This is an awesome thread! I have a quick question that I find safe to ask here, even though it may already have been answered, I don't have time now to read 28 pages. With the Hikari Gold, is there any nutritional difference between the red floater bag, and the blue sinker bag? Is it just floating or sinking? I just ordered some of both off of petmountain.com, which is an awesome website, and was wondering if there was really a difference between the two. I have used the red hikari gold for years and it seems fine enough. From what I have read, it seems that the next step up from Gold is the Bio-Gold. Might have to give that a shot too. Thanks for all the info!
Hikari vs. NLS
- Thread starter Biggfeast
- Start date
Miguel, what type of hikari and NLS will you use.... I think this is a great thread and many of use would like to see the out come.
No problem Miguel, but let's not pretend that this is going to be any kind of "test", or feed trial, because it won't be. 
A proper feed trial, with proper protocol is a tad bit more involved than just feeding one fish one food, and another a different food, and then attempting to make any kind of determination from such a (cough-cough) test.
You need to have some sort of methodology in place, and ideally a large group of siblings kept under exact same parameters from start to finish. In most feed trials the fish are fed to satiation, twice a day, or fed a certain percentage of their body weight, twice a day, then weighed at the end of the feed trial. (it also involves massive daily water changes)
At the end of the feed trial the test subjects need to be weighed, and ideally a necropsy is performed on each test subject so that what is taking place internally can also be examined. Specifically lipid deposition in the liver should be examined as this can play a large role in the overall long term health of the fish. A generic trout chow with high protein & fat levels will typically cause huge gains in growth, but as explained in the abstract of the study linked to below these gains can come with a serious price to the health of the fish.
http://afsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1577/A03-035.1?journalCode=naja
Having read that entire paper, and viewed the slides of the test subjects livers, I can tell you that it wasn't a pretty sight. Most of these fish would have been doomed to a very early death had they been kept on the trout starter pellet diet long term. Yet, the trout starter pellets had the best results in the growth department by far. So from a hobbyist standpoint, those results would most likely lead one to believe that the trout chow diet was the "best", when in fact that diet was slowly killing the fish, even with very small juvenile fish that due to their high metabolisms actually require higher levels of protein & fat in their diet.
And this was only after 12 weeks of feeding!
BTW - that feed trial involved twenty four, 34 liter tanks, with 20 fish per tank.
Below is a classic example of how a small sampling of test subjects, kept under the exact same conditions, and fed the exact same diet, can vary greatly from one test subject to another.
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=392722
12-15 festae juvies, all grown out in the same tank, under the exact same conditions, yet the sizes range from 1" to 2.5-2.75". That's quite the difference. It could be due to genetics, sex, hierarchy/dominance in the tank, etc. This is what can happen when small samplings are used in a feed trial.
I'm all for people trying different types of food & feeding methods, and drawing their own conclusions as to what's best for their personal situation. Just as I accept the fact that some people may only be able to feed lower cost bulk generic food from a commercial feed mill. But at the same time I don't need to run a controlled feed trial to understand that one product is superior over the other.
Personally I have a difficult time backing companies that use raw ingredients such as corn flakes, dried bakery products, alpha starch, soybean meal, rice bran, gluten meal, MSG, etc. with some of their foods being as high as 17% ash content.
I don't need someone in a white lab coat to explain to me what's going on behind the scenes, nor do I need a feed trial performed by a non biased 3rd party accredited institution. For those that do, feel free to source such an accredited institution & post back with the results. It's not like such studies haven't alrready taken place, you just won't find the results posted for public review.
A proper feed trial, with proper protocol is a tad bit more involved than just feeding one fish one food, and another a different food, and then attempting to make any kind of determination from such a (cough-cough) test.
You need to have some sort of methodology in place, and ideally a large group of siblings kept under exact same parameters from start to finish. In most feed trials the fish are fed to satiation, twice a day, or fed a certain percentage of their body weight, twice a day, then weighed at the end of the feed trial. (it also involves massive daily water changes)
At the end of the feed trial the test subjects need to be weighed, and ideally a necropsy is performed on each test subject so that what is taking place internally can also be examined. Specifically lipid deposition in the liver should be examined as this can play a large role in the overall long term health of the fish. A generic trout chow with high protein & fat levels will typically cause huge gains in growth, but as explained in the abstract of the study linked to below these gains can come with a serious price to the health of the fish.
http://afsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1577/A03-035.1?journalCode=naja
Having read that entire paper, and viewed the slides of the test subjects livers, I can tell you that it wasn't a pretty sight. Most of these fish would have been doomed to a very early death had they been kept on the trout starter pellet diet long term. Yet, the trout starter pellets had the best results in the growth department by far. So from a hobbyist standpoint, those results would most likely lead one to believe that the trout chow diet was the "best", when in fact that diet was slowly killing the fish, even with very small juvenile fish that due to their high metabolisms actually require higher levels of protein & fat in their diet.
And this was only after 12 weeks of feeding!
BTW - that feed trial involved twenty four, 34 liter tanks, with 20 fish per tank.
Below is a classic example of how a small sampling of test subjects, kept under the exact same conditions, and fed the exact same diet, can vary greatly from one test subject to another.
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=392722
12-15 festae juvies, all grown out in the same tank, under the exact same conditions, yet the sizes range from 1" to 2.5-2.75". That's quite the difference. It could be due to genetics, sex, hierarchy/dominance in the tank, etc. This is what can happen when small samplings are used in a feed trial.
I'm all for people trying different types of food & feeding methods, and drawing their own conclusions as to what's best for their personal situation. Just as I accept the fact that some people may only be able to feed lower cost bulk generic food from a commercial feed mill. But at the same time I don't need to run a controlled feed trial to understand that one product is superior over the other.
Personally I have a difficult time backing companies that use raw ingredients such as corn flakes, dried bakery products, alpha starch, soybean meal, rice bran, gluten meal, MSG, etc. with some of their foods being as high as 17% ash content.
I don't need someone in a white lab coat to explain to me what's going on behind the scenes, nor do I need a feed trial performed by a non biased 3rd party accredited institution. For those that do, feel free to source such an accredited institution & post back with the results. It's not like such studies haven't alrready taken place, you just won't find the results posted for public review.
I use NLS for my juvi GT, JD and EBJD and they love it. There were some palatability issues in the get go, but a slight starving session cleared that up.
Ever compared the ingredients of Hikari to NLS? I have and I prefer to feed my fish NLS. To me it's the difference between canned soup and home made soup made with organic foods.importracer;4875974; said:
