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New Life Spectrum or Tetra Colorbits?


ChrisNorris

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Hi guys,

Ive recently started to rethink my fish' diet plan.

Currently, I feed my discus a mix of:

- Frozen Brine Shrimp

- Discus Dinner

- Tetra Colorbits

And my Peacock:

- Frozen Brine Shrimp

- New Life Spectrum

- Tetra Colorbits

I only purchased my peacock the other day, and along with it the New Life Spectrum which ive heard so much about. I haven't incorporated it into my Discus' diet as of yet, as I'm keen to first see the results on my peacock.

So the question is: which is better, colorbits or spectrum?

I've had several people vouch for each, while others say its much of a muchness.

Spectrum guarantee maximum growth, vitality and color within 60 days if you feed your fish ONLY on spectrum, however ive always been one to try to vary my fish's diet, so im kinda skeptical.

Any advice would be appreciated

Thanks again,

Chris

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You will get an overwhelming response on here for NLS.

I've never been a fan of it when used by itself but when used in a mixed diet with other dry foods I never had a problem.

Colourbits while a good food can cause problems when fed in excess with mouthbrooders as it makes the eggs infertile. (personal experiance). I cannot say for non mouth brooding fish whether it has any effect or not for sure but I have never heard of it doing so.

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I have used both of these products and are good products, but with the release of prestige foods have been using nothing but there range with great results

Spectrum guarantee maximum growth, vitality and color within 60 days if you feed your fish ONLY on spectrum, however ive always been one to try to vary my fish's diet, so im kinda skeptical.

I can honestly say that this is not possible with food alone remember you have too keep your water in tip top shape as well. Water plays such a major part in the overall health and growth of our fish.

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Colourbits while a good food can cause problems when fed in excess with mouthbrooders as it makes the eggs infertile. (personal experiance).

How can you call it a good food when you say it made the fish infertile?

In addition, colour bits is fairly universally accepted to cause an unnatural colour in fish (yellows go an orangey colour).

Spectrum guarantee maximum growth, vitality and color within 60 days if you feed your fish ONLY on spectrum, however ive always been one to try to vary my fish's diet, so im kinda skeptical.

THE reason why we have always been told to feed a variety is because ALL foods (talking pre prepared dry foods here) were deficient (or worse) in one or more areas. Therefore, to overcome this deficiency we feed a variety of other equally deficient dry foods in the hope to mix and match this deficiency and at the end of the day cover all the nutritional bases. This I think is not generally known or understood.

It is my understanding that the base reason for this; is that the knowledge used to create commercial fish foods for the aquarium hobby has been gained from the human consumption fish industry. Their goal is to get the fish as big as possible and as fast as possible so it can be killed, sold and eaten. We with fish tanks have different objectives - long life, colour and health.

NLS spectrum has been designed/created with long life, colour and fish health in mind and has none of the inbuilt deficiencies other dry foods have. So what that means is this; you can feed NLS and nothing but NLS with no downsides. NLS is in fact variety in one container. :thumb

Further more, if you feed NLS + another commercial dry food you are in fact lowering the over all nutritional intake of your fish.

NLS has been created to be feed with equally good nutrition to "vegetarians" and "carnivores", and I can personally attest to this with my 2000 litre Tang community tank where I have Tropheus and calvus (amongst others) living together. I personally know of NO other commercial dry food that you can do this with, please correct me if this is no longer the case.

I personally believe that you should feed NLS as a prime diet, but if you want to add other such food as frozen or live, there can have no downsides (unless you introduce disease via these other foods or feed too much or inappropriate meat to "vegetarians").

The big problem here is missinformation from the fish industry which to a large degree can be very unprofessional, and how does a layman/hobbiest know/workout which food is better? It can be very difficult if not impossible to tell by looking at the fish. Their behavour is no guide, and how can you tell the condition of their internal organs from watching it swim around your tank?

Craig

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Thanks a lot for that Craig, very helpful :thumb

So just double checking, feeding frozen / live food to my fish whilst feeding NLS is fine?

