--Bruce Stallsmith
Huntsville, AL, US of A
>From: "Todd Crail" <farmertodd_at_buckeye-express.com>
>Reply-To: nanfa_at_aquaria.net
>To: <nanfa_at_aquaria.net>
>Subject: Re: NANFA-- do fish get goiters?
>Date: Tue, 21 Jan 2003 12:53:29 -0500
>
>Now my interest is really peaked. My feeding response for Geoff was more
>based on "If that's the problem, then this should fix it". I had a faint
>recollection of the endostyle from Developmental Biology, but I was very
>unsure about any of that (and too lazy to grab my book :). At any rate,
>here's where I'm going next...
>
>I did my daily 4:00am wake up and the lightbulb went on over my head,
>exploded, and then I went back to sleep ;)
>
>Marine systems are *rich* in Iodine, and the organisms that live there
>utilize this thru the food chain by phytoplankton utilizing it, zooplankton
>eating the phyto, and then forward and up. There's no way to avoid it in
>biopathways for these critters. It doesn't suprise me that trouble arose
>in animals that live in Iodine enhanced systems would need extra, and how
>they're the ones who show trouble first (ie we're not replicating their
>true
>food chain). Some/Most? pupfish are living in water holes where water
>comes
>in and doesn't go out regularly... It makes sense that they would have an
>Iodine rich diet available from the food chains that errupt in these
>systems.
>
>So that makes sense to me... What I wonder is... How freshwater organisms
>have dealt with leaving the marine systems and the consequential loss of
>Iodine in their diet, due to the majority of it getting swept away? *Or*
>perhaps we've not recognized how essential lower levels of Iodine and other
>nutrients biofixed by phytoplankton and algaes are in their diet.
>
>Question 1) Anyone familiar with any studies on the inorganic nutrition of
>freshwater organisms, or even better, how freshwater organisms have dealt
>with lower levels of available inorganic nutrients?
>
>Question 2) Am I making a faulty assumption that these nutrients aren't
>*as* available in freshwater systems as they are in marine systems?
>
>Now, thinking back, I used to have lots of problems with dropsy and TB like
>symptoms (bloating and sores). I used to feed freshwater fish a staple of
>flake and bloodworms. Once I had the shop, I began dumping excess
>"expensive" marine food into the freshwater fish so it wasn't wasted...
>When
>I saw how much more vibrant the animal's color became, well, I started
>using
>that unless I had a horribly busy day and had to just do a "drive by
>feeding" with flake or pellets.
>
>As a result of this (and I didn't realize this until just now) I *haven't*
>had problems of this manner ever since. I didn't see it in the thousands
>of
>fish that I held at the shop (which I recognize is a short term keeping), I
>haven't seen it in my Rainbowfish or Loaches that I've kept since then for
>3
>years (thier color has *exploded* recently now that I've been feeding the
>better foods), the natives are too soon to tell. However, what is
>observeable so far is, these natives were in vibrant color at 76 degrees
>(they look the same at 63 now). I would never had expected to see darters
>in full color (the rainbow darters would seriously go full nuptial
>brightness 3 times a week, redside dace were always *red sided*) at those
>temps.
>
>Okay so that's all good and nice that it's fairly simple and only
>marginally
>more expensive to get easy fish to shine with krill, plankton, and high
>grade brine, not to mention proportional growth (they're bigger, but not
>fatter). What's the next step...?
>
>3) I wonder if making this type of nutrition available to suckers and such
>would help in the causes of keeping them more healthy in our aquaria? And
>I'm also thinking they're all water soluable, could it hurt to have an
>overabundance of these inorganic nutrients?
>
>Wether they're predatory or not, a hogsucker, as an example, is getting
>algae and phyto as they route thru the sand and gravel looking for
>invertebrate prey. Maybe this is something we've overlooked? And I wonder
>how receptive they are to eating nori on a stick, which would give them a
>nice shot of what they may need once a day. Nori is that green algae stuff
>that you get your sushi wrapped in. If this turns your stomach (it turns
>my
>stomach, yumyum! :), you can go to an asian market, stay at the counter,
>and
>just ask for it. It comes in nicely packaged, unassumptive sheets :)
>
>At any rate, it's cheap and I think I'm going to run over to the market
>today to see if the stonerollers will much on it. In my marine
>experiences,
>it was *amazing* to see that even *obligate piscavores* would eat the nori
>from a clip or roll. I don't know why it never occurred to me that it
>*may*
>be a great supplement to freshwater organisms.
>
>Things to think about I guess.
>
>And thus ends my lunch time rant for January 21st, 2003. :)
>
>Todd
/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
/"Unless stated otherwise, comments made on this list do not necessarily
/ reflect the beliefs or goals of the North American Native Fishes
/ Association"
/ This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes Association
/ nanfa_at_aquaria.net. To subscribe, unsubscribe, or get help, send the word
/ subscribe, unsubscribe, or help in the body (not subject) of an email to
/ nanfa-request_at_aquaria.net. For a digest version, send the command to
/ nanfa-digest-request_at_aquaria.net instead.
/ For more information about NANFA, visit our web page, http://www.nanfa.org
</x-flowed>