Why should we keep fish in breeding condition?

[paul b]

I am in a writing mood and getting excited because tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I had a few ideas banging around in this bald head so I figured I would post some of them.  I also see my name mentioned in a few places as the Paul b method of keeping fish healthy.  But "my method" if there is such a thing won't work unless it is done correctly so don't blame me if your fish are croaking.  By the way, this is all just my opinion and I am an electrician, not a marine biologist, rocket scientist, or rap singer.
I know I mentioned this fifty times but I am going to re iterate.
The first thing that I am sure we all know is that fish are slimy.  There is a reason fish are slimy.  Do fish want to be slimy?  I don't know, do you want to be slimy?  It would do us no good to be slimy unless we wanted to get into tight places.  Actually, fish do that and I guess the slime helps with that but that is not the reason for the slime.  Fish, unlike us, manufacture antibodies in a few places in their bodies and much of it is made in their slime glands.   Slime is a great place to store antibodies because it completely covers a fish and as we know, it is sticky.  Unfortunately for the fish, it does not cover their gills because that would prevent them from breathing but the gills have their own protection other than slime.
Eels are very slimy and I doubt they ever get sick, but I really don't know.
Anyway fish and humans have much better immune systems when they are pregnant.  We do, well not me, I am a manly man, but females do as some human diseases either go away or get much better when they are pregnant.  It's the body's way to protect the baby.  I know that Multiple Sclorosis in humans gets much better while a woman is pregnant.
But i am not a woman doctor or any other kind of doctor, I am just a bald guy with a fish tank. 
Back to fish.  Fish are much different than us (well most of us, but I did date a girl in Colorado that resembled a flounder)
Fish for some reason have reved up immune systems when they are in breeding condition.  Why?  I don't know, work with me here.
I don't know exactly why but in almost 60 years of keeping, collecting, eating and raising fish I learned a few things.  I learned much of it from killing multitudes of fish from ich and just about everything else until I found the secret.  I am sorry fish that I didn't discover these things sooner.
For some reason, fish in breeding condition just don't get sick.
For a fish to be able to grow eggs, which may be a third of the fishes weight in a week or two requires a lot of energy from the fish.
My tiny pair of clown gobies spawned 4 or 5 times in the last three weeks, that is like a woman having a baby every other tuesday.  Imagine the diaper and college expenses.  Some fish, like damsels can get into breeding condition by just looking at another, good looking damsel, but most fish can not.
I see all the time that I am missquoted and just recommend that you feed some blackworms and the fish will miraculously get into great condition and be immune from everything including bubonic plague, radiation poisoning and a multitude or social conditions.  That is not exactly correct.
I do recomment live (not freeze dried, frozen, fricasied, stir fried or boiled) but live blackworms or live whiteworms.  What is it in live worms that performs this magic?  Again, work with me as I have no idea.  It comes from experience, but I do know that if live worms are fed every day, not just once in a while and not with flakes, the fish has a much better chance to get into breeding condition and ultimately, become disease free.  You don't have to raise the fish, the fish won't call you child killer or wish any ills on you as adult fish spawn every few weeks for their entire lifespan.  If they are not, they are not healthy.  Of course I am talking about fish that can spawn in a tank, not manta rays, great white sharks, or tangs.  Actually, tangs will spawn in a large enough tank.
So if you feel you want to quarantine, thats fine, but while you are at it, get your fish into breeding condition and you will not have any problems except the one I have, and that is what to do with a fish that you have for 20 years and you are tired of it so you have to donate it to a public aquarium.

References:

Really?  you actually think I have any references?  Listing references means that someone you don't know wrote something, you read it and believed it enough to re write it.  This is my opinion and as I said, I am an electrician.
Why would you believe me?  Do your own research.  This is me with my first girlfriend, I am sure she just helped me collect some worms to feed my fish.

[AlanM]

I need to get another foxface.  My guy (or maybe girl?) is getting spherical because of how much he eats.  Maybe I'd get some eggs.

[paul b]

A fat fish is not necessarilly a healthy fish.  It is just a fat fish.  By the way, fish don't get fat, they get oil.  Most fish don't have any solid fat, it is mostly oil.  I eat fish every day and I never had to cut away any fat from a fish fillet, did you?  Their body temperature is to cold to have solid fat but oil is happily stored in their liver.

