Pond Boss Forums MANAGING AN EXISTING POND Feeding Optimal vs. Purina

Okay, I decided to up my game and feed my Bluegill a higher quality of food than I was getting at the local Tractor Supply. I ordered two bags of the Optimal Bluegill (40% crude protein, 10% crude fat, 4% crude fiber, etc.). However, I researched the Purina Aquamax Sport Fish MVP (43% protein, 12% fat, etc.). Purina says they have a mixture of different sized pellets and have some pellets that will sink for the fish who are afraid to surface feed. Pound for pound, the Purina is a bit less expensive. I have to drive just a bit to get it at the nearest Purina retailer which is no big deal. Also, as I am farm tax exempt, I can save on taxes on the Purina. Pond Boss guy endorses Purina. Anybody out there using the Purina Aquamax MVP? Your thoughts?

I feed Aquamax 500, 600, and Largemouth. I tried a bag of MVP when it came out. I can get a 50 lb bag of 500 or 600 for a little less, and consider a mix of the two to do the same kind of job as MVP's mixed pellet sizes. Some 500/600 pellets sink right away (more when a big BG or YP smacks into them at the surface), although there are not as many sinkers as with MVP.

MVP is, IMHO, good fish food (43% protein vs 41% for 500/600 and 45% for LM). If you want a decent % of sinking pellets, it's good to use.

I feed 2 ponds daily. I have never paid tax on Optimal shipped to me. If you want different pellet sizes of Optimal. I mixed optimal jr. and optimal blue gill for at least 1 year to 18 months. Then go with Optimal Bluegill. In my opinion fish grow much faster on Optimal. It is the best food I have used and the owner is great guy and not a large corporation. Delivered to your door for free optimal

I avoid the Optimal vs Purina debates, because I think the choice that makes the most sense is the one that works for the individual wrt availability and price.

I don't recall anyone doing a double blind study between the two.

Theo, I agree with you. I switched years ago when Purina was having supply issues and &Optimal was just starting in the Pond feed business & have never looked back. Too convenient to get it delivered as I have to go to a mom & pop feed store for Aquamax that is about 20 miles away. TSC doesn't carry it here locally. I have more feed size and protein level choices with Optimal too.

I used both Purina MVP and Optimal. MVP was cheaper by the pound & available seven minutes from my pond, so I probably used more of it.

Both are very good, in my humble opinion. My fish enjoyed them about equally. Optimal claims that it has less waste & thus is healthier for the fish, which may be true. If your pond is very fertile, easily slipping into blue green algae issues, Optimal might be preferable. At my infertile place, this wasn't much of an issue.

October , through May , I mix Trout and BG Optimal .My RBT go from 10"-12" to 17"-19" hogs , don't get in their path for the Optimal. Now, my hunch is Purina will provide equivalent results , but Mark ships my 2 bags a month to my front door and Purina dealer , after multiple calls , didn't return calls, told me they couldn't get Fish Feed because of minimum orders, might be able to get some in 3-6 months , they would call me if and when they got any in stock . ( 2 and a half years now, guess how many calls ) Now, just as I believe "P" can grow fish, and very healthy fish, I'm sure there are very top end , professional Feed dealers for Purina . Suspicion if my SMB , YP, RBT, CC, ETC , all had Hooves instead of fins , Had white faces , had tails designed to swat flies instead of to swim , phone calls would be returned , feed would be readily available , LOL !!!June - September it's all BG , sometimes mixed with JR , still delivered to my front door , just a quick text message to Mark , and in return I get a courteous "Thank You , it's on the way " , Feed that I ordered on my Front porch in 4-7 working days of my text , and extra happy GSH, BG, GSF, in season RBT, CC, and a few YP that have trained themselves. May you have happy, pudgy , beautifully colored fishes with which ever brand you choose , Front door delivery is hard to beat. Thank You, Mark ! And Snipe , for the excellent referral.

I usually feed the Purina game fish chow, (I am not that worried about the max performance as much), get it from my local mom and pop feed dealer that I like to patronize, the last time they were out of the game fish so I bought a couple bags of the Purina MVP. wow, there is a pretty big difference in the quality of the feed, and the fish love that stuff!

So I started keeping it in the truck to hand feed when I get by there and put the way cheaper game fish in the feeder, in 15 acres I could never feed enough to feed them all for maximum growth, and couldn't afford to if I wanted, I just kinda supplement feed to keep them hungry and then hand feed to watch them come sailing up when you walk or drive up to the pond.

I have fed the optimal several times and it appears to be super high quality feed as well, you can see them be more aggressive to a feed that they really like. I don't think a person is gonna go very wrong with either choice, a little more spendy but in this case I do think you get what you pay for. and the fish will thank you for it.

