Jus found this thread. So, acroboy, do you have a nice comfy couch by your pen?
It dosn't sound like you are at risk of introducing anything foreign into your local waters. Laws on releasing wildlife can by funny though. Years ago when I was living with my folks on the farm, we looked at hatching and releasing pheasants. Nothing exotic, just the same birds found locally. We found out that permits were needed to do this and they were hard to come by. Releasing without approval was stricktly verboten.
Again, if you are releasing with the knowledge of the local conservation folks, I suspect you are just fine.
I wish I had your access to local salt water. Might actually encourage me to try cold water diving.
My personal thoughts on foods and feeding are that you need variety and you need live.
In my fresh water days, I used to feed a combination to any fish I kept. I once recieved a 'best in class' award at a local fish show for a giant danio. For those not fimiliar with fish shows, commoners like danios never win awards. The judges commented that they had never seen such good colour or active behavior from a danio at a show. It was the food. Simple as that.
In my case I added a 40 gallon refugium to my 40 gallon tank because I wanted enough supplemental live food to keep my horses in good breeding condition.
I think that live food is important for more than just the HUFFAs. Dead stuff breaks down. Though I have no data to back me up, I believe that there is more in live food than just huffas that fish need. There must be amino acids, vitamins and other good stuff that breaks down in frozen foods.
To me, a few live guppies would be better than no live food at all.
Great topic by the way!
Fred