So if im feeding my peacocks:

- NLS

- Frozen brine shrimp

and my discus:

- NLS

- Frozen Brine Shrimp

- Discus Dinner

am I set?

Thanks again mate,

Chris

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I found both great foods for my Tanganyikans. Although the tetra bits are small granules and found they seep through my frontosa's gills and tend to make a mess.

You seem to be on the right track. I could make a suggestion to feed a variety of dry foods as if you ever run out or decide to change their diet, your fish will be more acceptable to the new food(s).

my 2cents.

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Prestige Foods

I have moved all my fish over to this Australian made food and could not be happier

I dont have any fish with wasting anymore MAybe the food is fresher because its made here and distibutated quickly as such is the demand

After all over products come from over seas it can take 3 months by sea-freight to get here and god only knows how old it was once its put onto boats

Maybe thats why some are full of perservatives ;)

Just my Thoughts

Craig

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Thanks a lot for that Craig, very helpful :thumb

So just double checking, feeding frozen / live food to my fish whilst feeding NLS is fine?

So if im feeding my peacocks:

- NLS

- Frozen brine shrimp

and my discus:

- NLS

- Frozen Brine Shrimp

- Discus Dinner

am I set?

Thanks again mate,

Chris

In my opinion that will be fine. You could just feed NLS and forget the rest if you wanted. I'm not sure of the quality of Discus Dinner, but as a generalisation; be wary, or at least have a question mark over any pre prepared foods (dry and frozen) you use unless you have prepared them yourself (and you know what you are doing). My frozen food comment was more aimed at ones made home by yourself.

For example frozen foods such as daphnia (bags of water) are only as good as how soon after harvest they were frozen/prepared. The longer between capture and freezing the more water to nutrition their bodies will hold. Fozen brine shimp quality will also vary because of this. At least with fronzen brine shrimp you'll have a resonable idea what's in the packet, as apposed to Discus dinner :dntknw: .

I used to go to the effort to make my own home made frozen foods, but NLS has made me lazy and I haven't prepared a batch for ages. :(

I believe my fish are none the worse for my lack of effort, and I still own the blender (my whole family leaves the house when I start chopping up fish, squid, prawns etc. :thumb ), so still can make it in the future.

Be aware that NLS can be feed in smaller amounts than other dry foods. Feeding correct amounts, that is, not underfeeding and not putting in more food than is required (after all the fish ALWAYS look and behave hungry) is a tough balance to reach. You can easily feed more food than is needed and have fish no better off (and costing you more), and it can take months before a conclusion can be reached as to the appropriateness of the amount fed. I use a small spoon (as apposed to fingers) so I can match each time how much I put in and at the end of say three months take stock of the fish (Can I use less? Do I need to feed more?). Remember too, to complicate things, as fish grow, bigger fish need more food than smaller fish, and in the case of fish such as a lot of cichlids, their numbers can also increase. In my opinion overfeeding does not only mean food sitting around on the bottom of the tank uneaten.

Any fish foods you feed, dry or frozen will have preseratives, and regardless of where they are sourcd, OS or Oz, will have a shelf life. Most of the commercial stuff we eat from bread to cans of stew will have it, why shouldn't fish food?

Glad I could help :raisehand:

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frozen foods such as daphnia (bags of water) are only as good as how soon after harvest they were frozen

Daphnia is by far the best food I've fed fish. I've collected tonnes of daphnia and found it is impossible to keep unless it is immediately stored at -18C.

Initially when collected I tried to store in a cold room at 0 degrees, but found that the daphnia would ferment and increase in temp. until it rotted. I hired a freezer to store the daphnia at minus 18 and found the resulting product to be excellent.

Daphnia are in fact bags of algae which bring amazing colours to tetras, and are a perfect diet for goldfish and African cichlids esp. Tropheus.

If more people tried daphnia for their fish, we wouldn't waste money on brine shrimp or make fish sick with bloodworm or beef heart.

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Any fish foods you feed, dry or frozen will have preseratives, and regardless of where they are sourcd, OS or Oz, will have a shelf life. Most of the commercial stuff we eat from bread to cans of stew will have it, why shouldn't fish food?

Yes this is true but different foods uses different preservatives.

In saying that we also have proof that prestige has produced less waste in the tanks than other brands. Therefore making the overall maintenance alot quicker and also with less waste comes less water problems. This then gives the aquarist an easier job when it somes time to clean the tanks.

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Chris what you have to do is try things even if they are new find out what your happy with but there is choices in foods out there now and it wont hurt to give them a go. And make your own mind up.

All I can say is I have tried every variety of food that is out there including nls and tetra bits and have found something that is made here in Australia that is made for our fish and have grown to love this product.

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Thanks so much for your input guys, youve all been super helpful.

I think im just going to have to go with the trial and error method, see what works best for me.

Ill keep you all posted as to what works, but again thanks heaps :)

Cheers,

Chris

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If you want a shirt, you can try different ones on till style and size are good. If you want a new…TV you can go to a shop and trial different models. If you want a meal in a restaurant you can "trial and error" till you find the place that suites you.

However, when feeding our fish;

how does a layman/hobbyist know/workout which food is better? It can be very difficult if not impossible to tell by looking at the fish. Their behaviour is no guide, and how can you tell the condition of their internal organs from watching it swim around your tank?

That is, you really can't "trial and error" your way to a good food. What you have to do is research, which is made easier nowadays via the internet. Even then, don't believe everything you read, cross-reference, compare information, look at the source of the information. For example; can you believe what fish food wholesaler/manufacture says about their fish food "A"? Do you think they might be biased, and have other reasons to promote food "A". Find out who is saying that food "A" is good/bad/indifferent. Read independent articles (From TFH or FAMA for example) about food "A". Learn about the company or at least the person behind the product. Look at the list of ingredients of the food (though even here you have to cross reference as to honesty).

If you can't find out this information - that in itself will be information :yes:

Weigh it all up and THEN make a judgement. You truly can't tell the difference by just feeding to your fish.

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If you can't find out this information - that in itself will be information

This is very true imo. Transparency and being prepared to back their product with real results/guarantees as well as accessibility and honesty speaks greatly of intentions and integrity. Spectrum all the way for me with very occasional treats of frozen.

Jason

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I use NLS thera A and growth for my tropheus.

For my american cichlid, I feed NLS and prestige.

I hardly feed frozen as I found the fish is messing with the food and I dont like the mess in the water.

I prefer pellet as the fish will it it in one go.

Imo, just stick with food that you feed your fish regularly. Change of diet will trigger problem.

:)

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Yeah but you have listed american mags which dont run articles on Australian products.

The only way you can comment on a product is to try the product.

I did and I am over the moon with the Australian made prestige.

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Hi

Can anyone suggest what food that will not cloud the water? I find that with the foods that LFS sell in a take-away containers, they cloud the water really bad, the water won't clear until the next morning.

Thanks

Kevin

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To a certain extent one can indeed trial & error their way to a good food, but for certain portions of any properly controlled feed trial it can take years to determine the true overall health of the fish when using those products. Also, to properly analyze how each food works with your fish (color, digestibility, growth, breeding, etc) the food needs to be fed exclusively so as not to dilute the end results.

As an example, a typical generic feed mill trout chow will cause very good growth in juvenile cichlids, but over time the high lipid content of these foods will cause excessive fat accumulation in & around the liver. Over time this will cause a decline in overall health, and if continued long term will typically cause premature death. Even when feeding very young juvenile cichlids (that have very high metabolisms compared to adults), a short term feed trial of just a few months will show excessive fat deposition around internal organs. (if one performs a necropsy on sample subjects)

This is also why one really doesn't need to use a product, just to comment on it.

A quick read of the ingredients, and the guaranteed analysis (protein/fat/fiber/ash) is often times more than enough for me to give a thumbs up, or down, on any given product. Using a generic farm feed trout chow with an 18% crude fat content as an example, knowing nothing more than the crude lipid content would be enough for me to avoid ever feeding that food to ANY of my aquarium fish. Having said that I am quite certain that there are many hobbyists that feed this very type of food, never realizing that their 'show' fish that died at 5-6 yrs, could have lived for 10-15 yrs had it been fed a more properly balanced diet.