Some of my hybrid crappie will take Optimal in the mornings. I bought and a bag of Purina mvp sport fish. I was told that it is 50 percent floating and 50 percent sinking. Friend of mine said he thinks his hybrid crappie eat it better. So do any off you know how much really floats vs sinks, that have or do use it? I am mixing the Optimal with Purina, hoping to maybe get some of these crappie and some of the redear ( that do not eat pellets well) to eat better. You can tell real quick who is eating pellets and who is not!

From the product overview. I don't think the 50% number you were told is correct. 9 sizes with the smallest 3 being 50% sink. How much volume the 3 smallest sizes are in the bag I have no idea.

9 / 100 x 3 = 27%
27 x .5 = 13.5% if there's an equal amount of all nine sizes in the bag.



Multi-variable product
Nine unique particle sizes ranging from 1/8" to 9/32" to feed a greater percentage of different sized fish in your pond

Floating and sinking diet
Designed to allow just the three smallest particles to be a 50% sink, the remaining particles float 100% to allow easier management and prevent overfeeding helping to maintain water quality

While on the fish food topic. I feed MVP to my fish.
Newish pond, so know how many fish there are in total.
I’m sure only the 50 HSB, 50 CC and BG are eating, along with a few turtles.
Just how much food is too much? I’ve heard, all they can consume in 5 minutes or 10 minutes ?
The problem I’m having is I set my Texas Hunter feeder to 10 seconds, the water boils for 1:30ish then it goes quiet,
Throw out another 10 seconds worth and the same thing, under 2 minutes.
I’m throwing 40 lbs a week at them and they seem to eat every piece in no time,
As in another thread I posted, my fish are well above average size but at some point can this become unhealthy for the fish and for the pond itself?

Right, wrong or indifferent Jason, I'm in a similar boat to you. I have experimented a little bit with the feeding and monitored any change I made for a few days after the change. Currently feeding for us is 5:30A 10 sec, 11:30A 5 sec, 7:30P 10 sec, and a 9:00P 8sec. Feeding 5x per day was to much and 4x seems to be working. Anytime we go to the property we can hand-throw in the feeder area and the fish are quick to respond. The 9:00P was the last to get scheduled and it seems to be working well. Not seeing feed on the shore and if there's moderate wind we get to watch the fish chase the food across the water until it's cleaned up.

I'll probably keep this schedule until the sun sets earlier, or the heat really slows the fish down.

I have not started to check the fish for RW's yet so kind of guessing and feeding based off the response to the food we are auto feeding. Sept 1 is our date to start setting traps to see how we did on RW's and spawns for the year. New pond here as well with just starting to stock this year.

I have fed optimal since it came out, I've even done growth comparisons between the 2. In my opinion Optimal is a better feed fish respond to it better and had better growth rates. I've grown some channel catfish up to 38 lbs. using the optimal hand throw feed. It was intended for my feed trained bass, but he obviously got plenty as well.
However Optimal is more expensive and not as readily available as Aquamax and you get 10 lbs. more feed with Aquamax. If Optimal could ever get their feed into feed stores at a lower price point, I think it would be a no brainer. But with them having to ship ever bag through fed ex individually it's just not cost effective.

If you would do a feed conversion rate comparison (pounds of fish flesh produced vs. pounds of fish food fed) you would see that Optimal is indeed cheaper even having to ship individual bags.

Tried to google this and came up empty. Where would one go to look for FCR on available brands?

Can we link them somewhere for the inevitable question when pond owners look for "the best option for their pond"?

Optimal?
Purina MVP?
Skretting?
Anybody else?

FCR is a complex function of metabolic consumption and conversion efficiency of excess consumption. These are variable being temperature dependent. Without highly controlled experiments the truth of claims of conversion efficiency are suspect ... especially when comparing brands.

To be sure. None are identical and yet they are very similar ... meaning ... they have many of the same ingredients.

I would just offer this advice. Get whatever you want but err on the side of higher protein and fat contents. If the product lists ingredients, err on the side of fish sourced protein and fish sourced fat. A 48% fish food will have more than twice the amount of fish meal than a 40% food (assuming fish meal is the primary source of protein in the 48% fish food AND especially if the feed has a high fat content). What is certain, particularly if the fat content is high, a 48% food will source protein primarily from animal proteins which are more digestible for predator fish. The conversion of 48% feeds should be better than 40% feeds generally for predators like BG and LMB ... enough to make it worth the price.

Ahhh. I was thinking there might be some FCR data available from the manufacturers and I wasn't seeing it on my quest for info through the google. My FCR search only turned up descriptions like "highly digestible", and "efficient" vs any real data. Before we started buying food for the pond I spent a lot of time trying to research what I thought was going to be the best choice and what settled it in my mind was info from multiple sources (here on the forum, discussions in PM from members here, matching the food that the hatchery I was purchasing fish from - at least initially as a transition to the food I wanted to use (tip from our own Bill Cody), and The Yellow Perch Culture Guide.

Page 48 (listed on page) or page 56 listed some information from the study on protein and lipid counts that I thought were useful for the YP we were planning to stock in our pond.

From there it was trying to line up one of the feeds that was a close match. There was one clear winner here when I looked at Purina, Optimal, Skretting, and Cargil.

According to that table ... a 36-4 catfish feed converts much better than a 38-12 trout feed for YP. They also note no better conversion from a 50-17 trout feed than a 36-4 catfish feed. All that flies into the face of a lot of the conventional wisdom here. The 40-10 trout feed had the best performance but interesting enough those treatments received more feed. So how do I know that? I just multiplied the gain by the FCR to get the weight of feed fed to each treatment. Sometimes you have to look deeper and be more skeptical. Everyone who feeds fish as living knows that conversion can be improved by increasing the feed rate (to a point after which it FCR declines). Sometimes it is good to dig deeper, read between the lines, and carefully review.

Also missing are the temperatures of the treatments. This is potentially important. I am completely ignorant of YP metabolic expenditures at various temperatures but they (like LMB) vary by temperature as does conversion of excess consumption. I didn't see any clear winner. What I can tell you is that either ALL of the feed missed the mark in terms of digestible energy (for YP) or the fish were being kept under less than optimal conditions (one factor of which might have been high metabolic needs for energy). I say this because 4.4 (the best achieved) is VERY POOR conversion of feed especially when feeding at 5.05% of body weight daily. Yes I can infer (by calculation) that feeding rate because I know how much they gained and how much they were fed.

I have a good deal of knowledge about LMB energy consumption and conversion and if I fed at 5.05% of body weight daily for 10 weeks (70 days) and got a gain like that I would compute an energy density for the feed of only 3520 J/g. That sucks. That is less than wet BG energy density. With a 40-10 estimated at 7500 J/g digestible energy I would expect an FCR of 1.73 with only 3% of body weight fed daily getting nearly 2 times the gain. But that is LMB. Anyways something must have been wrong with the feed or the conditions of the treatments resulting in less than favorable conversion.

Just read this thread, I think from just the ingredients and protein/fat percentages I would say that you wouldn't go wrong with either brand... I don't put much stock in "observation" studies to compare feed, there are too many variables.
As far as I know there are no controlled studies to compare the two brands head to head so since I can get MVP for about $1 a pound vs. $1.50 a pound for optimal I'll feed the MVP.
I also like the fact that there are different sizes and some sinkers in the MVP. I've notice more smaller BG feeding on the MVP vs the 500 I was feeding previously.
That's not saying that if I see some independent data that clearly shows a difference, that I would not change, I have not brand preference either way.

While we're at it, which is better Chevy or Ford???

Chevy!

Mary Ann!

Mary Ann, when she was dressed as Ginger.

(I know, I should be feeding Purina out of an Optimal bag.)

Optiford in my opinion. Prefer the BG Lariat JR options personally.

Dodge.

I post reluctantly to this thread. People hear what they want and take what they want to take from the info posted.
There are some very sharp fisheries management people here with great knowledge, that live this every day.
I see a post above about there being too many variables to believe anything "observed".. The key is to remove all of the variables you can control in a feed trial to get the best results we can as humans.
With that said, one manufacturer has test results of 1.12 to 1 conversion. I feed the same and have only observed 1.42 to 1 on BG.
One thing I have learned is if a pellet sinks it is not the same ingredients as one that floats, MVP has both, but is intended to be used for many species at the same time so in a feed trial, it is not apples to apples to use MVP against any other feed for a specific species because-as jpsdad says- the digestive process is different in each. So... with that said, "observation" is incredibly important in selecting your feed. BUT,, knowing what you are looking for is even more important and I think there are aspects in this part that we as humans, may never have the answers to. Is it maximum growth rate? Maximum growth with longevity in lifespan? Just because they grow faster doesn't mean they will achieve their true potential.
I guess I'm trying to say observation is important, to include the fishery as a whole, not just 1 species. Listen to the guys here that do this every day, there's good data right here.

Both are excellent products and Pond Boss supporters.
There is a whole lot more to this subject than people are noting.
Each fish species has its own nutritional requirements.
Each application is pond specific.
You can not compare CC , BG , LMB , RT, HSB , Crappie, YP and others for nutritional requirements. Here is a bit from a PB conv. presentation on Fish Nutrition.

