Does fat equal health in fish?

[alton]

Since we are getting off topic slightly my son is allergic to warm water fish, whether it is farm raised catfish or a nice speckled trout from the gulf. He cannot eat nor can he touch warm water fish. Fry French fries in the same grease as the fish and his body starts to shut down. Now give him a cold water fish, fried, grilled or blackened and he is good to go. Caged eggs and he gets weak in the knee’s, but yet fresh farm eggs are fine.

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

every fish should go see a good CARDIOLOGIST at least once a year

It's kosher, my kind of fish
Anyone sushi

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

I do not know anything about birds more than that the Dinosaurs did not get extinct :)

Some fish have just a tube - mostly omnivorous and carnivorous fish. Other - still a tube but rather long and winding - mostly herbivores but also fish feeding on Periphyton (aufwuch). Some fish have the digestive track as a straight line but there is fish there the instentine does a bend under the stomach - like the European eel. This fish can't eat and poop the same time :).

Another thinkable fact is that it is believed that a reef ecosystem have developed the most diversed feeding specialists in the whole world: Still we talk about the importance of variation of the food types for single species........

Fat and a stable body is not the same. I'm fat but Schwarzenegger have a stable body :) :) (The ones that have seen me understand the joke and the comparison :))

Sincerely Lasse

Your balled and fat. What are we going to do with you, Lasse? Heeee

 

[Lasse]

That's the $10 000 question :) :)

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Lasse]

I cannot believe I am saying this, i am sorry Lasse, I have to disagree on this one

While tangs are vegetarian, the 100% things is a bit overstated. I have a Vlamingi, yellow, and purple. 5 minutes ago I dumped in 2 ounces of black worms and and a chopped up frozen mahogany clam. They go nuts. All are fluffy as saltyhog mentioned. Color is great as is their temperament in the tank. They do also get vitamin soak Nori and frozen mega algae, but I would say it is at least 50/50 or more meat than greens. May just be the way my guys grew up, but worked for over 10 years now.

And evening everyone, hope alls well.

When this thread has come to its end - you probably understand my standpoint better. However - what do we mean with fat fish. For me - a fat fish is a fish that have stored fat. Many fishes do that in the liver (like the cod) some fish store it around the digestive track and so on. There is some fish - often pelagic fast swimmers (predators) like mackerel, herring and salmon that store it around the whole body. They need reserves for migration and suddenly lack of food. Most reef fishes is fish that normally do not store to much fat - however they can be rather "round" but that more because of muscles than fat. You can get most tangs round an healthy without meaty food and their digestive tract will work better if it get the food it is constructed for IMO.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Mastiffsrule]

Hello, evening or morning. Not sure out in your area.

I see your point, but I fell a diet of 100% veg is not an absolute or realistic to pull off short of a species only tank. Most reefers have a mix of tangs and other fish feeding a veg diet supplemented with meat as the norm. To prevent a tang from eating meaty meant for other inhabitants would not be realistic.

Advanced aquarist did a small write up on the diet showing how they can become omnivorous...

https://www.advancedaquarist.com/2009/12/fish

“In addition, almost without exception, they'll become omnivorous and will eat brine shrimp, copepods, mysid shrimp, bits of chopped clam and regular shrimp, and other sorts of meaty things, too. But, the same goes here once again. These are not what a tang relies on in the wild, so they should not be the only foods given in aquariums.”

A lot of times is see the tangs already being fed brine before sold. If I get one from a LFS, I always ask them to feed to make sure they are eating. Every time they do the drop in brine.

Now I am hungry, all this talk of food
;Woot

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Anyone in need of a 1942 HD side car?

 

[Sailfinguy21]

Eat tangs, not tuna or salmon. They are healthier.

.

Since tangs come from the pacific mainly and the pacific is now polluted for millions of years thanks to fukashima.. i dunno.. eat tangs with cesium and so forth or eat salmon with mercury lol.

Ive actually been really curious to see if our imported fish measure on tools that measure radiation.. and itd be interesting to have a lab test the fish for cesium and stuff.. i garuntee you they have it in their bodies now. Specislly since the west coast of the united states has been testing positive for radiation for years now. I would never swim in the oceon in california or those states anymore. I wouldnt get in the water in hawaii either anymore.

 

[MPS]

You are what you eat. Wild caught are healthy fish. Farmed fish are usually unhealthy, diseased and riddled with parasites. Farming fish is a cruel practice.

