Type of Market fish for food???

Kenneth Wong · Post by **Kenneth Wong** » 02 Dec 2003, 20:26

Wanted to know if there are any suggestions as to the type of market fish you use to feed your Predatory cats (RTC, Tigrinus, Tiger shovelnose, Juruense, limas,etc.)?

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 02 Dec 2003, 23:23

well many fish will work, I actually feed a few different seafoods. You can get catfish fairly cheap, as ironic as that is. I personally prefer to feed things like shrimp, mussels and those type things, you can buy salad shrimp in a bag that's like a pound for a couple of bucks, mussels are more expensive. I've heard of whitefish being used, but my guess is most all fish would be ok. Always suggest pellets in the diet too, for good balance.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 02 Dec 2003, 23:29

I surpose any fish without too much oil as this would make a mess of the tank.

Kenneth Wong · Post by **Kenneth Wong** » 03 Dec 2003, 02:43

Thanks for the quick response. Just wanted to know what is acceptable. The only experience I've had was with smelt which ended up being disastrous. catfish reacted badly and died few days later. I've heard that it depends on the season and where they are caught as to how contaminated they maybe. These are the same smelt that people fry and eat.

What else do you feed your big cats?

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 03 Dec 2003, 05:10

canned or fresh? heh, I'm not very good when it comes to fish. ahi tuna is about all I eat and I don't prepare that myself.

characinkid · Post by **characinkid** » 03 Dec 2003, 15:59

Hi

I have a few large B.Juruense and they get Freshwater Shrimp which have been previously frozen, salad shrimp, LOVE night crawlers and small pieces of smelt. I find the key to feeding smelt is to make sure that they do not eat too much at once as it can be messy, and make sure that there is NON left in the tank...

I have not tried catfish yet, but am sure that this would work as it is not too oily..

I have also been warned before about feeding too much saltwater fish to freshwater fish.. I hear that continued feeding will result in accumilations of salt in the fish.??? Not sure how try this is, anyone care to comment???

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 03 Dec 2003, 20:24

I have also been warned before about feeding too much saltwater fish to freshwater fish.. I hear that continued feeding will result in accumilations of salt in the fish.??? Not sure how try this is, anyone care to comment???

Sound to me like someone got the wrong idea. it doesn't make any sence.

coelacanth · Post by **coelacanth** » 03 Dec 2003, 20:51

characinkid wrote:I have also been warned before about feeding too much saltwater fish to freshwater fish.. I hear that continued feeding will result in accumilations of salt in the fish.??? Not sure how try this is, anyone care to comment???

Nah, this is a myth. The concentration of salts in teleost fish blood is more or less the same whether you're looking at a marine or a freshwater fish.
What can be a problem however, is that often the fish that are available for use as food like this are Clupeiforms (whitebait [in the UK], sprats, herrings, shads etc. etc.).
These contain an enzyme called Thiaminase, which destroys the vitamin Thiamine. This vitamin is necessary for control of the nervous system, and the over-use of Clupeiform fish as food for freshwater fish which have no mechanism for dealing with this can easily lead to chronic physiological problems. Given a balanced diet it doesn't usually manifest itself though.

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 03 Dec 2003, 21:07

Ross mentions that in his stingray's of south america book(he is actually talking about goldfish though) and mentions a certain B vitamin being added to the water of the tank to combat deficiencies.

;) one of the reasons I always have fed pellets and other foods... one kind of fish is unlikely to hold all the nutrition that's needed.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 03 Dec 2003, 21:35

a certain B vitamin being added to the water of the tank to combat deficiencies.

There has been alot of similar experiments with adding vitamins directly to the water however none to my knowledge have been successful in treating deficiencies. however adding boosters directly to another food source has had promising results.
most of the research centers are done with vitamins now and seem to be messing about with other chemicals hopefully with some good results.

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 03 Dec 2003, 22:43

interesting. I don't remember whether Ross suggested the vitamin for the main tank or for the feeder tank... either way it didn't interest me as I never have fed feeders and if I ever have to it'll be guppies or swordtails and not goldfish.

Kenneth Wong · Post by **Kenneth Wong** » 03 Dec 2003, 23:14

Thanks for all the info.

I also keep discus and make may own food for them that contain, beef, shrimp, multivitamins, seaweed powder, shrimp powder, and Ester-c. I was also thinking of feeding this to my cats. What do you think about this kind of prepared food. May add fish to this mix in the future just for the cats.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 03 Dec 2003, 23:37

S. Allan wrote

either way it didn't interest me as I never have fed feeders and if I ever have to it'll be guppies or swordtails and not goldfish.

Actually I was refering to dry food mixes with flake and blender mixes, live fish does still work to some degree however most of the research in this area is a closely gaurded secret.

the idea of feeder fish doesn't exist in the uk.

