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what food do you give apistogramma? vitamins?

Wojtek.86

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How do you feed apistogramma? Do you give vitamins? What food do they color best with? Can the right light color them too? I'm mainly talking about fish from Colombia
 

MacZ

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Any live and frozen food except red mosquito larvae / bloodworms will do. Diversity is key.

Colour enhancing foods never worked in my experience. The most likely thing will be they develope reddish meat.

Of course light has a big influence as do humic substances in the water. Certain light colours will simply filter out certain colours. The only thing that always stays the same are reflective scales that shine blue/green like the stripes of a neon.
 

MacZ

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Oh, and about vitamins: The small bottles from JBL (Atvitol) or Sera or any other manufacturer will do. The mixtures are all more or less identical. A few drops with a feeding of frozen food per week suffice completely.
 

Wojtek.86

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Dowolna żywa i mrożona żywność, z wyjątkiem czerwonych larw komarów / ochotek, będzie dobra. Różnorodność jest kluczowa.

W moim doświadczeniu pokarmy wzmacniające kolor nigdy nie działały. Najbardziej prawdopodobne jest to, że rozwiną czerwonawe mięso.

Oczywiście światło ma duży wpływ, podobnie jak substancje humusowe w wodzie. Pewne kolory światła po prostu odfiltrują pewne kolory. Jedyne, co zawsze pozostaje takie samo, to odblaskowe skale, które świecą na niebiesko/zielono jak paski neonu.
 

Wojtek.86

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Jak What do you think, which frozen or live foods will dye what color? Which will be better for getting red?
 

MacZ

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I doubt you can enhance colour with food at all. Colouration of cichlids doesn't work like the colourstion of a flamingo or salmon meat. Genetics play a big role in this.
 

MacZ

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You can, <"astaxanthin (carotenoid) enhances red coloration"> in Apistogramma spp. in the same way that it does for Salmon (Salmo salar) and Flamingo (Phoenicopteridae) spp.
But you are aware, that in Salmon just the meat is taking up colouration and in Flamingos the feathers grow with that colouration and won't change after that until the next moulting? In Apistogramma and other Cichlids chromatophores have massive influence on the colour.

When still breeding Malawi cichlids colour enhancement with food has shown minimal effect. *shrug* Sceptical about it.
 

anewbie

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1,879
But you are aware, that in Salmon just the meat is taking up colouration and in Flamingos the feathers grow with that colouration and won't change after that until the next moulting? In Apistogramma and other Cichlids chromatophores have massive influence on the colour.

When still breeding Malawi cichlids colour enhancement with food has shown minimal effect. *shrug* Sceptical about it.
I have found for some of my larger cicihlds that carotenoid have a big influence on the amount of orange/red showing. However i have never intentionally fed anything with carotenoid to dwarf cichild and won't comment there. As a rule i don't intentionally feed a particular mineral or substance for colour but rather i try to feed things that will keep the fish healthy. That is not to claim that things as carotenoid is bad for fishes (i eat enough of the stuff as i love carrots); but i do not have any data to suggest it helps or hurts the health of fishes.
 

ApistoBubs

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8
Any live and frozen food except red mosquito larvae / bloodworms will do. Diversity is key.
hi MacZ, my two get live tubifex, daphnia, moina (which i cultivate myself) and frozen foods as well for diversity. Now i did try bloodworms but funnily enough not many of my fish like them. I was also about to ask this very same question on what is the best foods for them and am really interested why red mosquito larvae and bloodworm were an exception on your list of foods. Are they harmful? Or just not a natural food source?
 

MacZ

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3,586
Location
Germany
red mosquito larvae and bloodworm
First of all, both names are synonymous. They are the larvae of chironomid midges/mosquitos.

Are they harmful?
We still do not know what exactly is the problem, but feeding those to dwarf cichlids in particular has caused a lot of fatalities. The theories that are not yet disproven range from a protein poisoning, to an intolerance of something in them to the simple fact that they are very often produced cheap in contaminated water and handled without care when frozen, leading to some kind of food poisoning. The theory of barbs on the larvae causing inner bleeding has been disproven, they don't have any, and white mosquito larvae (aka glassworms) which indeed have barbs, can be fed without worries.
On top there are people that never had any problems feeding them, either because they collect them themselves, buy high quality or simply blissfully ignore the connection.
Bottom line: Most people avoid feeding them to dwarf cichlids and there are voices from the betta community that say they are experiencing similar problems.

Or just not a natural food source?
They are technically a natural food source, certain chironomid larvae make up a high percentage of the food of fish in South America. This makes it all the more puzzling how so many cases of dead captive dwarf cichlids can be traced back to feeding them.
 

ApistoBubs

New Member
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First of all, both names are synonymous. They are the larvae of chironomid midges/mosquitos.


We still do not know what exactly is the problem, but feeding those to dwarf cichlids in particular has caused a lot of fatalities. The theories that are not yet disproven range from a protein poisoning, to an intolerance of something in them to the simple fact that they are very often produced cheap in contaminated water and handled without care when frozen, leading to some kind of food poisoning. The theory of barbs on the larvae causing inner bleeding has been disproven, they don't have any, and white mosquito larvae (aka glassworms) which indeed have barbs, can be fed without worries.
On top there are people that never had any problems feeding them, either because they collect them themselves, buy high quality or simply blissfully ignore the connection.
Bottom line: Most people avoid feeding them to dwarf cichlids and there are voices from the betta community that say they are experiencing similar problems.


They are technically a natural food source, certain chironomid larvae make up a high percentage of the food of fish in South America. This makes it all the more puzzling how so many cases of dead captive dwarf cichlids can be traced back to feeding them.
Thank you for your detailed response, it is appreciated. Bloodworms definitely off the menu for good. as you say it could a mixture if reasons, difficulty in digesting hemoglobin or just poor quality / not fresh.
 
Last edited:

ApistoBubs

New Member
Messages
8
Oh, and about vitamins: The small bottles from JBL (Atvitol) or Sera or any other manufacturer will do. The mixtures are all more or less identical. A few drops with a feeding of frozen food per week suffice completely.
One more question, is this something that we should be giving or does variety of quality food suffice. I am a bit loathe to put any additives in the water if its not beneficial to / necessary for my residents.
 

MacZ

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3,586
Location
Germany
One more question, is this something that we should be giving or does variety of quality food suffice. I am a bit loathe to put any additives in the water if its not beneficial to / necessary for my residents.
Diversity, freshness, quality. Usually all you need. You can add Vitamins. There are vitamin drops, that only need a handful of drops to be added to a portion of frozen food once a week.

That's optional though.
 

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