HOW
TO FEED
We always recommend to feed VARIETY to achieve the maximum benefit from nutrition. The importance of nutrition cannot be over-emphasized. Healthy appearance & condition, bright coloration, resistance to disease, normal growth and natural breeding behavior are all directly dependent on proper nutrition. What is proper nutrition? The short answer – feed variety. Frozen foods, pellet foods, flake foods, specialty foods - with V2O Aquarium Foods, your choices are endless.
HERBIVORE,
OMNIVORE or CARNIVORE ?
Community
A second major category of foods from the extensive range of V2O AQUARIUM PRODUCTS include frozen products intended to feed not just the corals and filter-feeding inverts, but ALL of the reef tank community including the small reef fish and the bottom-dwelling (benthic) "scavenger" invertebrates as well. These foods cover a middle range of particle size - basically food pieces from 1/8 inch up to 1/2 inch. The Fish & Reef "Gel Diets" in this category are held together by a delicate alginate binder which is also intended to break apart into 1/8 to 1/2 inch pieces as the fish attack the cubes.
This category of foods is intended to feed 2 primary groups:
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Medium to Large-polyped corals and bottom-dwelling (benthic) scavenger invertebrates such as shrimps, crabs, starfish, amphipods, worms, etc...
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Small reef fish ranging in size from 3/4 inch up to 3 or 4 inches.
As always, feed a good variety of foods and always feed in small increments. If all of the food is consumed readily, feed another small increment and repeat this until the fish (or inverts) begin to lose their immediate interest. DON'T feed more than is consumed in 5 minutes.
Keep in mind that, in their natural coral reef environment, almost all of the fish and inverts living in your reef tank would be looking for and picking at food continuously throughout the day (or night for nocturnal feeders). It's basically all they do. Therefore and whenever possible, feed your aquarium at multiple times during the day to try and mimic this natural feeding behavior.
We also recommend that for one day a week, feed the aquarium much less than you would normally feed. This will force the fish and scavengers to seek out elusive feed particles or critters and essentially "clean up" the environment.
Carnivores + Large Fish
This major category within the very extensive range of V2O AQUARIUM FOODS includes frozen products intended to feed the larger aquarium fish which we define as 3 to 4 inches in length or more. These may be some of the large specimens in a reef aquarium or the fish which normally are used in a "fish-only" aquarium.
These fish are often "predatory" in nature with large or strong teeth for "munching" (triggerfish and parrotfish) or large mouths for gulping and devouring like groupers, lionfish, and moray eels.
Along with the larger fish, these aquariums may also have predatory or scavenging crustaceans such as crabs, lobster, shrimps, and mantis shrimp. These critters are perfectly adapted to this same category of foods and when everybody in the tank is finished eating, the scavengers will keep up their end of the deal and clean up all the un-eaten pieces of food on the bottom until the tank is "squeaky" clean….or close to it anyway.
The foods in this category include the very popular Krill Superba which we produce in an IQF (Individually Quick Frozen) form as well as the standard flatpack. The Krill Pacifica is a smaller species, around 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch, but just as valuable as the larger Krill Superba for protein, Omega 3 fatty acids, and valuable pigments. Our krill are un-cooked which makes them fresher and more natural and nutritious than the standard "blanched" krill.
We also have the Silversides IQF (Individually Quick Frozen) for ease and convenience of feeding. These "silversides" are actually anchovies which are very rich in fish oils and flavor - the perfect food for Moray Eels and other predator fish. To complete this category, we produce Clams, Mussels, and Scallops - all on the HALF-SHELL. The meat is still attached to the shell and this creates a very natural feeding behavior for the fish to hover around and pick their food bit by bit until the shell is entirely cleaned.
NO OTHER COMPANY provides this variety of foods for so many varieties of fish and invertebrates!
REEFS
This category in the extensive range of V2O Aquarium Foods includes very fine specialty foods for use in feeding marine reef tank invertebrates including SPS Coral, some LPS Corals, and filter-feeding critters such as sponges, clams, flame-scallops, gorgonians and feather-duster worms.
These foods vary in particle size depending on which critters we want to feed. The various species or groups of animals in this category fill their individual niche, or niches, in their environment by feeding their own special diet. The food items can be anything from microscopic (5-10 microns) single-cell phytoplankton to assorted zooplankton - crustacea, larvae, pelagic eggs - in the range of 2 to 3 mm. Therefore, we produce a variety of foods in order to cover a considerable this range of food particle size.
The products you see to the right are listed in general ascending order of particle size from the smallest to the largest. Our goal is to cover all the bases in order to provide proper nutrition to all of your reef aquarium inhabitants…and we always recommend feeding a variety of foods whenever possible.
In this particular category of feeding small things to filter-feeders, you, the hobbyist, will either be "target-feeding" to one particular coral or coral/zoanthid colony, or "broadcast feeding" to the entire aquarium so that the planktonic food items will drift or be driven past the hungry filter-feeders looking to "grab" their meal. During broadcast feeding, food items are suspended up in the water column throughout the aquarium and create a "cloudiness appearance" in the water. At this time it is best to turn OFF the aquarium filtration system to allow the aquarium critters to filter the water, rather than to allow the aquarium filter system to remove 80% of the food from the water before the corals, etc. get a chance to feed.
If you have "circulation only" pumps which are not involved in filtration, these should be definitely key ON during the "cloud-feeding" process as this will obviously keep the foods suspended in the water and create currents which drive the food to the filter-feeding animals.
After 10 or 15 minutes, the food should be consumed and most of the food particles have now been ingested.
At this point,
DO NOT FORGET TO TURN THE FILTRATION SYSTEM BACK ON!