I also keep discus and make may own food for them that contain, beef, shrimp, multivitamins, seaweed powder, shrimp powder, and Ester-c. I was also thinking of feeding this to my cats

I am assuming this feed is fed in frozen cubes which discus take small bites off? depending on the catfish some would take it whole and being frozen it could potentially cause intestinal blockages.

Kenneth Wong · Post by **Kenneth Wong** » 04 Dec 2003, 03:19

good point on the frozen food. My mixture is frozen. Do you think there is a problem if I thaw it so its not frozen solid but soft and still keeping the frozen form. When I feed discus I thaw it and break it into pieces in the water.

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 04 Dec 2003, 04:15

yeah, I used a clear flavorless gelitan solution to help keep the cubes together when I made discus food, that way even thawed they will stay together underwater. I quit doing that a while back cause I completely gave up on beefheart for discus, partially because preparing it was so unpleasant. I have considered going back to a similar thing, using only fish and invertebrates but I kind of like feeding different things daily. If there was a certain ingredient that I felt they weren't getting enough of I guess that's one way of enticing them to eat... but...

And magnum, yes, this is a very simple blurb in the book, maybe a paragraph or 2, as to their reaserch, i haven't any idea. I can certainly post it if you've got an interest.

coelacanth · Post by **coelacanth** » 04 Dec 2003, 09:34

Kenneth Wong wrote:good point on the frozen food. My mixture is frozen. Do you think there is a problem if I thaw it so its not frozen solid but soft and still keeping the frozen form. When I feed discus I thaw it and break it into pieces in the water.

The problem with using homogenized mixes is that large predatory Catfish tend to take in a piece, and then crush it as they would if it were a prawn, crab or small fish. This creates a large amount of particulate matter which ends up putting unacceptable loading on the filter. Not so much of a problem if you have a large Pseudodoras in there with them, but not many people have the 1000+ gallons required for more than one large Catfish.

pturley · Post by **pturley** » 04 Dec 2003, 17:42

coelacanth wrote:

The problem with using homogenized mixes is that large predatory Catfish tend to take in a piece, and then crush it as they would if it were a prawn, crab or small fish. This creates a large amount of particulate matter which ends up putting unacceptable loading on the filter.

This is where the gelatin S. Allan mentions comes in handy. If you have fish that crush their prey as described, add more geletin. Makes for stiffer chunks of foods. I usually make mine kinda loose, small fish can pick/rasp bits off of the larger pieces.

My blender mix is typically something like this. It varies though.

1/2lbs (200g) fish, frozen, then minced in a food processor (lake trout fillets in most recent mix) Sometimes Whole prawns too.
1/2 lbs. Freeze Dried Krill, also send through the food processor to pulverized it into a powder.
1 can green beans (drained then pureed in food processor) cooked Zuchinni or sweet potatoes work too.
2-4 packs dissolved geletin in hot water (Knox brand or Japanese Agar, either work)
1-2 vitamin E capsules
1-2 vitamin C tablets
A couple of handfulls of flake/pelleted foods I have around that are getting a bit dated (used to dry out, stiffen up the mixture).

Pre mince the fish, pulverize the krill, puree the green beans and crush the vitamin pills.
Add it all to a blender/food processor and mix together.
Add the geletin mix.
Add the flake/pelleted foods to make a thick paste. Basically as thick as the food processor can handle without turning to dough.
Spoon into large fish bags and lay flat. Smooth them out into ~1/4"-1/2" thick, seal the bags and place in the freezer.

I have fish that will come out of hiding for this that do not for nearly any other prepared foods.

Give it a try,

S. Allen · Post by **S. Allen** » 04 Dec 2003, 17:51

I bought some ice cube treys at the grocery store for smaller ice cubes(more surface area, cools drinks faster), the cube size is about the size of a gum drop or the first knuckle of your index finger, they worked great for me.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 05 Dec 2003, 19:34

The mix food might save money however it will in no way be as beneficial as fresh fish and other well known predator foods. would not be my first choice....or second....or third..erm...8th mabey

pturley · Post by **pturley** » 05 Dec 2003, 21:08

Magnum4 wrote:

The mix food might save money however it will in no way be as beneficial as fresh fish and other well known predator foods. would not be my first choice....or second....or third..erm...8th mabey

So what exactly would be your first (through 7th) choices?

I am not quite what you mean with your response

or what logic you may be basing it on?

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 05 Dec 2003, 22:40

I am not quite what you mean with your response or what logic you may be basing it on?

Simple logic for this one will do. Would you eat the same meal every day just because it satisfied your body with enough energy to live, or do you eat different foods every day?

coelacanth · Post by **coelacanth** » 05 Dec 2003, 23:48

magnum4 wrote:Simple logic for this one will do. Would you eat the same meal every day just because it satisfied your body with enough energy to live, or do you eat different foods every day?

