Fish Health Through Proper Nutrition

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by xJake


So, in conclusion, I've gotten my point across, or at least I hope. Feeding vitamins and dosing trace elements to maintain fish health is all fine and dandy, but I still haven't seen any demonstrations of conclusive evidence that it is a requirement of captive husbandry. This holds especially true when you examine the nutritional content of the many of the foods I've listed. Some are better than others, but as long as one feeds a variety of these food to their fishes, then a healthy nutritional input can be achieved.

I suppose I should specify that when I say "I feed w/e is available..." it's not as if I simply pick at random for each fish, because obviously that would never achieve a nutritionally complete diet. I am more selective about what I feed to which fish, with respect to what their diet is in the wild. I'm simply trying to say that vitamin supplements, while potentially useful, are unnecessary as long as a varied and natural diet is maintained.

As for whether trace element dosing is vital to a fish's health, I'm still not convinced that the uptake of these minor elements is significant enough to prompt everyone to begin dosing seemingly random amounts of trace elements that are provided from commercially available supplements. From my experience, there is no necessity to do this as long as relatively regular water changes are performed with a high quality salt mix.

Jake, one of our oldest successfull reefers on here PaulB maintains the secret to feeding fish healthy is feeding them live food----brine shrimp, black worms, whole silversides. He also states that a key component missing in their diet is the oils---in the wild they eat all the specimen including the guts which are laden with oils and minerals ect.

[Paul B]

Capn, when you say brine shrimp, you need to say new born brine shrimp

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by Paul B
Capn, when you say brine shrimp, you need to say new born brine shrimp

thank you great mentor

Paul, can you post the two pictures here of your shrimp and worm breeders.
This is my project for next week.

alot of people here feed live gold fish to their lion fish and predators. I was thinking of using very small minnows---would they contain enough nutrition for marine fish.

[Paul B]

Capn, only if they are salt water minnows

Worm keeper



Shrimp hatchery and shell seperator

[Insane Reefer]

Originally posted by capn_hylinur
...alot of people here feed live gold fish to their lion fish and predators. I was thinking of using very small minnows---would they contain enough nutrition for marine fish.

I kept a lion fish for 3 years (before trading him in) on converted Mollies - they can easily be acclimated to salt water conditions, (so they live on until the predators do catch them), they are "smooth", so you don't end up with "scale snow", which with lions is a bit of a problem as they "scale" the minnows and gold fish as they suck them down and as an added bonus, mollies breed like mad. I would "gut load" the mollies with vitamin treated food just before dropping them in the lion's tank.

Not really sure about the nutritional content of mollies (or the others), but the gut loaded food seemed to work well...

[Paul B]

I have also kept them on mollies which are really brackish fish and "probably" contain some of the essential oils that a saltwater fish needs. I really don't know but although 3 years is OK they really should be few full saltwater fish as a staple diet. Of course mollies can be used as you found out. Goldfish can also be used in an emergency. Goldfish won't kill a lionfish but it's like feeding yourself cornflakes, you will live for a few years but probably not in the best health.

[eyesinthedrk]

paulB, down here on the louisiana gulf coast people do a lot of red fish fishing. So as my coworkers come back to the shop with their catch (they all park their boats at the shop). After they cut their filet's, i ask them to leave me the biggest carcass. I'll take the guts and a little bit of flesh and freeze it into a brick. Then i run the brick over a cheese grater for a feeding portion as needed

since we don't have salt water feeders here and most of my fish are too small for silver sides. Does this should like its good idea for giving my fish the essential vitamins or is the whole freezing part negating any benefit

this is something ive been feeding on a rotation with may other items including table shrimp, frozen mysis, and a few types offlake and pellet food

[Paul B]

Boy, that sounds messy. If they will eat those guts it would be better than many foods but don't feed all guts which are very rich.
Of course a complete fish would be better to eat but in Lieu of that, your gut meal sounds plausable. Does that stay together enough for them to eat it?
The only mineral they will be missing from that would be calcium which is in fish bones.
The things we do for our fish.

Since this is Lee's thread you should ask his opinion.
We sometimes have different opinions

[eyesinthedrk]

i'll take any and every opinion

its not as bad as it sounds, just like cleaning the fish instead of throwing the guts in the trash you stick it in a zip lock bag, fold it up and toss it in the freezer, the frozen fish gut brick makes it easy to handle and use on the cheese grater,

i know you have said (typed) in the past that the liver and other guts have the nutrition that most prepaired foods are lacking, so when i see the guys tossing the carcasses of 24" red fish i remembered your advice and decided to recycle,

see im going green too

[Insane Reefer]

Originally posted by eyesinthedrk

its not as bad as it sounds, just like cleaning the fish instead of throwing the guts in the trash you stick it in a zip lock bag, fold it up and toss it in the freezer, the frozen fish gut brick makes it easy to handle and use on the cheese grater,

Find yourself a garage sale blender (or processor), and do away with hand grating. Just give the gut brick a few whacks with a hammer or hand maul to chunk it up, and then toss it in the blender and chop it as fine as you need (this is easier and produces better results if the material is frozen to begin with). Put that back in the ziplock, sort of smooth it out to make a thin sheet, refreeze, and your feeding time will be less nasty and quicker - you should be able to break off the pieces you need with your fingers...

