Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding Tasters Choice in feeds

I have been reading a lot of the posts of feedng lately and honestly thought there couldn't be much difference in performance from one feed to another as long as they contained a similar diet. boy was I wrong

we started feeding with a 10lb brown bag of pellets we would buy at the local hatchery. I then realized that I could buy the TSC brand for about half the cost so we made the switch. Feeding has continued but with the hatchery product our YP , BG , and some small LMB were feeding but with the TSC brand we only see a few BG .

So, today I decided to call the hatchery and ask exactly what is was they were selling in these brown paper bags ... I quickly realized I had just learned yet another lesson about listening to the experts.

Yup you guessed it ! The hatchery sells AM500 in those little 10 lb bags. I convinced them to sell me the 50 lb bags and they agreed to order whatever AM product I might need.

Lesson learned with a shot of humility. Thanks again to the experts who know what they are talking about.

So what do you think is the secret to the AM?

Is it the added attractant, taste, size, protein, etc.?


I would really like to know what Purina changed so drastically in their Game Fish Chow to Aquamax that makes the fish take to it.


Does anyone on here have the answer?

From what I have read in the forums I think it's a higher fish oil content probably making it more palatable. The dietary makeup is not that different overall so I can only relate it to the oils. size of the pellets is almost identical.

Another interesting thing is my tank raised comets wont even touch the TSC brand even though they were pellet raised from my supplier. I am very curious to see if they will take the AM once I get my hands on some more of it.

It depends ! All 3 (GFC , AM and Burris)are good feeds. For BG all of them work well because they are all fish meal/oil based. It depends on your goals for feeding. The more the pellets are used as a primary food source for predator fish (BG , LMB , HSB etc) then the more important it is to have the right (usually higher) % protein from fish products. There is a lot of data on fish foods and results. Here is the archive on fish food producers and feed.

http://www.pondboss.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=92623#Post92623


My BG often will eat GFC over AM. When the water starts to cool they eat AM better. Both are Purina products fyi.

I knew both were Purina products and that is why I was curious as to why GFC is $20 and AM is $40+.

Do you get double the benefit?

Do you get double the benefit? Cost is not double for me though as GFC = 18 and AM = 30.

Not on BG. That is the point of many of the studies as its a $ question for the aquaculture business. Most fish growth for the $.

There is however a lot more to fish nutrition than just $. And goals and ponds are different for many.

I agree and if it is a much better food for the fish and they eat it but not the other than the extra cost really does not exist as there is no waste.

Now however if my BG and CC are eating both of them equally as well would I see much difference in their growth?

I know this probably can not be answered and as in your case $12 difference does not seem bad, but for me it is a $20-$25 difference and unless I can see any more active feeding or growth, I am not sure it is justified.

I was just trying to get some info from others that may have experienced these two foods compared to each other.

I just want to get the most bang for my $ so to speak.

Like I said it would be nice to have about 10 pounds of each where I could throw out a handful of each for a few days in about the same place and see which ones they gravitate to more often.

Thanks

For us I would be so bold as to say there is a double benefit in our pond. Of course different species, different locations, temps, you name it there are all kinds of variables but what has convinced me is how much more interest there was at feeding time with the AM.

Twice as many fish feeding and twice as many species. maybe an all BG pond someone might not see the benefit but with our paticular situation the AM just worked better at least by appearance at feeding time.

What were you using before?

I wonder if the lighter color of the GFC makes it easier to see for the fish during certain times of the day or conditions of the water. I bought a bag of GFC last fall while waiting for a AM500 order to show up. The fish seem to attack it more quickly but often spit them back out. When I try to mix the 2 feeds I see the same thing. Initial aggresive strikes on the GFC pellets only to see them float back up a few seconds afterward. When they hit AM pellets they swallow much more often.

Is AM any softer than GFC?

If not does it soften more quickly once in the water?

This is where I am trying to figure out what makes them hit and take it more readily than GFC.

I'm late to the party here but I have noticed the difference in the way both feeds are consumed, my perch prefer A-max to GFC, and in point of fact I should have been feeding this all along as the protien levels are more in line for Perch than the other food, may be less of a concern to bluegill care takers though.

As far as the fish oil content, the smell of A-max stays on your hands much longer so I believe the oil thing to be true. I have looked at the oil slicks around a pellet once tossed in the pond too, they are oily!!!

Here is my take- if you want to grow 3/4 to 1 pound bluegills you can do that easily with game fish chow. If you want to grow 1.25 to 1.75 pound bluegills you can do that with aquamax, but I havent yet seen it with game fish chow or catfish food.