There is something in this if you follow recent thinking in optimal husbandry standards, but there are also great benefits to using a high quality prepared food as part of a planned dietary regime.
I am happy for fish to be fed foods like this, but only in conjunction with 'real' foods. They can act as a useful vitamin delivery method, particularly in places like here in the UK where the use of live feeder fish (which could otherwise be 'gut-loaded') is generally frowned upon as being a lazy, defeatist attitude to aquariology (and is actually very carefully controlled, and rightly so, in licensed zoological institutions). They can also be used for medication delivery should it become necessary.
Unless someone has a large enough aquarium that they can throw in several kinds of fruit, some chopped squid, a few prawns and a smelt without worring about pollution, a properly made gel diet can take care of many nutritional requirements. This is why many public aquaria use gel diets as a primary food type. Even if you have a new and untrained member of staff, all they have to know is that Display#3B (or whatever) requires fifteen 2cm cubes of herbivore formulation (or whatever). It may not be good aquarium practice from our point of view to use this as sole diet, but it is used, and in time-critical environments such as hatcheries or wholesalers it is a huge leap over simply buying in cheap and nasty Trout feed.
For the home aquarist, using this as a part of the diet leaves the aquarist free to finish off the feeding with a nice fat crunchy expensive head-on Prawn or two, and a handful of mussels or juicy earthworms. This gives the enjoyment of feeding something 'real', and also provides evironmental enrichment for the fish, something that may or may not be important depending on whether you want a trophy in a glass box or a vibrant example of the living world given access to a wide range of the non-hazardous stimuli it would encoucter in nature.
If the home aquarist ever finds that they are needing to take the prepared food route because of time restraints, they should probably stop and consider whether they are caring for fish or just collecting them.

pturley · Post by **pturley** » 06 Dec 2003, 06:47

Magnum4 wrote:

Simple logic for this one will do. Would you eat the same meal every day just because it satisfied your body with enough energy to live, or do you eat different foods every day?

Did I in any way indicate that this is all that I fed my fishes? No.
I have even commented in the past that my fish often eat better than I do! Prawns, cockles, clams, various vegetables and blender mix are all common in my fishroom. The last time I had a clam-bake was over a year ago. My fish ate fresh clams less than a week ago! So what's you point?

Lastly: Magnum4, I took the time to look over your previous posts and would like to offer a bit of advice. As an avid reader of these forums, it doesn't too long to determine who among the posters is taking the time and effort to respond in a constructive, helpful manner and who is just chiming in with a quip or two based upon opinion. Jools and the rest of the moderator staff have undoubtedly through extraordinary efforts made this forum what it is today. We should all try to honor these efforts by putting some forthought in our responses, and not just providing a response.
If you care to respond to this, please do so via PM, I am certain the rest of the readers would appreciate not have to weed through additional wasted bandwidth.

Sincerely,
Paul E. Turley

BTW: I thank Coelacanth for such a well worded answer.

magnum4 · Post by **magnum4** » 07 Dec 2003, 00:59

The main problem with feeding high protein mammalian and other foods is the issue of fat content which does cause fatty deposites in fish. No vet i know in the uk recommends you feed your fish beefheart for this reason. when it boils down to it this is my main point. It's excepted in discus because of the high temperature which people keep them in and to get equal growh rates it costs alot of money.

I thought this was an advanced forum and in most but not all circumstances the message i am trying to get across does not always have to be spelled out. however i am just getting used to bandwidth and this is new to me so i will take on board you comment.

my reply was just a easy to understand methaphor and was not aimed at you personally. you could have explained earlier that your recommendation was to feed this diet intermitantly.

Katman · Post by **Katman** » 07 Dec 2003, 05:36

There has been many years of reserch and technology put into the development of
comercial fish foods. Believe me they have come a long way in the last 40 years. Some of these foods are pretty well balanced and by useing your head and food combinations you can come up with a somewhat balanced for the fish you are working with. This is what is done in the comercial end of the industry.
As far as Beefhart goes it is fed extenslvely because it is one of red meats that
contain the least amount of fat(when well trimed) . However Beef heart ,Tubifex,
blood worms and all other live food are seldom if ever fed as a maintance food.
these are used only as condictioning foods. Fat fish do not spawn well, A healthy
fish pumped up with high protien foods will spawn or lets say produce eggs 95%
of the time. Live food is very seldom used , Only when there in no other option ,because of the chance of contaminating brood stock. Frozen fresh water fish is a strict NO NO as you have no idea what they might be carrying.
Again I am not telling anyone this is what should be done . This is what the people
who breed fish for a living do.