A fishes liver which may be a third of it's weight is all oil.

[davelin315]

We have seen many liver and thyroid issues that have taken fish out at the Aquarium, obese fish suffer the same way as obese people.

 

Paul, I can't tell if she is smiling or grimacing in your picture...

[paul b]

She has no teeth so it's hard to tell.

[Enkay]

Paul, do you feed any foods other than live white worms and black worms? In your experience, do the fish need a more diverse diet or is live worms accounting for all that they need to stay healthy?

[paul b]

Yes I do, today they will get some turkey but every other day they get either clams or frozen mysis.  Fish do not need a variety, they need what they are supposed to eat.  Lionfish eat fish and thats all they eat, mandarins eat pods and thats all they eat.  Many fish like damsels eat anything that floats their way but a large part of their diet is baby fish.  If you dive you will see fish fry all over the place and most fish dip down a few times a day to take a few.

The secret is to feed whole foods like worms, clams, mysis or fish fry.  These foods are like a vitamin pill because they are a complete animal and everything a living creature needs to live is in it in the correct amounts.  I add clams because they are easy to get, cheap and are a complete animal as you feed the entire thing, guts and all.  Shrimp, scallop, squid and fish fillets are not good foods because you are only feeding the muscle tissue and little else.  That is just protein.  The nutritious parts are the guts.  All the oil is stored in the liver of the prey animal and the vitamins occupy the organs and eyes.  A living worm or small fish has everything.

You can buy frozen commercially prepared foods and sometimes I use them and for the most part they are fine, but they lack the proper proportions of nutrients which is only found in a complete animal.

When a fish eats another fish, they do not spit out the guts or bones.  They digest the entire thing.  If a fish dies it's eyes and guts are eaten first.  Yes, it is the softest parts but fish know where the nutrition is.  We don't eat that stuff, but we are not cold blooded fish, well most of us are not.  People tend to feed fish a variety because it is good for us.  We ride bicycles and do the macarana, fish do not.  Why?  No, not because they can't hear the music underwater, it is because they are different creatures than us.  And they have no rhythm.

See the fry to the left of this lazy looking nurse shark in the Caymans?   That is what fish eat for lunch.  They are all over the place on the reefs.

 

 

This has nothing to do with this, but my Grand Daughter Greta is cute, so I put her in here.

 

Edited November 28, 2013 by paul b

[PatrickB]

she is so cute !

 

Sent from my GT-N5110 using Tapatalk

 

 

[AlanM]

what kind of clams do you get and how do you prep them?  Were the clams the ones that you just shucked, froze into a block, and shaved a bit off for feeding?

[Enkay]

Thank you Paul. That was a very insightful explanation. Never thought of it the way you explained it.

[wade]

Fish do accumulate fat in amongst their gut tissues and under the skin.  We used to do pathology reports on fish all the time and it is especially common in aquariums where they are fed too much or too heavily.  Eyes are not nutritious either.  The vitreous humor (same in fish as people basically) which is the majority of the eyeball is very clear of anything resembling vitamins, minerals, and other "nutrients" - which almost all glow/refract light.  They are just the softest bits and lend easy access to the nervous tissue beneath.

 

I won't get into some other issues posted here, but overall appreciate the sharing and the thoughts.  

 

And cute kid makes it all ok.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

Please get into the other issue posted here, how else would any of us learn???

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

Paul if you moved one of your healthiest breeding pairs of fish into a newer tank, one that's running well with good parameters but is only a few months old, and you keep feeding your worm diet, do you think ich would show itself?

[paul b]

 

 Eyes are not nutritious either.  The vitreous humor (same in fish as people basically) which is the majority of the eyeball is very clear of anything resembling vitamins, minerals, and other "nutrients" - which almost all glow/refract light.

It is true that eyes are the easiest things to eat, but there are quite a few benefits to eating eyes.  Vitamin A is just one of them: Vitamin A  (from Wikipedia)

:Vitamin A is a fat-soluble vitamin. It plays an important role in good night vision, bone growth, reproduction, and cell division. It maintains the surface linings of your eyes and your respiratory, urinary, and intestinal tracts. It helps your body regulate its immune system and may help prevent bacteria and viruses from entering your body by keeping your skin and mucus membranes healthy:

.  Most nutrients would be found in the retina and optic nerve.

