White rice feeding

[KoiCop]

Bil's paste food recipe has been floating around the net since the early days of KoiVet, long before the "other" boards split off, and seems to have stood the test of time quite well.

I feed pellets (Hikari Wheat Germ) year round and supplement it 50-50 with high protein pellets during the summer, along with fruit, veggies and greens.

[Clay]

Quote: Originally Posted by KoiCop Bil's paste food recipe has been floating around the net since the early days of KoiVet, long before the "other" boards split off, and seems to have stood the test of time quite well. I feed pellets (Hikari Wheat Germ) year round and supplement it 50-50 with high protein pellets during the summer, along with fruit, veggies and greens.

Bluntly feeding a ratio of Hikari Wheat Germ and Hi-Silk 21 depending on water temps myself. HWG has served me and many other koi keepers over the long haul. I personally believe the R&D department at Hikari is among the best in the world.

I removed the dates from when I modified Bil's recipe some. I played with that in 2000, 01 and 02.

I also wanted to make sure that Bil recieved the credit for this even though I put my personal twist on it. I have a problem when someone represents an idea as their own when it was someone else's altogether. This is the last contact that I had with Bil from 5-14-03:


"Hi Clay, I don't know if you have been following it, but there have been some threads on food on NI. I have changed the recipe a bit to boost the algal content.

Thom B posted some excellent stuff about hyopglycaemia in koi from feeding the wrong foods, eg cheerios.

Gelatin based food mix..
300g prawn waste/fish/squid (fish, squid etc cooked)
400cc hot water with 4 x gelatin allowed to cool a bit.
20 cc oil, 4 vit B tablets, 1 teaspoon vit C powder, 20g dried bugs, etc.
150g seaweed flour
60g Refresh clay
150g wheatgerm.

What I do now is this. First put the dry gelatin in a mug, and pour the hot (not boiling) water onto it, not the other way round. To speed cool, as soon as it has dissovlved, pour it into a cold mug and fill the hot one with cold water, repeating till cool enough. Then put the wheatgerm and the dried bugs into the blender, blend to a dry powder and put to one side. Measure clay and seaweed and put into the mixing bowl. Line the paste mould with greaseproof paper, and put the cooked fish, prawn waste into the blender, together with the vitamins and the oil. As soon as the gelatin and water has cooled, I tip that into the blender and get it going. The resultant soup is poured into the mixing bowl with the clay and seaweed, and that is mixed in well. Then I add the wheatgerm/bug powder and mix thoruoghly. That is then put in the mould (I use a stainless steel tray, 8" x 9" x 3/4 " deep), I press it flat and smooth it with a knife, then fold the flaps of the greaseproo!
f paper over, smooth, and put it into the fridge to cool and set. Then I cube it and store it in a plastic bag in the fridge.


Beware. If you add yeast to this mix it will make it very crumbly, so it will fall apart. Don't add yeast unless you have cooked it and killed it first.

The oil needs to vary throughout the year in cooler water I only add 10 cc, in warmer 20. That's a variation between 2 & 4%, but remember the fish and prawn waste contains oil too.

Wheatgerm is 27% protein and 45% carbs. I assume these to be mostly fast carbs.
Seaweed is 7% protein and 50% carbs. I assume these to be mostly slow carbs.

Total dry weight of food - clay = 480g

300g fish gives about 150g dry 'animal' protein + 20g dried bugs = 170g animal protein. = 35%
Wheatgerm is 27% protein so 150g gives 40g protein
seaweed is 50% carbs and 7% protein, gives 10.5g protein = 50.5g plant protein. = 10.5%

Fish to plant protein ratio is 170 : 50 (crudely) ie about 7;2
Total protein weight is 220g



dry weight total % protein would be about 45%


wheatgerm is 45% carbs, > 68g = 14% fast carbs (down from 16.5%)
seaweed is 50% carbs, > 75g = 15% slow carbs (Up from 9.5%) High seaweed paste has a total of about 30% carbs

Fibre. Wheatgerm is 16%, > 24g, seaweed is 8% > 12g Total = 36g = 7.5%


So to compare dry paste % to pellets, paste has

45% protein, 30% carbs (14% fast), 2 - 4% oil., and 8% fibre.

Costs.

herring 75g 35p
prawn/squid waste 150g 0p
dried bugs 20g 12p
Vit C 4g 15p
Vit B 4 tabs 10p
oil 20cc 23p
seaweed 150g 11p
clay 40g 48p
Wheatgerm 150g 17p
Gelatin 2 sachets 30p

total 202p = £4-20 a kilo. of which 30% is carbs. Nobori/medicarp = £8, of which 50% - 60% is carbs.
Real cost, (ie minus the carbs) paste = £6-10 N/M = £20
for the average 60% carb pellet to work out the same, it would need to cost about £2-50 a kilo."

[Clay]

Paul, as you see we aren't the only ones to think about different things to feed our fish. Also note the abscence of any rice in the above. Again, I think of rice as a low cost filler not a main stay.

After reading Bil's comments that I posted, I would love to draft Thom B to stop by and give us some comments on his extensive research. Also one of the true losses in the hobby has been when very solid informational threads drop off of the NI board.

Rick

[KoiCop]

you can still find the odd post by Bil over at Deadwood (that's Newt's Forum).

Just look in the Board Wars section.

[bekko]

Ranskye - you're back. Good to hear from you.

