Live foods

Now more than ever, there is a huge variety of foods available to the marine aquarist. If there is one, big distinction between them it is whether they are live or not live. Almost as a rule, live is better. There are several reasons for this. In some cases it’s because of what’s in them, and in others it’s because of what isn’t in them. Heavily processed aquarium foods, much like human processed foods, are formulated and manufactured with one thing in mind: Convenience. Now, it’s not like we’re all looking to make things more time-consuming or complicated for ourselves. But let’s face it; we don’t keep reef aquaria because they’re easy. We do so because they are, when healthy, amazing to behold. Building and maintaining even a modest, so-so system requires some time and expense. Just as it is with our maintenance routine, if we start to slack or skimp when it comes to animal nutrition, the system and every living in it will look much, much less than amazing to say the least. Processed foods, and even many preserved foods, lose important dietary constituents during the production and packaging process. Particularly where heat is involved, many essential vitamins, antioxidants, etc. are lost. Exposure to light, freezer burn, etc. are other factors to consider. And then substances such as preservatives are often added, even while we remain unsure about their long-term effects on the health of the potentially thousands of species we might keep. Live foods, on the other hand, are complete and natural. Even chemically delicate but nutritionally valuable compounds such as enzymes are left intact. Their natural behavior even makes a sizable difference. For example, motile phytoplankton and bacterioplankton swim in the water column long enough to get captured by sessile, filter-feeding inverts; copepods move in a manner that elicits the feeding response of picky eaters such as mandarins and sea horses. But that’s not all; live foods are, overall, comparatively less messy. Powders from dry foods and juices from frozen foods can significantly pollute your aquarium waters, necessitating extra water changes, extra use of chemical filtrants, additional equipment, etc. (who’s saving money/time now?). In contrast, live phyto actually removes nutrients from the water, and live pods actually clean the bottom and tank panels! In this section you will learn how to use live foods and how their use improves the health of your precious livestock.