 

As for fat, normal not fat fish have mostly oil for fat and not solid fat like a mammal.  I know some fish like tuna have some solid fat but a tuna, like a shark is partially warm blooded but they warm their blood by using a different means than we do.  They use their muscles to warm their blood, while we use metabolism.  Their slightly higher body temperature allows them to store some solid fat.  I am not real sure about tropical aquarium fish but I have autopsied many and I can't say I ever say solid fat but it is hard to tell in a tiny fish.

 

 

I won't get into some other issues posted here, but overall appreciate the sharing and the thoughts

 

I would love to hear the other issues, but remember, some of my fish are 20 years old and even though I have not quarantined in over 35 years, there has never been a paracite that killed any of my fish and I do add mud, NSW, crustaceans, fish, and seaweed from the sea a few times a year as well as fish from many different stores.  So if my method does not work, we need to figure out why that is so and where the paracites went in my tank.  Are they doing the macarana or just hiding?  I often add fish with obvious infestations as I know nothing will happen.  That fish may die, but nothing else ever does.  I recently added a copperband that was heavily infected with ich.  I got it for $5.00 for that reason.  It is fine and I gave it away.

[dave w]

Paul, I like your perspective, your sense of humor and the idea that you don't take yourself too seriously.  I don't know whether there's a strong link between breeding condition or not, it could simply be that fish with nutritous food are healthy enough to fight most pathogens, and healthy fish are coincidentally the best breeders.  Twenty five years ago I noticed that angelfish fed blackworms quickly improved health and breeding so I fully agree with your theory.  I didn't think much of it at the time but since then I have thought a lot about why that happens.  

 

I might be different than you in two respects.  First I am a cheapskate regarding paying for small portions of live food and second I intend to have lots of breeding fish.  Blackworms only reproduce at 10-15% per month, so I am thinking of a rack of trays holding 5-10 pounds of worms and feeding them sinking food pellets.  A constant drip of cold well water would come in the top tray, standpipes lets the water drop down through the trays, and the bottom standpipe goes out to water my azaelas.   I don't know much about whiteworm culture but at your recommendation I will now go research that.

 

Finally, you put down your biology abilities in jest but my experience is that school training is easily overmatched by an observant mind and high speed internet connection.  I've been reading everything published about larviculture for 25 years even though I was only a business major in college.  My neighbor is a retired PhD in marine biology who published 50 books, but within a couple years of her retirement 7 years ago her knowledge was outpaced by the speed of today's research. 

 

Keep up your sense of humor and wealth of experience.  We'd like to hear more of it.

[paul b]

 

Paul if you moved one of your healthiest breeding pairs of fish into a newer tank, one that's running well with good parameters but is only a few months old, and you keep feeding your worm diet, do you think ich would show itself?           

That would be an excellent experiment, but I don't have another running tank.  I would imagine that it is not just the food but the entire aquarium experience that gets and keeps fish in breeding condition.  You will notice that new tanks with all new water look lousy and un healthy.  Science and common sense would seem to conclude that a new tank, like a new car should perform better as all parameters are correct, but that is not the case and one of the reasons I am opposed to changing to much water at once.  But I am not opposed to changing water (I don't want any hate mail)

 

 

Paul, I like your perspective, your sense of humor and the idea that you don't take yourself too seriously.

Thank you Dave.  My perspective comes from keeping fish for almost 60 years, most of that, way before computers or the internet, so my ideas formed by themselves with no outside influences.  I am not sure if that is good or bad but my perspective used to be the only perspective until someone invented the net.

As for my humor, (and not the stuff in my eyes) that comes from the fact that I realize this is just a hobby, and a hobby is supposed to be fun.  It is not that important (except to the fish) as we are not curing cancer, building space shuttles or performing in Cirque de Solie.  (I can't spell that, it must be French) 

My ideas about the worms came about in 1971 or 2 just after I started keeping salt water fish.  I bought blue devils from the first batch imported to New York City.  I had seven of them and they were living fine (with copper in the water in the form of pennies)  I would feed the only thing available which was flakes.  After a while I started feeding worms that I used in my fresh water tanks where I was breeding beta's, angelfish, gouramies etc.

