Making your own reef food

[lenver]

Does anyone make their own food, when I was doing discus a lot of us used to make our own food, but haven't found many discussions about this in the forum.

[Timfish]

I've messed with it but it's but I've found all the fish I keep including Anthias do fine with Spectrum Pellets and making frozen food I thought ws more hassle than it was worth.

[jestep]

I did it when I was doing discus and fed it to my dwarf morays which also loved it. Central market is your best friend because you can get small and random portions of seafood.

Basically, fresh shrimp, squid, clams, and oysters, all wild except oysters can be farmed.

I would add spirulina powder. I've heard of adding nori, commercial flakes or pellets, lightly cooked spinach, gelatin, cooked eggs, oyster eggs, garlic, assorted vitamins.

Basically blend or use a food processor and put in ziplock baggies flattened out like the flat pack frozen food.

[lenver]

I did it for my Discus so I kindda know how to, just wanted to know what to include, any recipes?

[Woods]

TroyPT and I made some based off a Borneman recipe. It basically had the items Jestep lists above. we also added a few other things like a few small carrots, Cyclopeeze, Mysis, Brineshrimp, etc... My fish go nuts for it.

[lenver]

Cool, I'll try it out.

[ct67stang]

TroyPT and I made some based off a Borneman recipe. It basically had the items Jestep lists above. we also added a few other things like a few small carrots, Cyclopeeze, Mysis, Brineshrimp, etc... My fish go nuts for it.

carrots huh? you must have a rabbit fish or sea hare....

but cheesy jokes aside, ive done it with just some of the wild cought seafood mentioned. the fish AND coral went nuts for it. before freezing i took as much of the "juice" out and set that aside for feeding my zoas.

[Woods]

lol nice Chris... Yes, we added carrots (and several other vegetables and Nori) for the orange pigments... If any one wants to try some without having the hassle of making it themselves (upsetting wife for using her blender on Fish Food), I would be willing to part with a couple bags for $20 each... they are Quart sized freezer bags. I would say about 150% more than a Rods Food size bag in food volume. Just PM me so we don't take over this thread...

[Sascha D.]

Wow Lenver, you've been busy with that tank!

I think I noticed four tangs, two wrasses, about 10 or so chromis, some clowns and possibly some anthias? It's hard to tell because the light is so blue. I saw them in your video in the build thread.

There are quite a few different feeders in that mix of fish, especially with the Cleaner Wrasse and Leopard Wrasse. Most of the tangs you have get pretty big so I would make your food mixture a little heavy on the veggi side to reduce aggression. You also need enough protein and crude fat to keep the anthias in good health and the chromis from fighting.

I think Jestep and Mike summed up the food ingredients nicely. I wouldn't add cooked eggs or carrots because I don't know the benefits, if any. I would make sure there is both red and green algae in the mixture. I would also include garlic extract and broccoli. I have heard of people putting amino acids in the mix but I don't know enough about it to say one way or another. Adding a quality flake food to the mixture is pretty common.

[Wade]

Is there any advantage to making your own food other than potential cost savings?

[Woods]

The advantage I see is that you know what goes into it and don't have to add the fillers like gelatin, and other items that might add unnecessary phosphates to your tank, and can alter it according to your wants and needs... more fine for coral and smaller fish, some larger chucks for larger fish, more veggie material for Tangs, more meaty for Triggers, etc...

[lenver]

Right now I'm feeding NutriDiet Marine plus http://reefbuilders.com/2013/06/06/new-seachem-nutridiet-flake-food/, and all of my fish love it, I tried also the Marine but they don't seem to like it.

I also feed them half of Nori sheet and they seem to be happy, for the rest I'm feeding 3-5 times a day of the flakes but very small doses.

I'm feeding Kent Marine Coral Nutrition 2-3 times per week.

And I'm supplementing weekly Iodine and Seachem Reef Trace Elements

[Sascha D.]

Wow I bet that skimmer is working overtime!

I don't recommend Marine Cuisine. My fish eat it, but it makes a mess and I'm not happy with the quality. I like Formula One and Formula Two pellets, but it's not very good for bottom and mid feeders.

Here's an article you may like on supplementing and dosing. It's an interesting read and there is a section on Iodine and Trace Elements.