bug bites… fish love them, but they are too coarse for many of my micro preditors…

[Magnum Man31 145]

I just picked up my 2nd mortar and pestle… I wish the company would do a better job of screening these bug bites, I’ve read complaints about people getting too much dust, likely from shipping and handling… several of my fish love the bites in their proper size, but I also have many micro predators, that prefer them milled to dust… so I do a blended, milled dust, consisting of bug bites, a 50% protein fry food, and a pinch of my flake food mix this has become a favorite of my breeding swords, with various size fish, as well as my Florida flag fish, down to my breeding tiger teddies… I find most fish prefer smaller, easier to eat foods… Silver Dollars get 8mm algae cookies, as well as my acara's eat small to medium pellets, nearly everyone else eats milled blends ( I do also like the super fresh micro pellets, on days I’m not milling…

anyone else out there grinding foods smaller for their fish???

 

[GaryE29 144]

That what old coffee grinders are for...

 

[Magnum Man31 145]

I have one of those on my shelf, that I used to chop up whole black soldier fly larvae, but mine was too difficult to get all the dust out of, I find having a small mortar and pestle in each area, actually easier, even though it requires the manual labor

 

[Magnum Man31 145]

BTW… I saw 3 new baby tiger teddies today… the one pair that survived shipping, has been breeding regularly on this blend, though I still would like to get another couple pairs, to get a sustainable population…

 

[Fishmanic30 146]

about bug bites:
I recently bought a container of smaller sized bug bites.
There was a lot of bug bites that turned into dust like consistency. I have a very small screen type device and I separated the dust from the proper sized bug bites. After separating the dust from the normal sized bug bites, I had at least one third powder and 2/3rds proper sized bug bites.

 

[TwoTankAmin25]

I feed a variety of the Ebo-Aquarisik foods which includes the veggie sticks. These tend to produce a fair amount of veggie dust in the container. This is actually a good for me. I separate the "dust" and I feed it to shrimp and, when I had them, ancistrus and other fry. Some ot the Hypancistrus plecos I bred need more veggies matter when small, So they got the dust also, But, most new pleco fry are able to eat any food that gets soft and/or tends to fall apart. Tiny plecos can feed on a sinking stick or wafer ones it has softened up as they then can take tiny bites without needing to scrape a dried wafer as bigger plecos can do.

Another non-bottom feeding fish will also go after the dust as it sits on the surface as it get wet or as it sinks to the bottom.

In general I prefer feeding good quality foods and these usually cost more. I buy in quantity and then store foods in the freezer or fridge. Ebo tells one not to freeze their food as it degrades it. They recommend putting it into the fridge.

Also, I tend to feed Repashy and Frozen more than I use commercial foods. I converted in this respect to Ebo, I also mix up my pwn blend of kensfish sinking sticks and my own blend pf his flake.

 

[Panda_Monium]

I have an electric pepper grinder with adjustable coarseness. I only have 4 species (2 are subspecies) - Panda and Peppered Corydoras, striped and black kuhli loaches, cherry shrimp and Rhubarb - my big golden mystery snail.
I also have Lots of panda and peppered fry and juveniles in three other tanks. They all love Bug Bites (bottom feeder formula), and I often combine them with various Hikari branded pellets and wafers so they don't just get bugbites.
The pepper mill is rechargeable, and it grinds so finely that even the hatchlings can manage them, along with freshly home-hatched BBS from their first feed onwards.
I adjust it out for the adult fish. I used to manually grind them in a large, extremely heavy marble mortar and pestle (until I dropped it and it landed on my foot, crushing my toes!!!! No. It did not break. Just my foot. Lol)
The pepper mill cost me $6AU, and I've never looked back!!

 

[sharkweek1781]

I just picked up my 2nd mortar and pestle… I wish the company would do a better job of screening these bug bites, I’ve read complaints about people getting too much dust, likely from shipping and handling… several of my fish love the bites in their proper size, but I also have many micro predators, that prefer them milled to dust… so I do a blended, milled dust, consisting of bug bites, a 50% protein fry food, and a pinch of my flake food mix this has become a favorite of my breeding swords, with various size fish, as well as my Florida flag fish, down to my breeding tiger teddies… I find most fish prefer smaller, easier to eat foods… Silver Dollars get 8mm algae cookies, as well as my acara's eat small to medium pellets, nearly everyone else eats milled blends ( I do also like the super fresh micro pellets, on days I’m not milling…

anyone else out there grinding foods smaller for their fish???

I use a mortar and pestle or a pill grinder. Depending on which tank I'm feeding.

 

[Rusty_Shackleford30 145]

I've tried Fluval Bug Bites flakes, twice, but never again. It's basically dust in a can. The flakes are so small even tetras ignore them.

 

[TwoTankAmin25]

BTW- I now get the Ebo powdered brine shrimp. They sell a lot of their foods in different sizes. I also have their larger size brine as well. Their Artemia Softgran comes in 0.4-0.6 mm, 0.6-0.9 mm, 0.9-1.4 mm and 1.4-2.2 mm sizes. I have both the 0.4=0.6 and the 1.4-2.2 mm sizes. No grinder needed, I also get a number of their larger foods- Shrimp, mussel and veggie sticks. I also get their shrimp food and in my recent order i got a small can of their snail food for my assassin snails.

I used to buy directly from Germany until the exemption for up to $800 able to be imported duty and tax free was taken away by the current administration. So I got my last order from Saburi Aquatics. I spent over $400 for what used to cost less.

I try to get higher quality foods for my fish which includes frozen (I do not do live), Repashy and the Ebo. I also used kens for my flake and sinking stick mixes. These are my concession tomore commrecial style foods. But by picking the more nutricius varieties I thinks they are OK to use occasionally.

For the flake I start with about 30-40% kens basic premium flake mix and then I add more color flake, more veggie flake, some earthworm flake and immune booster flake. With the sticks I use only those where the main ingrediant is list in the the first 3 ingredients with one exception. I ams using earthworm, blackworm, brine shrimp, veggie, blood worm (only the 3rd ingredient) and a minimal amount of soldier fly larvae sticks as the larvae is only the #4 ingredient) (Fish Meal, Gluten Flour, Soy Flour, Fresh Solider Fly Larvae).