That seems WAY off topic.
I’d like to see the data behind your statement. You seem so certain, I’m interested in knowing the facts that brought you to that conclusion.

 

[Wrangy]

There's so much nonsense and completely false statements in this thread about food fish. Could we stick to the aquarium fish please and not start talking about completely inaccurate and untrue things to do with the fish that we eat.

 

[Hans-Werner]

There are scientific articles about feeding, food and digestive tracts of tangs. The challenge is to find them and unfortunately some are in books and not available as full text online. Here is one article about the food of Zebrasoma xanthurum and Ctenochaetus striatus in the Red Sea. It clearly shows that brown and red algae are the preferred food of this Zebrasoma species. Brown and red algae are very different from the green algae found in freshwater habitats. They are much more nutritious than the green hair algae rich in cellulose fibers. Of the more nutritious brown and red algae Wakame (Undaria) has 10 - 20 % protein in dry mass and Nori (Porphyra) even 29 - 47 % protein idm.

Here is another one about all kinds of herbivorous fish on coral reefs. Here is one in the same series about the alimentary tracts.

 

[Lasse]

Sorry @Hans-Werner - the last 2 links - access denied.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[Hans-Werner]

The title is "The trophic status of herbivorous fishes on coral reefs", part I and part II. If these links do not work either I can only try to link abstracts. I have access to some full texts with limited access because I contributed an article to research gate.

 

[Lasse]

Thanks - it works for me - I'll read them later

Sincerely Lasse

 

[alton]

I had a purple Pseudochromis once that was way overweight. He cleaned up after a 6" clown Trigger all the time and he ended up only living a few years. My boss had an office tank and the person taking care of it added a long nose hawk fish to control the bristle worms which was because the secretary overfed the tank. So between feedings and endless supply of worms he went from three inches to eight in one year and was very round. It died after two years. Many years ago I would get clown triggers at 1" and raise them to 6" and then trade for a baby. One of those ended up along with several other large fish in a newbies hands and died after two weeks because of overfeeding. When the person came back into complain, they where asked how many times they fed the fish? And the answer was "They were always hungry so I fed until they would not come up for food and laid on the bottom". And I never could understand why people at a fish store feed tangs brine shrimp instead of Nori or algae sheets?

 

[OrionN]

While the examples Alton cites above may died from over feeding, they also can died from sub optimal or poor water condition.
I hand feed my Harlequin Tusk until he stop coming for food about twice a week. He grows fast.
My tangs graze all day and often finish the Nori I put in for them late in the day.
All my fish seem to poop a lot more in the AM. As the light come up. They hardly poop during the day.

 

[OrionN]

For obvious economical reasons, food animals or plants generally have been pack as tightly as they can and not suffer the decrease production. Mass chicken house, Mass egg-laying chicken, Mono-culture banana plantation, catfish (or other fish) ponds, farm raise shrimp, Salmon farms and on and on...Various methods of disease control were need to keep the animals and plants from dying due to overcrowding. These have not always ecologically sound, nor produce the best food, nor good for the organism involved or the environment.
I think we all can agree on this.

Today, in the US and for most people on this forum, we have choices. When I was in Vietnam before 1975, 80%+ of our budget is for food and we were and middle class family. Hunger is a very common problem and people died of hunger all the time.

There have been movements of more ecologically sound, less destructive ways of raising food; Organic farming, free range chicken and the likes. However, if cheap is the main driving force then we will have methods that is not best for the animals involved or the environment. This is just the fact of life.

Vote with your wallets everybody. Please find out more so you can spend your hard earn money wisely. Don't just use mainstream news-bites to make your decision. These can be so misleading.

 

[ZoWhat]

I buy my Salmon out of a guy's trunk on 5th and Elm. Says he raising them in his abandoned backyard above ground pool.

LOLOLOL

 

[Reefthedayaway]

That seems WAY off topic.
I’d like to see the data behind your statement. You seem so certain, I’m interested in knowing the facts that brought you to that conclusion.

That seems WAY off topic.
I’d like to see the data behind your statement. You seem so certain, I’m interested in knowing the facts that brought you to that conclusion.

would ye aye!

 

[Mastiffsrule]

I buy my Salmon out of a guy's trunk on 5th and Elm. Says he raising them in his abandoned backyard above ground pool.

LOLOLOL

Is that the same guy I bought my watch from?