When I throw Aquamax 600 near the shore the pellets become self-propelled from the fry hitting it, the trout enjoy that too cause it gives them a choice of fish or pellet.

So can this be done in the same amount of time?

Also how long would you guess these results would take?

However long it takes for the bluegill to eat 2.5 lbs of gamefish chow or 2.5 lbs of aquamax.

So it is about 2 pounds of food for 1 pound weight gain?

What is a rough estimate, 1 year, 3 years, 5 years?

It depends, but I'd bet that it would be 3 years at a minimum.

Ok,
I have read several threads about pellet feeding, so I looked up aquamax and enetered my zip code. I went to 3 of the closest locations and everbody looked at me like....."what the hell are you talking about".
So I bought a bag of "Farm Pond Food" Made by Nutri Source.
36% Crude Protein
5% Crude Fat
6% Crude Fiber

I threw handfull into the pond today, but no takers. How long should I expect that it takes for the fish to figure it out. And has anybody heard or Nurti Source?

I would have loved to get the Aquamax , especially since everything that I have tried after reading it on the forum has worked out great, but as I stated nobody here seems to have it.. Thanks in advance
NY

NY,

Unfortunately that is the same product I was using when I started this thread. Ours were not nearly as interested in it.

I have mixed what we had left of the Nutri with the new AM we purchased, oddly enough we can literally see the fish selecting each pellet during feeding times. Sure some of the Nutri gets eaten but it seems to be the last ones floating at feeding time.

We have a hatchery nearby that provides AM , may want to look into something like that. I was also able to find it cheaper at our local grainery believe it or not.. Try to think of any commercial businesses that might sell dog food, cat food or anything like that and chances are if you speak to the right person they can add it to their next feed order. Kroger( local grocery store ) for instance carries purina products but they aren't listed on the purina website as a supplier.

Good luck ,

Hey Attica,

Thanks for the reply. I was interested to see if anyone else had used that product. I threw some out today while the sun was out and did see some bg,s eating it. But they were by no means devouring it. We have a trout hatchery not too far away(Eldred Preserve). I will give them a call, and see if they use the AM. Thanks again for the reply...

NYpondguy, I bought a bag of Burris trout pellets (at least it was apparently formulated for trout) from a local fish farmer and my BG absolutely kill it. I had previously been using Tractor Supply's in-store brand and nothing really ate it. Most of it got eaten and spit right back out. They love the Burris, though, and at 43% protein, with a good strong fishy smell to it, it's been doing wonders over the few months I've been using it. I only feed by hand right now, and only a few days per week, but the fish come from every direction when they see me standing there at the edge of the pond. I'm up to throwing a full cup out to them and they devour it in no time flat. The cool thing has been seeing how much they've grown over this summer (visual estimate only) compared to the pretty small sizes of fish that were feeding at the start of summer. I would guess these fish have easily added 2" of length, again just doing this visually, and the number of larger BG has jumped noticeably as well. I guess my point is that a good quality feed, whether AM or one of the other good ones, will do wonders for your fish and they will probably take to it pretty well. Mine were not feed trained fish, but learned to take the food within a week or two at most.

Todd.... I have been feeding for 3 weeks now, and the bluegills, nd other small fish seem to really like the food. I have even seen couple of nice bass slam the fish that are frenzying over the pellets. I would still like to find the AM but until I do, at least the fish are eating everything that I throw at them. I also think I see some small bass eating the pellets, That would be great.

I've been feeding my fish AM600 for 1.5 years, sometimes the stuff is on back order for several weeks so I get a basic bag of "Catfish Feed" from Tractor Supply or wherever; my fish will not touch the stuff and I mean that literally. Those pellets will float out there until they sink. I have CC,BG and LMB, Gizzard Shad and Golden Shiners (possibly).

I have been using Game Fish Chow for about 3 weeks now and my fish took to it after the first week.

(This was actually cheaper for them to carry than just Catfish Food so they switched to GFC as their floor food -- $19.50)

We just went back to fill the feeder after 2 weeks and ran a test feed to make sure everything was still working ok.

The fish literally jumped out of the water when they heard the feeder go off, the food had not even hit the water yet.

But when it did they just tore it up. Plus for some reason my water clarity was the best it has been all year at about 12-15 inches which made it nice since I could see the fish feeding.

Did not see to many big fish so that was disappointing but hopefully by this time next year I can start taking some out to eat as they are overcrowded.