can equate to your product being disallowed in an entire state, and each state requires a permit just to get your product across their border, and like everything else, you have to pay for that privilege.

And that's just what takes place within the USA, now factor in all of the other various countries that some fish food products are exported to & things can become goofy stupid.

The USA & Canada couldn't give a rats behind with regards to things such as GMO products, but the UK requires additional labeling if the product contains .9% or greater GMO. A country such as Turkey doesn't allow any GMO products, not even if it's as little as .0001%. They use outdated testing equipment that simply tests positive, or negative, and if it's positive your shipment will be refused at their border.


I seriously doubt that fish food will ever come under the same type of scrutiny as dog/cat food, but it doesn't get any free passes either. Having said all that as clockwork suggested the way things currently are there are a number of ways that one can bend the rules & manipulate a fish food label, and some manufacturers do take advantage of these loop holes.

...........................


It always seems so easy, when one isn't actually doing it, just critiquing from the sidelines.

 

[Coryloach]

I bought a NLS container for medium fish a few weeks back. The label says: whole Antarctic krill, whole fish, whole wheat flour, ulva seaweed, chlorella algae, beta carotene, etc.

 

[joe jaskot]

Most people don't know what fish meal is. After the fillets are removed from a fish, the carcass (bones, guts, head, fins, tail) is processed (cooked and dried).

 

[RD.]

All of the smaller oily & bony species of fish, are processed whole, which is what the majority of fish meal is comprised of. Herring, sardines, menhaden, anchovy, pollack, capelin, etc. Not a lot of fish meal is made from processing leftovers. Just another piece of misinformation in this wonderful hobby of ours.

https://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/fa122

Table 2.

"Principal fish species in fishmeal. Most of these fishes are small, bony, with high content of oil, and considered of little edible use (e.g., anchovies, herrings, capelin, menhaden). A small percentage of fishmeal is rendered from fish offal, trimmings or cuttings, and other wastes principally from filleting and canning operations from the edible fisheries (e.g., tuna, cod, haddock, hake, pollock)."