Perhaps in the big equation longevity isn't overly important to some people, but it is for me.

With regards to the OP's original question, if you read the ingredient list of NLS, and then Tetra ColorBits, it shouldn't be overly difficult to make an educated decision.

New Life Spectrum

Ingredients: Whole Antarctic Krill Meal, Whole Herring Meal, Wheat Flour, Whole Squid Meal, Algae Meal, Soybean Isolate, Beta Carotene, Spirulina, Garlic, Vegetable and Fruit Extract (Spinach, Broccoli, Red Pepper, Zucchini, Tomato, Pea, Red and Green Cabbage, Apple, Apricot, Mango, Kiwi, Papaya, Peach, Pear), Vitamin A Acetate, D-Activated Animal-Sterol (D3), Vitamin B12 Supplement, Thiamine, DL Alphatocophero ( E ), Riboflavin Supplement, Folic Acid, Niacin, Biotin, Calcium Pantothenate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, L-Ascorby-2-Polyphosphate (Stable C), Ethylenediamine dihydroiodide, Cobalt Sulfate, Copper Proteinate, Ferrous Sulfate, Manganese Sulfate, Choline Chloride.

Tetra ColorBits

Ingredients: Fish Meal, Dehulled Soybean Meal, Wheat Germ Meal, Wheat Flour, Corn Gluten, Feeding Oat Meal, Potato Protein, Shrimp Meal, Dried Yeast, Wheat Gluten, Monobasic Calcium Phosphate, L-Lysine Monohydrochloride, Lecithin, Algae Meal, Soybean Oil, Yeast Extract, Ascorbic Acid (Source of Vitamin C), Inositol, Niacin, A-Tocopherol-Acetate, Riboflavin-5-phosphate, L-ascorbyl-2-polyphosphate (Stabilized Vitamin C), Choline Chloride, d-Calcium Pantothenate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Vitamin A Palmitate, Menadione Sodium Bisulfite Complex, Folic Acid, Biotin, Cyanocobalamin, Cholecalciferol, Manganese sulfate, Zinc sulfate, Ferrous sulfate, Cobalt nitrate. Coloring Agents: Beta-Carotene, Red 3 dye, Ethoxyquin and Citric Acid both as Preservatives.

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Hi RD

I noticed in your post with the 2 foods ingredients outlined that Tetra still uses Ethoxyquin and NLS Once did but has dropped it I asume due to the bad press

Whats the name of the Preservative that is used in the New Packaged spectrum

This is important to me as Australia is far away from the US and the rest of the world preservatives can have a adverse effect on fish ,animals or even people for that

I have noticed since I dropped the imported foods (Not only the ones mentioned) my fish dont seem to suffer from wasting

Diet is the only thing I have changed in my fish room only the last 6 months

Water Changes ,Buffers and salts have stayed the same

Just curious would this be food related ,or just a coincidence

Or has anyone else experienced the same or different results

Cheers

Craig

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LMAO, that was funny Skippy. :raisehand:

cobalt - NLS never added ethoxyquin to any of their formulas, one of the ingredients that was used simply contained some of this substance. Any/all foodstuffs that contain any amount of fat in them must contain some type of preservative, even your locally made food. And no, ethoxyquin doesn't cause wasting disease, or any other type of disease when used accordingly. I believe that you & I have already been down this road before, yes?

My fish never suffer from wasting disease, nor do I know any local breeders that have this problem and they feed the same food as I do so perhaps in your case it is exactly that, a coincidence.

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Ok RD then why has the container I have here from new life spectrum. Have ethoxyquin in the ingredients list if they have never used it. It is an old container I kept to use when breaking down my buckets.

As for the clouding I have prestige does not cloud the water. Also it has been proven that the waste from prestige is far less than the waste from other food products.

This was done by having bare bottom tanks that were side by side one fed on prestige and the other by another brand. The tank fed on prestige was far less than the tank fed on the other brand for the same period of time.

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