Your Opinions

[luisprado]

I just talked to a few Discus experts this last week before making my beefheart mix and all of the experts whom have been in the business for well over 10, 16 to 9 years agreed that beefheart was bad for the discus. They said that the people that made them did not have bad intentions but that they were wrong in doing that for them. Here is why: 1. No matter how hard you try, you can never trim 100% of the fat on beef. 2. Eating all the fat throughout a sustained period of time MIGHT not always but might and has caused strokes on many discus. 3. Cows are not found in water and therefore are not a natural source of food for the discus. And what better for food than what they eat in their natural environment. (examples: bloodworms, daphnia, larvae, earthworms, mosquitoes....) These are all high in protein and great for the discus. 4. What you give the discus in beefheart mix requires large amounts water changes and more frequent water changes to keep the water clean.

There were many more reasons but these are the ones that stood out the most. Sorry for the long post, but I would love to get your comments and opinions on this.

Thanks.

[jim]

I normally feed my discus beefheart twice a month max...just in case dry food miss out some animal fat...and I feed them beefheart just before my usual water change...(I am too lazy to do water change just for beefheart)..

[Escher]

Most b/h mix don't contain just beefheart. By the time you add all other bits, b/h might only be one quarter. And if you feed your fish a variety of foods (not just b/h) it should be less of a problem.
We don't live under water, but we eat fish, so the theory of cows (or earthworms for thata matter) not living under water.... Animals will adapt to eat whatever they can find; if then some stuff is not that beneficial it's a different story.
In any case variety I think is the key word!

[kevkoi]

This topic has been buggered to death time and time again.... At the end of the day, the proof is in the pudding (or in this case, discus).

Show me a Grand Champion discus NOT fed on a beefheart/animal protein diet. :wink:

Show me a full time successful discus breeder who's livelihood depends on breeding and selling quality discus that relies not upon a raw beefheart mix to feed their fish.

In the wild, discus spend all day browsing for food and get a constant supply of little critters for food. They grow large (I should say HUGE! I've had seen wildcaught discus at 17-18cm and are by no means old fish!!!).

In tanks, we cannot provide for this constant supply of food all day long for our discus. (most of us can hardly manage 2 feeds a day!) Instead, we supply a few meals with very high levels of protein to try and achieve the the max growth. Feeding bloodworms, daphnia, larvae, earthworms, mosquitoes.... for 2 feeds a day, u will never grow the discus to large sizes. Composition of those creatures is mainly water and exoskeleton with little protein. U would have to feed plenty of these and almost constantly to achieve discus growth rates in the wild.

Then there is also the risk of disease....

[Proteus]

The key word in regards to BH, & BH mixes is Protein.

I also second everything that Kev states.

[luisprado]

I don't necessarily agree with what Kev says. Just because we cannot feed the discus more than 2 times daily are we going to give them something to make up for it. What the experts say makes sense to me. Cows simply do not belong as a diet for the discus. Imagine, the little bit of fat left on the beef is not much for us, because as humans with cannot imagine how much is really a lot unless we see it through the eyes of a fish whom is 10 times smaller than us. Would you feed your baby(human) beefheart(figuritavely speaking) just to make up for the fact that you work all day long and can't feed him more than 2 or 3 times a day and you want him to grow fast? Yes, I agree that they have a high protein diet in the wild, but I can provide people who have great quality discus, that do not feed them a beefheart mix. It's like the age old question, how can a vegeterian survive without eating meat, how does he get his protein? There are other ways my friend....

[weird]

I think the fact that professional breeders (in Hong Kong for example) feed their discus prodominately BH should be proof enough. A professional is not going to do something to jeopodise his livelihood.

I think if cows were abit smaller, and lived in the amazon then discus would eat them in the wild.

[africandiscus]

Don’t forget, BH is cheap compared to buying the equivalent nutritional food. You are getting a high protein diet for little money.

[Proteus]

Imagine, the little bit of fat left on the beef is not much for us,

luis, one thing you need to take into account is the fact that the Heart is primarily muscle, any fat content would be so minimal it would barely regsiter. That is why mince or other meat products are not used.

Personally my Discus get fed anything between 3-7 times a day (auto feeders and random feeds from myself), a mixture of prepared foods, frozen foods (i.e. bloodworms), live foods and maybe once every 2-4 weeks, some BH mix laced with Astaxanthin.

You will not find many who purely feed BH, and for that matter raw BH is not used to my knowledge, it is always combined with other ingredients therefore reducing the true amount of animal product provided to the fish.

From your statement, I would suggest the so called experts learn a little about the raw product we are discussing, excluding the outer lining, the heart has no fat so what is there to trim??? You are more at risk of your fish having a stroke from being spooked compared to feeding animal products. We dont feed our fish just BH, so normal water changes are all that is required, unless you overfeed.

Hopefully that clears a few things up.

[Proteus]

more info to clarify some of the comments at hand.


BH is high in protein, rich in minerals, vitamins, amino acids, lower in fats than other organ meats and is cheap.

article can be found: HERE (http://article.discusnews.com/cat-01/beefheart1.shtml)

an example mix can be found: HERE (http://www.clcdiscus.com/DiscusFeed.html)