Pellet Recommendations Needed

[Itchy Trigger]

I currently feed my fish a mix of frozen foods - mysis, brine, Rod's, clams, sheets of nori, all kinds of good stuff... I like feeding this stuff and the fish definitely dig it. But it'd be nice to have a good staple pellet food I can feed when I'm in a rush and don't have time to thaw and rinse the frozen stuff. I've got some Hikari pellets from when I was keeping a smaller reef with small fish, but these pellets are just too tiny. Fish in my big tank now are large angels, tangs, hi fin snapper, pork fish... Big guys with big appetites. Can someone recommend one or two great pellet foods for big fish?

 

[deepblue68]

Mine love hikari seaweed extreme medium size pellets and new life spectrum marine and new life spectrum Thera a+

 

[Giants13]

ocean nutrition formula 1 and 2.

 

[Tigerdragon]

New era marine pellets my fish love it also use the grazers

 

[usmc1812]

New Era Pellets and Larrys Reef Frenzy hands down. It costs a lot more but well worth it.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Thanks for the suggestions! I haven't even heard of New Era, so will check them out.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

The New Era definitely seems to run a bit more expensive... Anyone else on here have opinions on this? Is it worth it to spend extra on that as opposed to say, the Ocean Nutrition foods?

 

[mattcoug]

New Life Spectrum

 

[Dkuhlmann]

I've never heard of the New Era. I've used New Life Spectrum for many years and have fish eat it that won't eat anything else. My Hector's goby will only eat NLS pellets and doesn't touch mysis, brine or LRS but he loves the NLS pellets.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

I used to feed NLS when I kept African cichlids, so I'd be happy to return to that brand. I think I might try a combo of the Thera +A and the AlgaeMax in 2mm size.

 

[skiwez]

I've been using New Era for about a year. Fish seem to like them, I feed the algae pellets and regular marine. I prefer them because they come in soft making it it easier for fish to chew/swallow depending on size

 

[SDguy]

I use small Ocean Nutrition pellets (1 and 2) along with HBH spirulina soft pellets, which I am unsure if they are still around (I bought like 10lbs a while back).

And then of course Larry's Fish Frenzy, PE mysis, and a slew of frozen seafood meats from the grocery store.

 

[deepblue68]

Give seaweed extreme by hikari my tangs and other fish love it. They sell it small and medium sized pellets.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

I use small Ocean Nutrition pellets (1 and 2) along with HBH spirulina soft pellets, which I am unsure if they are still around (I bought like 10lbs a while back).

And then of course Larry's Fish Frenzy, PE mysis, and a slew of frozen seafood meats from the grocery store.

I don't think the HBH pellets are still around. I used to feed those too back when I had freshwater tanks. I've read in a few places that the Ocean Nutrition pellets color your water. Have you found this to be the case? And yes, I use Larry's, Rod's, PE mysis, etc. every day. :thumbsup:

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Give seaweed extreme by hikari my tangs and other fish love it. They sell it small and medium sized pellets.

Will do. I actually have some of this on hand but it's the small pellets, and they're so small most of my fish don't even pay attention to them. Will check out the medium size - thanks!

 

[SDguy]

I don't think the HBH pellets are still around. I used to feed those too back when I had freshwater tanks. I've read in a few places that the Ocean Nutrition pellets color your water. Have you found this to be the case? And yes, I use Larry's, Rod's, PE mysis, etc. every day. :thumbsup:

The O/N pellets likely color the water, but not to an extent that it is visible to my eye... I also run carbon periodically. But yeah, my skimmate will either be tinted green or red depending on which pellet container I'm using that month.

 

[Itchy Trigger]

Cool. Might be fun to mix up the color of the skimmate from month to month.

 

[laga77]

The O/N pellets likely color the water, but not to an extent that it is visible to my eye... I also run carbon periodically. But yeah, my skimmate will either be tinted green or red depending on which pellet container I'm using that month.

This was taken from a Oscar fish site, but applies to marine fish as well. "Your fish do not care about the color of the flakes and/or pellets you are feeding them. The pet industry adds artificial colors for marketing, to make the flakes and/or pellets appear more appetizing to us or to keep the color of the food consistent between production runs. The uninformed consumer thinks those green flakes are green because their content is primarily plant based. Chances are that's not the case. The green comes from a mix of Yellow 5 Lake and Blue 2 Lake. The flake is nothing more than bad fish meal, added non-preferred proteins, and chemicals. I use the existence of artificial coloring agents as an indication of the quality of the meals in their foods. Chances are, any fish food manufacturer using these agents will not be using quality fish meals.

So, to make the food more appealing to our eyes the industry adds chemicals that are banned in many countries. Avoid any foods that list any of the artificial coloring agents or use the phrase "natural and artificial colors" in the ingredient list."

 

[SDguy]

ON uses this for coloring their pellets: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astaxanthin

I agree, I'm not in love with all the ingredients of this brand of pellets, but it's not a staple for my fish (you really shouldn't have a "staple" at all IMO), and my fish do love it noticeably more than other pellets.

 

[Lostinthedark]

I alternate my foods also between frozen, Clams and pellets. The New Era are expensive but all my larger fish take to it readily. Even my Marine Beta chase them down.