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Old 07-13-2011, 07:27 PM
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Yes because it it much better than products that advertise as spirulina, or herbivore food and list spirulina down the list of ingredients after land based veggies.
It all boils down to the inclusion rate of each raw ingredient.

As an example, a manufacturer making a 1 ton batch of food could have 100 pounds of spirulina in that 2,000 lb batch of food, with the next 19 ingredients each weighing in at 98 pounds. That still leaves some room for additional oil, and the vitamin premix.

That formula could have "spirulina" listed as the main ingredient by dry weight, yet overall it would contain FAR more low cost terrestrial based fillers, fillers with overall poor digestibility, fillers that are known to contain anti-nutritional matter such as saponins, tannins, protease inhibitors, phytic acid, etc, and fillers that contain lipids that are known to cause long term liver damage when fed in excess to marine fish.

IMHO not only would that food be a poor choice for algae supplementation, but due to the fact that it would also be missing key amino acids, and long chain fatty acids, elements that are known to be essential to the growth and overall health of a marine fish, it most certainly would fail as any type of stand alone food for a herbivore, or otherwise.



Another manufacturer could make a 2,000 lb batch of food, and use just as much spirulina as the example above (perhaps even of far higher grade), as well as a substantial inclusion rate of algae meal, which is comprised of several sources of marine algae and micro-algae, and those ingredients could show up further down on the ingredient list simply because of the varying amounts of the other ingredients (that contain the correct balance of essential amino acids & fatty acids) in that formula. That, and have only 1 terrestrial based starch used as a binding agent, that does not contain known anti-nutritional matter such as saponins.

It is virtually impossible to compare ingredient percentages by simply reading a label, unless you are privy to the exact amounts used in each & every formula made by each & every manufacturer.

In some cases the listings on labels are nothing more than a numbers game, and some companies know how to play the game very well. And while I agree that there are foods marketed as "spirulina" or "algae" foods, that overall contain very little marine algae, by the same token one cannot conclude that a food is of high quality by simply looking at the main ingredient. It's always a good idea to look at the little picture (main ingredients) but if the BIG picture doesn't add up, then you most certainly need to consider that as well.


If it is your opinion that certain tangs require some form of algae supplementation beyond what one can find in some of the various pellet foods currently on the market, I have no problem with that, your fish, your call, but as previously stated nutrient wise the discs that you recommended are about the furthest thing away from what a fish in the wild would find when feeding on any type of marine algae, or the micro-organisms found within that algae.

HTH
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