After a couple of weeks on worms something happened to my blue devils.  One of them turned into a male and his fins and tail turned blue.  The 6 other blue devils fins stayed clear.  The "females" got fatter and the male chased them until they spawned.  They all spawned for 7 years and I tried to raise some of the fry, but at that time, rotifers were not available and they would not eat the pork chops I had on hand.

So I got the idea that the worms were a good idea.  I removed the pennies and as the hobby progressed other fish became available and at the times when I could get live worms, everything was well.  Sometimes for months at a time worms were not available and I would again have to add pennies until liquid copper became available.

I do read a lot and was a reading sponge.  Now I seem to have more experience than the people who write the newer books and I don't agree with everything that is written.  Not that I am smarter as I can now fish plenty of obvious errors in my early books from the 60s and 70s.  Times change and so does our perception of how to keep things healthy.

I also feel (and I may be totally wrong) that ich may in some instances be good for a tank, just as we are inoculated for diseases and sometimes we get booster shots.  That is another theory I picked up from life experience and just observing.  I almost never get sick and I can eat anything but the two times I went to Mexico, I (and my wife) ended up in the hospital with dysentery.  The Mexican people are not filling the hospitals every time they drink the water.  Why is that?

While I lived in the  Jungle in Viet Nam I had to take a malaria pill every day or I was almost assured to get malaria like our POWs got.  The Vietnamese people lived in the jungle longer than I did, but they had no malaria pills.  Think about that.

Ich is a paracite just like malaria, maybe small numbers of paracites support the fishes immune system.  I really don't know but how else can you explain tanks like mine and plenty of other people have.

I add mud, water, fish, crabs seaweed every week and nothing happens.  Just something to think about.

 

I can't keep up with you intelligent guys as I didn't go to college.  There was that draft thing and all

 

Now I am going to just stare at my feet.

 

This is that first blue devil over his nest of eggs.  Remember in 1971, blue devils were the only fish around except for domino's.  They were not easy to keep and no one was spawning them except Martin Moe at the same time.

 

 

Here are the eggs.  I was very proud then, but without an internet, I couldn't tell anyone except the mail man and he just looked at me funny.

 

Edited November 29, 2013 by paul b

[paul b]

what kind of clams do you get and how do you prep them?  Were the clams the ones that you just shucked, froze into a block, and shaved a bit off for feeding?

Sometimes I read to them, but usually I just freeze them and shave off paper thin slices.  They are the same clams I eat  so my fish get the leftovers.

 

You could also feed them raw oysters, but they would never get past my table as they are one of my favorite foods.   Yesterday, on Thanksgiving we had some turkey with our oysters on the half shell.  My fish ate cake.

 

[paul b]

Read the part of this titled:  Why eat fish eyes?

 

http://www.hybridrastamama.com/2012/10/yes-i-eat-fish-eyeballs.html

 

I won't eat them, sounds disquesting, but fish eat them. Maybe they read this.

 

Yes, she is cute

 

Edited November 29, 2013 by paul b

[wade]

The omega 3 fatty acids (dha and epa) are in all seafood in quantities not found in terrestrial critters.  They are lipid soluble, which means they are in the fatty parts of the animals... livers, brain, oil/fat deposits and so on.  The eye is no higher than anything else, and in total weight per unit, probably even less than many other fish parts.  Vitamin A (also lipid soluble) is typically highest in the liver (there are prime examples of Vit A (hypervitaminosis) poisoning in people who have eaten elostobranch livers - sharks and rays, and in polar bear liver apparently).  All in all, seafood, of just about any kind, is good for you. Some parts will certainly have more vitamin content than others.

 

This is an old table published by USDA that lists the omega3 content of various seafoods: http://www.health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2005/report/html/table_g2_adda2.htm

 

And while we are on the topic of fat soluble vitamins, most fish do in fact store energy as oils, but that is no different than fats in a technical sense.  They just contain far less saturation (more H bonded to the strings) than lipids that are solid at room temp.  And that makes sense... because fish are cold, they'd turn into sludgy blocks trying to swim with more saturated lipids.

 

I do agree with whole animal feeding by and large, but I don't believe there is a ton of missing anything in feeding just muscle either.  

 

And as to earlier, having animals that are healthy is key to longevity and reproduction.  They are very well correlated.  So feeding well is certainly the best approach.  The type of food matters insomuch as the critters are receiving enough of any materials their own bodies cannot synthesize.  But, having a diverse gut flora (a recent and exploding field of research), is a major contributing factor there too. So constant exposure to challenge (in a low grade) certainly helps.  

 

In regards to disease and resistance I'd pass on a highly significant warning about disease:  Very healthy fish can resist a great deal - just as healthy people can. Just as they do in the ocean on a regular basis. BUT.  A low grade infection is likely to result if exposure to a pathogen occurs.  All it takes is some form of stress to bring it raging to prominence.  Many of the cleaning mechanisms, as well as the normal turnover of fish eating weaker/diseased fish (hence the average damsel lives to a very short age in the wild) do not exist in our aquaria.  A sudden burst of parasite or pathogen load will kill the healthiest of fish.  Don't mistake health for imperviousness to disease.  When we were harvesting atlantic menhaden for research, a full 50% or more had visible external parasites.  I would guess that if you considered internal parasites as well as bacterial/viral pathogens, almost 100% of fish had something when harvested from the wild.  They are tough, but it will certainly shorten their lifespan.

 

 

(Sorry for the long winded response, I'm one of those PhD types.)

Edited November 29, 2013 by wade

[paul b]

 

They are lipid soluble, which means they are in the fatty parts of the animals... livers, brain, oil/fat deposits and so on.

Wade, this is true and why I advocate feeding whole animals and not just the muscle even though you said there is ample nutrients in the muscle.  I don't think so.

I think (and it is just an opinion) that fish need a large amount of oil in their diet to stay healthy and disease free.  I believe that because (as you said) most of the vitamin A and oil is stored in the liver.  A fishes liver could be almost 1/4 of it's weight and most of that liver is oil.  When a fish eats another fish, almost 1/4 of that meal is oil so if a shark eats a 100lb fish, about 20lbs of that is oil.   That is a lot of oil and that much oil would probably kill us, but we are not fish.  When a fish produces eggs, almost all of the material in those eggs is oil and it takes a lot of energy for a fish to produce that much oil which could be a third the weight of the fish.  So fish are full of oil in their livers and in their eggs so I believe that figh require large amounts of it in their diet.

To me, that is just common sense but I could be wrong.  Eating fish muscle is fine, but eating the entire fish is much better.

I also don't know if my theory of spawning fish that don't hardly ever get sick is correct but so far no one has been able to tell me why my fish are still living with no diseases for over 20 years in water where no quarantining is going on for about 35 years and new fish, water, mud, seaweeds are added every few weeks.

I am not one of those PhD types and I have never went to college, there was that draft thing in the 60s.  But I do like your long winded answer and I am looking forward to you answering my question because I want to learn these things or at least have something to think about.

By the way, I only mentioned that fish eat eyes because I meant they eat the entire fish, guts, eyes, bones, scales hooks and all.  Not that I figured eyes were the most nutritious parts.  I know I wouldn't eat them and I eat fish almost every day, I also take fish oil every day.

 

  A sudden burst of parasite or pathogen load will kill the healthiest of fish.

 

Maybe, but my tank is 42 years old.  I am sure there has been some sudden bursts of just about everything going on in there.  I am just looking for an answer as to why.  If we could figure out what is going on, maybe we would get the Nobel Peace Prize.  I will split it with you.

[GraffitiSpotCorals]

Maybe, but my tank is 42 years old.  I am sure there has been some sudden bursts of just about everything going on in there.  I am just looking for an answer as to why.  If we could figure out what is going on, maybe we would get the Nobel Peace Prize.  I will split it with you.

Think your tank being 42 years old has anything to do with why your fish are resistant to disease? Even though you have not really for sure added anything that was proven sick with anything other than ich right? Maybe we can get John to scrape a fish and diagnose its disease and we can toss it in there and see what happens.

 

Wade thanks for continuing this conversation it's all good information for people!

We suppliment our fish food, feed a lot and a lot of different things. Or should I say Amanda does, I don't take part in it but she is very smart and knows what's best for the fish. Maybe if she had time to be on wamas, then maybe she could chip in.

[paul b]

Think your tank being 42 years old has anything to do with why your fish are resistant to disease?

 

I would be guessing if I answered that as I have no idea.

 

 

Maybe we can get John to scrape a fish and diagnose its disease and we can toss it in there and see what happens.

 

 

That would be an excellent experiment.  And if my tank crashed, I would collect stamps or take up golf.  I am getting to old for this anyway.

There is someone on RC argueing with me on this and I am to old to argue.  I am getting very passive in this now as I don't feel I have to prove anything to anyone any more.  It is what it is and if I didn't think someone's opinions were valid, I just would not read their threads.

I don't even read half the stuff I post. 

[dave w]

Paul, most of your opinions come from years of experience and developed intuition.  Most of mine come from reading academic papers and trying to tie those different tiny findings into a larger picture.  Your perspective is undoubtedly better, although we can learn a lot from the scientific research.

 

Regarding ich, I am amazed that in 42 years you haven't had an outbreak go through your tank.  Congratulations, you must be doing things the right way.

[paul b]

Well it hasn't been 42 years without an outbreak.  For the first 8 years or so my tank was an ich farm like all tanks and I had to keep pennies in the tank for the copper.  In the early 70s all fish had ich and copper was used extensively.  The only food was flakes and the ASW was not the best so i normaly used NSW.

I only found out how to keep disease out of my tank after I figured out how to keep the fish in the best condition they could be in, and that is to feed live or at least whole foods.  But live is the best.  Saltwater fish eggs are also very good but they really make your skimmer go nuts.  3 salmon eggs would make my skimmer overflow so they have to be rinsed very well.

 

As books were written I would buy them as soon as they came out.  I even became friendly with some of the authors.  Bob Goemans is my friend and he has come to my home to see my tank.  Albert Thiel is another friend of mine.  Both of those respected gentlemen have published my articles on their sites.

I still read as much as I can but now at my age, I have been in this longer than most people who write books.  Not that I can't learn new things but most books on the subject would be geared more for beginners.  Scientific papers are mostly for food fish as that is where the money is.   There are not to many scientists trying to raise copperband butterflies for profit when you can get them wholesale for ten bucks.  It is just not worth it.

It is up to the younger people on these forums to come up with the new ideas, the people who think outside the box or disregard the box all together will be the educators of this hobby.  But old ideas die hard and this hobby now has so many members with so many different ideas that new (or very old) methodoligies are laughed at.

I have a reverse UG filter.  OK stop laughing now.  Virtually everyone on these forums will tell you they can't work.  Of course no one uses them but they have a stigma as being very old school.  It is ironic that the oldest tank on here runs one, They are supposed to have insurmountable problems.

Disease forums use up the most ink and ways to cure ich and other things are the backbone of these forums but very little is written about how to keep these animals healthy in the first place so we don't need to cure them.  My blackworm idea is laughed about all over the place, but then again I have those 20 year old fish that stay healthy and keep spawning in spite of the fact that I never quarantine.  Many people wish i would just go away as my ideas throw a wrench in current philosophies.  I can't help it, these are my ideas and at least in my tank they seem to work.

On RC as I said I am getting all sorts of arguements that my opinions are wrong.  No one is offering any other opinions, just that I am wrong.

My fish don't think I am wrong, but I could be.  I am here to learn like everyone else and if anyone has any better Ideas on how to keep fish disease free or why we should keep fish in breeding condition, I think we should all hear about it, don't you?

 

A member there, actually a friend of mine posted that blackworms come from drainage ditches and eat fecal matter.  I found a California Blackworm farm and copied this from their site:  http://www.aquaticfoods.com/BlackwormFarmM.html

 

Our current Blackworm Farm and shipping facility is the end result of raising and shipping California Blackworms since apx 1980.  As you can see, our Blackworms are not raised in ditches, trout hatcheries, or dairy ponds.   Our water source is clean well water.  We do not reuse any of our water.  We always have fresh filtered water running through our ponds.

I like to keep my reading current.

Edited November 30, 2013 by paul b

[Enkay]

I think blackworms are many times mistaken with Tubifex worms. Tubifex worms do grow in sewage and ditches. Blackworms on the other hand need much cleaner conditions to grow.