Fish Food: How to Properly Feed Your Underwater Pet | petMD
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The small, open-ocean fish that are caught in industrial fisheries are consumed directly, used as bait in commercial and recreational fisheries and in lobster traps, used as ingredients in the feed for aquaculture, pigs, poulty, cattle, and pet food; and are converted into fish oil pills.
Photo provided by Flickr are a great supplemental food, an excellent alternative to that can carry diseases. This type of food is all-natural, usually in whole form. They have plenty of nutritional value and flavor that your fish will crave. Available varieties include , , , and other fish favorites. All fish will eagerly feed on freeze-dried foods, though give sparingly, not as their primary diet.
Photo provided by Flickr
Photo provided by Flickr
Photo provided by Flickr
Well, thankfully, it is not hard. We have so many very high quality flake foods and freeze-dried foods that fish can be adequately nourished with very little fuss and bother. You may read articles where it is stated categorically that flake foods do not make an adequate diet for any fish, but this assertion has long been disproved by the hordes of aquarists that feed flake foods exclusively, and still maintain colorful, breeding, vibrant fishes. So why not end this article here? Well, it's not that simple. Just because most aquarium fish will thrive on a good flake food, that doesn't mean they all will and it certainly doesn't mean that all flake foods are good. And of course, flake food is boring. Boring for you to feed, and probably boring for the fish to eat. Boring. This is a hobby right? It's supposed to be fun, right? Well why not get some fun out of meal times then? So I'll talk about live and homemade foods too.You don't need to feed a goldfish anything but goldfish food. It is a goldfish. It will be perfectly healthy with just this. You shouldn't add anything else. I had fish for years and they were happy and healthy with just regular fish food.Wardley is the least expensive of the recommended brands and is also available in bulk, but the Wardley brand name lacks the range of "specialty flakes" that Aquarian and Tetra offer. As far as these specialty flakes go, the only one I have any use for are the "green" flakes that are high in vegetable matter. Most of these vegetable flakes contain Spirulina, which is a photosynthetic cyanobacterium (so Spirulina is not an alga as is generally assumed). Spirulina is quite high in protein and a great source of many amino acids that are otherwise difficult to acquire. Health food stores are full of the stuff. Spirulina flakes are just what you need for mollies and a host of other vegetarian fishes. Aquarian and Tetra also offer Spirulina enriched wafers that sink, which are very good for algae-eating bottom feeders like plecos.The rule of thumb to feed all the fish can eat in five minutes twice a day is a good one, provided that all of the fish are actually getting some of the food. This isn't a problem with schooling fish, but a territorial fish like a cichlid can monopolize a food supply. Most aquarists therefore end up feeding a cichlid aquarium more than the recommended amount, and so they must deal with the high nitrate levels, algae growth, and unwanted breeding that comes with overfed fish. This is just part of the deal when you raise cichlids. But schooling fish can be fed quite sparingly because they will feed as a school rather than competitively. The concentration of their wastes can therefore be kept to a minimum, thus giving you a healthy, easily maintained, and more enjoyable tank.