High Nitrates

[davelin315]

I am starting to wonder if the food I am feeding has something to do with the high nitrates and the type of waste the fish have in my tank. I have tons of fish, but previously with large feedings I didn't experience the high nitrates. I was previously feeding pretty much only the Dainichi pellets and nori along with periodic feedings of mysis. I have gotten lazy of late and have been feeding the Ocean Nutrition brand pellets and am wondering if this is causing issues.

 

My question really boils down to how much "waste" is in fish waste when they are eating a diet that consists of too much of what they don't typically eat. I would say that my fish load consists of an overwhelming majority of herbivores (4 very large tangs, 4 smaller ones, although the smaller ones are fairly large by most standards, too, possibly some that I'm forgetting) that body mass probably constitute 60-70% or more of what I've got. Looking at the ingredient list (I started doing this after buying some quick fix goldfish pellets from Lowes and realized that they put hydrolized chicken feathers in the food) I notice that there's an awful lot of animal protein in there. Ignoring the old argument about non-marine based foods, do fish produce dirtier waste when they eat things their systems are not designed to digest as well? If I fed more nori and then supplemented with other foods, do you think my nitrates would go down due to fewer organics in the waste of the fish?

[treesprite]

Very good subject. I think what a creature eats has everything to do with the chemical makeup of its waste. I would love to see someone do an experiment using various foods, along with the subjects being separated into groups by type of diet.

[Jon Lazar]

Dave,

 

I think you're overthinking this. Switch back to your old feeding techniques and see if the nitrates come down.

 

Jon

[CHUBAKAH]

Dave,

 

I think you're overthinking this. Switch back to your old feeding techniques and see if the nitrates come down.

 

Jon

+1 and unless your measuring the food exactly, and your fish are eating the same exact amount of food each day I see no way to do a fair comparison.

[davelin315]

As far as the feeding techniques, it's basically dump a couple of big handfuls in at one time... these fish are much larger than before and eat like pigs all of the time. Just trying to figure out if the food itself has an effect. Kind of like feeding someone something that they are allergic to, it's likely to come out having very little of it digested. Would this in turn cause it to add more nutrients to the system since they are not being absorbed by the fish?

[treesprite]

If it counts for anything, I think so. There just isn't any experimental data to back it up. Who here is up to doing the experiment?

[treesprite]

Didn't occur to me until just now... it might also depend on whether or not the cleanup crew likes the things we are feeding the fish, and the way the cleanup crew digests and processes the foods they eat.

 

I don't like flake food because I feel like the cleanup crew doesn't eat as much of the fish leftovers as they do with fresh or frozen foods. Pellets to me seem like the shrimp don't eat - they try to catch them to eat them, but I don;t think they actually take them in... of course I've never watched them long enough with the pellets to be sure.

Edited August 24, 2010 by treesprite