Frozen krill/mysis

Performance & sizing

Core numbers for matching this unit to your tank and electrical plan.

Power

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Flow rate

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Noise

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Dimensions

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Price range

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Tank fit (L)

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Consumables & maintenance

Follow the manufacturer schedule for seals, impellers, media, and other consumables.

Description

Frozen invertebrates are perishable stock, and what goes wrong with them is nearly always handling rather than the food. The Merck Veterinary Manual gives commercial frozen feeds a shelf life of about one year, listing brine shrimp, bloodworms, mysids and glassworms among them, and adds the rule that gets broken most often in a home freezer: once thawed, these feeds should not be refrozen. A blister pack half used, left to soften on the counter and pushed back into the drawer, has broken it. The comparison with dry feed is useful for working out what is actually old in a cupboard. A tub of dry feed opened and kept at room temperature should go after two months. Commercial feed kept in the freezer lasts about six. Fish feeds carry a lot of protein and oil, and rancidity is one of the causes Merck lists for hepatic lipidosis, so a package kept well past its point is not simply less nutritious. What frozen items are really for is variety. Merck's position is that nutritional requirements are known for only a handful of fish species, so the practical answer is to feed a range rather than to trust one product, and mixing prepared and non-prepared feeds also stops fish from locking on to a single item. A frozen crustacean is the cheapest way to put a second texture into a tank that otherwise eats one dry food. On handling, which is keeping practice rather than something the manual prescribes: thaw a portion in a cup of tank water instead of under the tap, feed only what the fish clear in a couple of minutes, and siphon out the rest. Krill and mysis are messy, and uneaten protein in the substrate is the same nitrogen load as overfeeding anything else.

Source

• merckvetmanual.com — https://www.merckvetmanual.com/exotic-and-laboratory-animals/aquarium-fish/nutritional-diseases-of-fish

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