My staple fish food is Silver Cup (Nelson) trout food. It is 40% protein, 10% fat, fish meal, soy meal, wheat flour, blood meal, fish oil, wheat middlings, poultry byproduct meal, wheat germ, dried whey, hydrolyzed feather meal, vitamin and mineral pre-mix. This stuff is fed to everything from koi to clowns, either as whole pellets or pulverized. Even the peacocks get a few hand fulls. But, every species get a different supplement. For some, the supplement costs way more than the trout food and for others the supplement is less expensive. For adult koi, the trout food is supplemented with either seaweed or rabbit pellets (alfalfa pellets). I have looked inside a few and not found visceral fat. But, they are not fed heavily either. Adults get less than 1% body weight per day in trout pellets. It would be dangerous to give them all the trout food they want in a clean-bottom pond. I would like to give them real koi food, but this hobby is way over-budget as it is.

-steveh opkin

[ranskye]

hi steve, yep im back looking at fish and getting into selecting some nicer ones this year..good to see your still here.
i forgot to take my camera to work today.
ive been meaning to show some ponds and some fish.

thanks for the info too, i checked my feed bags just today.only the old ones though and the new ones have little info really.

the silver perch food is much like your feed actually. all those standard things you mention..

my smaller dust and 1 mm has fish meal in it but i think the larger stuff doesnt have so much. doesnt smell as fishy..we dont get a full breakdown as they might be worried we will rip off the formuale but itd cost me more anyway i reckon and i cant justify spending more on feed for the adults when my sales wont go up as it wont increase the holding capacity of my fingerling ponds unless maybe i got a better diet for everything and really im happy with my productuion and i could get better results i think by adding more air and water changes and general pond mangement first.

i did once try this other diet for the fry and fingerlings but it seemed to be low on protein and things grew more slowly so what i use seems good for the young.

i am considering looking into the stuff mike was so kind to post about but im yet to work out costs for importing a shipping container of it.
i spose i could buy some but maybe have to sell some off or refridgerate it.
i like to use all my feed up in a month or two.

i know in the early days the original manager used to be able to buy straight fish meal but now its too expensive and consumes too much time to make my own feeds..yep my ring is hanging out already..

i spend about 6-8000 au a year on silver perch feeds.
maybe four or five tonne or something like that.
farm brings in about 200 k a year atm.
i spose im pretty happy with it. ive never checked for this visceral fat though i will cut the next one that floats open to see what people are talking about.
sometimes i lose a few fish via lack of oxygen on cloudy days when im being slack with water and air.
i also dont feed much really. not to the breeders anyway.
the other fingerling ponds get twice more by weight.

lets say i feed a four or five litre bucket twice a day during summer to about 120 breeder koi and 800 large breeder goldfish.
funny huh. i had a koi guy visit not long ago and he said he feeds that to his 20,000 litre tanks and ive got a million litre tank and feeding the same amount. he says his fish shoot in growth rate.
i wonder how much i could hold or grow up if i put in proper airpaddles wheels and some filters..
anyway that works out bugger all by body weight. im not really grwoing them fast or anythign just maintaining size mainly and keeping em healthy enough to produce eggs which is happeneing well enough for me.

just im scrathign my head about the feed place making the change to protein levels and wondering if itll effect anything much.
my fat levels are about 10 percent.

i got a bit put off when i bought some real expensive koi pellets in the last month, i mainly did that casue i ran out of big pellets but had plenty of small stuff left getting old.
i wanted to use it up and my feed place only sells by the tonne..so i bought some 6mm and 4 mm off another company to see me through till then.

ive got the horse feed freind telling me to check out his horse breeder formulae..i now it sounds bad..more protein he says.
i will look at the ingrediants though and may use it as a supplement if the ingreduiants and ratios are ok and workable. i have been feeding it to some of the small fish to maintain size and not put on weight and they like to nibble on it. no problems seen so far but i am not feeding them soley on it.

anyway that visit to the proper koi feed place cost me about 600 bucks for way less than half a tonne as i would ussually spend 1200 odd per tonne on silver perch diet.
but i dont mind so much at this stage as i am in a critical period where i want them to be healthy and for what i have left to give me good eggs.
i guess it makes me feel a bit more confident im giving them good stuff.

in winter i feed about a four or five litre bucket to the whole pond once a day unless they are chomping at the surface when i walk past.

i could feed much more in summer but i still dont have any filtration, just agi drain pipes which i let the bad water out of the bottom of the pond weekly and just slight aeration, spose i have a lot of surface area on the walls though and a lot of bacteria on the netting and stuff.
im intending on putting in a aquaponics system one day - when i bust out and pay some dollars for some rock meduium for them to grow in.
i could probably get away with less breeders and keeping what good ones i have in better condition and grwo em up a bit more.
thall come as i find more an more good looking varieties in my offspring.

im finding some showas and these red and black fish too with red face and im expecting the black body to break up later on.
ivce got good asagi and shusuis happening now.
my kohakus used to worry me as their red was seemingly light and not as dark and not so well defined on edges but i have noticed even momotaro stock to have them amongst them in the cheaper ranges , so i think i have to look harder when culling out and i might get somewhere near it.
i have identified a few dark red kohakus now,
i was looking at my pond of kohaku today and not happy with the brightness of the red but i thihnk it will come out much more yet.

i hope to show some pics of these in the next month to see ewhat people think. im thinkin whioe im sitting on the ability to breed a few hundred thousand koi a year easy i might as well try and shimmy a few nice ones over to grwo up and see if i can get some great fish through to good size.


anyway im writing a novel again.. sorry.

next time ill get some pics for you all. till then.