[Insane Reefer]

sorry - double post

[unleashed13]

i really agree with the original poster about the dietary needs needing to be met.however i highly disagree with the use of brine shrimp , broccoli, lettuce etc other than the broccoli the others have no nutritional value to them at all for sw fish .lettuce barely has any for humans.. as for prepackaged foods if you read you ingredients and know what your fish needs you can find a happy medium for everyone including your wallet.. as for the spectrum pellets I did my research on these a few yrs back compaired ingredients to other popular brands.I researched from websites of each food and compared each and found that spectrum pellets to be the most beneficial and balanced to most fishes daily needs made from real marine life ingredients ...we spend hundreds to thousands of dollars on these fish.between the cost of the tanks equipment everything then the price of each fish in general .. why would you skimp on the most important factors of nutrition.. you dont have to go broke feeding them properly but unless your buying plastic fish you do need to feed them what they need.

if you don't know the answer ask a question however the best answers are always found by doing your own research

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by eyesinthedrk
i'll take any and every opinion

its not as bad as it sounds, just like cleaning the fish instead of throwing the guts in the trash you stick it in a zip lock bag, fold it up and toss it in the freezer, the frozen fish gut brick makes it easy to handle and use on the cheese grater,

i know you have said (typed) in the past that the liver and other guts have the nutrition that most prepaired foods are lacking, so when i see the guys tossing the carcasses of 24" red fish i remembered your advice and decided to recycle,

see im going green too

A cheese grater---that's the secret I have been looking for
I made a blender batch using whole silver sides, fresh octopus, shrimp, oyster, spirulae algae, vita chem--you name it I put it in there.(actually I followed what Paul ate for a week and chucked it in there )
I put it in ice cube trays but gave up feeding it because it would just mush if I thawed it out making a mess in the tank.

The cheese grater idea---will do great er should I say "grate"

[eyesinthedrk]

capn yes that is the reason i use a cheese grater over a blended mix, the grater feeds small meaty chunks rather than the fish flesh smoothie, also by keeping the meat (or guts) whole after a min or two out of the freezer i can break off a nice chunk to feed my anemone,

warning dont use the old school 4 sided cheese grater, it will be a cleaning nightmare, use a little two sided deal

[Insane Reefer]

Originally posted by eyesinthedrk
...the grater feeds small meaty chunks rather than the fish flesh smoothie...

That's why I said that frozen material works best for blending - less smoothie and more bits. Also, pulse the machine, don't run it full bore.
I get great food this way - I found for me, that the grater made too much of a mush with the small holes (I'm feeding a tiny blenny) and the large holes made too big of a chunk for the little guy to swallow.

For those worried about "pollution", here's a tip.
After blending the food stuffs, put them in a fine wire sieve, and then put that in a bowl. Fill bowl with RO water, swirl the foodie bits and then pull the sieve. Most of the "ick" will be left in the bowl for disposal, and you will be left with clean, good food in the sieve.

As Alton Brown might say, leaving the fish with "Good Eats"....

[Aquarist007]

I hope my wife our are wives if applicable here, are not reading these posts

[Insane Reefer]

Originally posted by capn_hylinur
I hope my wife our are wives if applicable here, are not reading these posts

I AM the Wife

[illsquaddotcom]

Thanks for putting this thread together, my new powder brown tang has some ich and I'm hoping to help him fight it off with some good nutrition, he's going on your hebivore recos as soon as he wakes up.....

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by Insane Reefer
I AM the Wife

great to know---do you allow yourself to use "your" washing machine to wash dirty filter socks?

[Aquarist007]

Originally posted by illsquaddotcom
Thanks for putting this thread together, my new powder brown tang has some ich and I'm hoping to help him fight it off with some good nutrition, he's going on your hebivore recos as soon as he wakes up.....

ich----you might want to have a look at this thread

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...readid=1500214

and or this blog
http://www.reefcentral.com/wp/?p=286

[bzuka]

Oh i think it's too difficult how to find the time to do it all

[wooden_reefer]

IMO, the extent to which nutrition is important against diseases should not be overstated.

The extent to which this is true is obvious. Many diseases that are internal, such as internal bacterial infection, fungal infection are strongly related to nutrition and water chemical quality.

This is so obvious that perhaps most people need not be reminded.

One very important consideration in this hobby is the closed nature of the tank. That is the lack of the dilution effect of the ocean. This is a very important consideration that should not be overlooked. In fact, it is hard to overstate this consideration.

