Fish Foods?!?

[Paavn]

theres so so many! so i dont know which ones are good or better than the rest.... from looking at reviews i noticed that Hikari has really good reviews.
since i plan on keeping a community tank i thought it would be better to get variations of food as in pellets, flakes and granules. and i understand its good to keep a variation in foods when feeding fish.
i got: Tetra Flakes, Hikari bloodworms and Tetra Granules

which ones you guys recommend?
i want to eventually have some Rams, a pleco, various tetras

 

[Mikaila31]

I go with hikari algae wafer and micro pellets. Frozen bloodworms and boiled veggies. If you are looking for good quality food Hikari the best that is widely available. http/www.kensfish.com/ and brineshrimpdirect.com sell some really nice fish food that my fish just love. Some of their powdered and flake foods need to be refrigerated. Also some of them smell really bad, not like rotten bad, just like really smelly fish food. I have to wash my hands after touching them just to get rid of the scent. DO NOT SPILL THEM! Fish absolutely love them though! The smelly ones best .

 

[joshrm115]

Chopped Pees are not a bad idea either ..

 

[LauraFrog]

I feed NewLife Spectrum, which is extremely good for enhancing colour and vitality. It is expensive though. Nutrafin Max is also a good quality feed. Variation is definitely the best idea for active, healthy, well-coloured fish. I feed mostly NewLife Spectrum, Hikari algae wafers for the bottom feeders, spirulina flakes as a variation in the diet, and also quite a lot of fresh food - scalded lettuce and spinach, cucumber, zucchini (courgette), SMALL pieces of potato, sweet potato, choko or pumpkin, and shreds of fresh fish, meat, egg or shellfish.

You should not feed too much animal protein (red meat) to fish. If you are going to use it, only feed beef heart as animal fat is very bad for them and beef heart is the only red meat with suitably low amounts of animal fat. (Fish do need fat in their diet, but it should be omega-3; that is, it should come from fish - commercial fish food has plenty. Commercial fish food also contains essential vitamins, minerals and trace elements not present in fresh food, so it should make up at least 50% of the diet.) \

Carnivores can eat more beef heart, but it still should not make up too much of their diet. Preference should be given to fresh fish (you can buy it as cat food from fishmongers very cheaply and it contains no additives this way), shellfish (mariana mix is often cheap) and egg. If you have small carnivores in a tropical community, feeding a diet of mostly tropical flakes should be enough protein for them. Large carnivores need carnivore pellets.

 

[Mikaila31]

Yeah I have some of the New Life stuff. I totally forgot I had it until you mentioned it . I should start using it. I've got like a years supply of fish food, cuz relatives give me gift cards to LPS the only good stuff they got fish wise is the hikari line. I've got at least 3 packs of unopened micro pellets. I need to throw all my crappy tetra flakes away, cuz my fish won't touch them anymore since I've been feeding better foods.

Raw salmon, shrimp, crab, pumpkin, zucchini, earthworms, peices of boiled egg(egg white for adult fish and yolk for fry).

 

[LauraFrog]

I ran out of time to mention live and frozen foods. Live foods are the best thing to use to supplement fish's diets. They are far and away the best when conditioning fish to breed - careful control of temperature and water level, combined with use of live foods (to simulate the arrival of the wet season and accompanying glut of live food) is the best way to stimulate tricky species into spawning.

You can sometimes buy live foods, but they're often half dead when you get them home, as well as not particularly nutritious. The best way to feed live food is to culture it yourself. That way you can gutload it (feed it something nutritious before you feed it to your fish) to increase its value. Whiteworm is ideal to grow. You can buy packets of live whiteworm from most LPS. Fill a takeaway food container with 50/50 compost (or potting mix) and peat. It should be always moist but never wet. Put fish pellets, small pieces of root vegetable or small pieces of bread on the surface. Store the worms in a cool place, if you live in a hot climate it may be necessary to keep them in the fridge although this slows their growth. The colony will gradually grow. Rinse worms in tank water before feeding them. They have a reputation for being too fatty but this depends on what they are fed.

Brine shrimp are also ideal. Get a 1 gal jar and fill it with dechlorinated water. Add 4 tablespoons of marine salt and some brine shrimp eggs (readily available). The brine shrimp will grow if fed, you can buy brine shrimp food, Sea-Monkey food off ebay, or some people report growing them on green water. They need very little food. You never need to change the water or use a larger tank, just top up the evaporation. The larger strains of Artemia grow to 1/4 inch, and so you can feed them at any stage of their life cycle depending on the size of the fish.

The other alternative is frozen foods, which removes the mess and the fuss but are more expensive. Bloodworms are the best. They are ideal for most tropicals, I feed them at least once or twice a week. You can also get other frozen foods like Marine Green and frozen daphnia. They are all very good as supplements or treats but should not be the only food given because they lack dietary components the fish need.

 

[Paavn]

tanks guys! im glad i asked before i got my fish and opened the Tetras food lol
i'll be going back to do some exchanges lol