|
I see where you are coming from kong, but the facts I found out is that there are MANY sources of red pigment. Astaxanthin is red, as is Canthaxanthin, even red pepper is a source of pigment. The reading I did showed that the main ingredient of sulfate and carbonate forms of cobalt are what many algaes and other plants eat and synthesize into red pigments of various forms. I also found on looking deeper that in certain forms the koi can place the pigment from cobalt carbonate and sulfate directly into their chromatorphes. The stuff I read indicated that was a much more stable and permanent way to fill out the chromatorphes.
That is what the authors of those articles stated. They seemed qualified so I have no reason to dispute it. Alot of breeders use products that are derivatives of astaxanthin in both natural and synthetic forms. For instance salmon breeders use it because salmon in captivity do not eat the large amount of crustaceans that wild ones do, and they do not sell well when they look grey. The public has come to see salmon as a pink fish, so if they see a grey one in the store they think something is wrong with it, and won't buy it. So breeders use astaxanthin to redden it up.
There are alot of pigments out there, and sources of them. Cartenoids and canthaxathin and astaxanthin and xanthin(yellow) are what are found in plants. Plants synthesize cobalt sulfate and carbonate forms into those pigments. Cobalt in some forms is a deep blood red or purplish or pinkish. In some forms it is a dark bold blue.
Fish more easily utilize certain pigments in certain forms. Koi cannot synthesize color so they have to eat it, and then it gets placed in the chromatorphes. In the wild many of the algae and crustaceans (shrimp, cray fish, etc) that koi and carp munch in abundance and that fill out their red chromatorphes get their pigment from different forms of cobalt. So even though koi cannot synthesize cobalt metal into color, it can utilize the pigment that comes from cobalt via either crustaceans and algaes that have sythesized it for them, or directly via sulfates and carbonates in certain forms. That is what days and weeks of reading article after article on it revealed. There is even a site that tells you how much ppm of cobalt sulfate or carbonate needs to be in the soil for plants to draw enough of it up to synthesize it into red color pigment.
That is all aside from the fact it is a source of B-12.
|