Just think, even the most healthy and young people can get sick. If one is exposed to new patheogens, nutrition does not always help. This is in realtion to many external bacterial infections.

In regard to ich, nutrition link with ich is fickle. May be that the first fish in a tank get ich infestation due to stress (may be, even this is questionable), but such a fish will harbor and breed ich to such a high level that immunity can no longer be the issue.

Nutrition and disease is a rather limited link.

[Aquarist007]

Originally Posted by wooden_reefer

IMO, the extent to which nutrition is important against diseases should not be overstated.

The extent to which this is true is obvious. Many diseases that are internal, such as internal bacterial infection, fungal infection are strongly related to nutrition and water chemical quality.

This is so obvious that perhaps most people need not be reminded.

One very important consideration in this hobby is the closed nature of the tank. That is the lack of the dilution effect of the ocean. This is a very important consideration that should not be overlooked. In fact, it is hard to overstate this consideration.

Just think, even the most healthy and young people can get sick. If one is exposed to new patheogens, nutrition does not always help. This is in realtion to many external bacterial infections.

In regard to ich, nutrition link with ich is fickle. May be that the first fish in a tank get ich infestation due to stress (may be, even this is questionable), but such a fish will harbor and breed ich to such a high level that immunity can no longer be the issue.

Nutrition and disease is a rather limited link.

Good post and to add the importance of quarantining all new purchases, observing/treating in the appropriate manner, before adding them anywhere in the water column.

[Paul B]

one of our oldest successfull reefers on here PaulB

Who you calling old?

I just read Lees original first post from 3 or 4 years ago and he is correct.
I agree with the entire thing. And I rarely agree with anything (especially if Waterkeeper says it) (I really do but I don't let him know, he never reads this stuff anyway, I think he has ghost writers)

Anyway as I have said many times, fish are not people. We can live for 70 or so years on a diet of beer and potato chips (as the Capn does) with very few problems, We may get fat and have an assortment of health problems but looking at us, we may still appear to be healthy.
Fish are quite different. I feel that fish live in good health because of the foods that they eat. Their immune system is limited to diseases that they would encounter in the sea and not really made for aquarium stresses with our fake water and companions from all over the globe.
Like humans they may appear to be healthy but we can't see their immune systems. I don't feel their immune systems will work 100% unless we give them the proper food. Now I know our Mother's always said to us that we need to eat our vegetables to be strong and healthy and that may not be true in humans but fish need the foods they were designed to eat.
Feeding fish a variety of food is no better if the food they need is not in there in sufficient quantities. Copperband butterflies can possably be fed a mixture of pellets, kelp, fish meal, clam etc, (if they will eat it) but most of those ingredients will pass through that fish and do it no good. A fish like a copperband does not need kelp and probably can't dijest it. That fish was built to eat a high protein food like worms. Worms have the oils in them that that fish needs. A mandarin was built to eat pods. Some people have gotten them to eat pellets. As far as I know, pellets don't have squashed pods in them, much of the content of many pellets is fish meal, kelp, shrimp meal, etc. They need pods and they need one about every 15 seconds.
Lionfish need whole saltwater fish. You can feed them goldfish for a few years as I have done but that fish should live 20 years. Does anyone here have a 20 year old lionfish that ate goldfish for all that time?
If you just need your fish to live for a few years and swim around looking bored, then you can feed them KFC if you like. But I want my fish spawning and living long enough that I get tired of loking at them that I give them away. The proper food "for each fish" will "almost" guarantee that that fish does not get sick. I did say "almost".
I myself don't feed my fish as well as I should, it would be very time consuming but I make a good effort. They get live worms almost every day, newborn brine every day (for the small fish) salt water fish eggs a couple of times a week, the rest of the time they get plankton or mysis.
I mainly want to get oil into them as I feel it is the most important thing in their diet and the one element that is most often missing. It comes in worms
Not bloodworms, which are not worms, fish eggs and fish livers.

[Annarae]

I have a 4+" porcupine puffer that's eating thawed chunks of octopus, squid, cuttlefish, shrimp, and scallops. I found the mix at a local international foods store, it's all human grade and raw. Before serving I soak the mix in Vita-Chem. My concern is I cannot get him to eat any type of seaweed/vegetable/green stuff whatsoever. I know he's a carnivore but I've read various places that they need some green in their lives, he seems healthy and has grown from 2" when I bought him in July to over 4" now.

He's basically my girlfriend's baby as I was reluctant to put a puffer in with my smaller fish and corals, but he's been extremely well behaved and has not even glanced at his tankmates as a food option. That being said I would really like to keep it that way, any thoughts / recommendations for other nutritional foods?

He was being fed rosies at the petstore we bought him from...which he loved but we quickly coaxed him off of them after reading about his dietary needs.