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My Tank Thread
With recent posts about DIY fish food, I thought I'd post my experiences.
In the past, our local fish club would make food at one of our monthly meetings, or a group of us (8 - 12 folks), would get together and make up a batch and split it. For the most part, we followed Eric Borneman's recipe. You can see that recipe HERE. This isn't rocket science, and we would change this recipe up, dependent on availability of what we would find/purchase.
Recently I've been doing my own thing, and have greatly simplified the recipe so that it could be made quickly and without having to aquire multiple items. The fish still love this stuff! I simply use a one pound bag of frozen Seafood Mix (purchased from a local oriental market), a white fish or two, and a couple sheets of nori....that's it.
The seafood mix I purchased most recently is shown below and contains blanched squid strips and tentacles, blanched octopus slices, blanched peeled shrimps, cooked mussel meat, cooked crab stick slice (all wild caught). Most recently, this bag of goodies cost $3.69.
Here's the bag dumped out on the cutting board:
I also include a white fish. In this batch I'm using two disgustingly small flounder fillets that came from Sam's club. I don't know how they could sell such small fillets. I know if I were to take some of these fillets on my fishing trip, and got inspected, I'd be fined. We have a 14 inch limit on fish, and these little things came from a much smaller fish. Anyway, here are the two fillets.
So what I do is to first rough Julienne chop the frozen seafood mix and then pulse this in a food processor. I originally used a big (normal) food processor, but ruined it (wife not happy), so I now use a small one with small multiple batches.
Similarly, the flounder is cut up and chopped up in the food processor.
Finally, I take three or four (or five) sheets of nori and use sissors to first cut into thin strips (about a 1/4 inch wide) and then turn 90 degrees and cut into small squares.
Everything is put into a pot and mixed.
and then put into a one gallon freezer bag, flatten, and put into the freezer.
Once frozen, I'll cut cubes about 1/2 inch by 3/4 inches wide. When ready to feed, I thaw one or two of these cubes in a cup of tank water and feed the fish (and coral). There are a fair amount of "fines", so the corals get to eat too.
It's not the fancy mix like Eric's, but the fish still love it. Obviously, you can modify to fit your needs and fish's dietary needs.
Also note that my fish don't get this food everyday....I mix it up with mysis, black worms, flake food, and whatever else I find in the food draw.
In the past, our local fish club would make food at one of our monthly meetings, or a group of us (8 - 12 folks), would get together and make up a batch and split it. For the most part, we followed Eric Borneman's recipe. You can see that recipe HERE. This isn't rocket science, and we would change this recipe up, dependent on availability of what we would find/purchase.
Recently I've been doing my own thing, and have greatly simplified the recipe so that it could be made quickly and without having to aquire multiple items. The fish still love this stuff! I simply use a one pound bag of frozen Seafood Mix (purchased from a local oriental market), a white fish or two, and a couple sheets of nori....that's it.
The seafood mix I purchased most recently is shown below and contains blanched squid strips and tentacles, blanched octopus slices, blanched peeled shrimps, cooked mussel meat, cooked crab stick slice (all wild caught). Most recently, this bag of goodies cost $3.69.
Here's the bag dumped out on the cutting board:
I also include a white fish. In this batch I'm using two disgustingly small flounder fillets that came from Sam's club. I don't know how they could sell such small fillets. I know if I were to take some of these fillets on my fishing trip, and got inspected, I'd be fined. We have a 14 inch limit on fish, and these little things came from a much smaller fish. Anyway, here are the two fillets.
So what I do is to first rough Julienne chop the frozen seafood mix and then pulse this in a food processor. I originally used a big (normal) food processor, but ruined it (wife not happy), so I now use a small one with small multiple batches.
Similarly, the flounder is cut up and chopped up in the food processor.
Finally, I take three or four (or five) sheets of nori and use sissors to first cut into thin strips (about a 1/4 inch wide) and then turn 90 degrees and cut into small squares.
Everything is put into a pot and mixed.
and then put into a one gallon freezer bag, flatten, and put into the freezer.
Once frozen, I'll cut cubes about 1/2 inch by 3/4 inches wide. When ready to feed, I thaw one or two of these cubes in a cup of tank water and feed the fish (and coral). There are a fair amount of "fines", so the corals get to eat too.
It's not the fancy mix like Eric's, but the fish still love it. Obviously, you can modify to fit your needs and fish's dietary needs.
Also note that my fish don't get this food everyday....I mix it up with mysis, black worms, flake food, and whatever else I find in the food draw.
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