The immense variety of cultured finfish species hampers efforts to simplify production industry wide. Approximately 170 taxa are currently cultured, including carnivores, herbivores, planktivores, and omnivores, each posing its own set of nutritional demands

• Fish meal has proven to be an excellent dietary protein source for finfish, leading to its description as an ‘‘ideal protein.’’ The ideal protein concept is based on the premise that if the amino acid profile of the feed mimics the whole-body amino acid profile of the animal being fed, protein utilization and growth should be maximized
• Lipids, fatty acids, and their derivatives play a role in virtually every physiological process that occurs and for this reason dietary lipid composition and content represent a massive sector of overall nutrition. Nowhere is this more true than in finfish nutrition where lipid can exceed protein in the body composition of finfish, a testament to the physiological and energetic importance of this nutrient class (Tocher2003). Aside from physiological importance, lipids are indispensable energy sources, especially for finfish, which are not well-adapted to carbohydrate utilization.
• Dietary protein and energy must be kept in proper balance because a deficiency or excess of dietary energy can reduce growth rates. Fish fed diets deficient in energy will metabolize more expensive dietary protein to meet energy requirements. Excess dietary energy can decrease protein intake and suppress growth.
• finfish do not require carbohydrates in their diet, … complex carbohydrates cannot be digested and utilized efficiently by most finfish species. A general dichotomy exists in the carbohydrate digestive ability of warmwater omnivores and herbivores versus the inability of coolwater and coldwater carnivores, which lack the appropriate function necessary for digestion of carbohydrates.
• For this reason, diets fed to these fish rarely contain more than 20% complex carbohydrate
• Conversely, warmwater omnivores or herbivores (e.g., channel catfish, tilapia, common carp, and white sturgeon) adapt well to diets containing as much as 40% dietary carbohydrate .
• Although vitamins and minerals are required in minute amounts compared with protein, lipid, and so forth, they are critically important, … Every micronutrient has a deficiency disease associated with it, the effects of which are sometimes irreversible or fatal. For a few vitamins and most minerals, excess can be equally detrimental, resulting in toxicity.

Mean fat percentage of Dorosoma spp. (24.2%) exceeded that of Lepomis spp. (15.2%) and fathead minnows (19.1%), but was less than that of mosquitofish (25.8%) and golden shiners (34.8%) . Bluegills had lower caloric contents than gizzard and threadfin shad ; preliminary data collected for the present study also showed Lepomis spp. To the lower in caloric content than the clupeids.

Although carnivorous fish species generally have a limited ability to use carbohydrates for energy, hybrid striped bass are relatively adept at it. Digestibility coefficients for the carbohydrates were generally high (83.3 to100 percent), indicating that both simple carbohydrates and complex carbohydrates were digested efficiently by these hybrids.

• Because fish growth often is limited by food availability, supplemental feeding is a logical tool to improve the condition of fish in small impoundments as the energy cost for bluegill to feed on pellets is small relative to the high caloric intake, which can be 4-5 times greater than those fed natural foods (Schalles and Wissing 1976).
• Substantial increases in the standing stock of bluegill in ponds that receive pellet feed have been recorded (Schmittou 1969) and, in lakes, pellet feeding has been found to increase the number of large bluegills (Nail and Powell 1975).
• These results indicate that total fish production and production of bluegill were each increased approximately 75 to 80% by supplemental feeding in 19 months after stocking (Schmittou 1967)

• Previous studies demonstrated that feed in excess of 10 pounds per acre per day in bluegill ponds was not utilized. Some accumulated and decomposed, thus depleting the supply of dissolved oxygen which resulted in fish kills (Schmittou 1967) .
• the rate of growth of sunfish can be increased by short-circuiting the food cycle, thereby producing harvestable size sunfish in a shorter period of time than would occur under natural conditions (Carnes 1966).
• The pellet size should be approximately 20-30% of the size of the fish species mouth gape. Feeding too small a pellet results in inefficient feeding because more energy is used in finding and eating more pellets. Conversely, pellets that are too large will depress feeding and, in the extreme, cause choking. Select the largest sized feed the fish will actively eat.
• Addition of supplemental pelleted feed did not contribute to the rate of growth of young shad, but did increase the growth and spawning frequency of adults.

There have been new developments in this field since the presentation.

Thanks ewest, that is a great amount of useful information to inject into this discussion.

Do you happen to know the approximate year of that presentation?

Don't overthink the FCR. You can get the same FCR from Purina or Optimal just by feeding different weights of feed. The difference between 1.51 and 1.42 when fed the same weight of feed is only about 300 J/gram (approximately 3% difference in digestible energy between one and the other).

Which brand do you feed to your fish?

The cheap stuff that I find at Tractor Supply, that is good enough for them. To many turtles & very large tilapia stealing from the CNBG.

My favorite forgotten long ago post that I bumbled on to about this subject:

https://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=423360

Notice the price. Clearly demonstrates which is the superior food.

Picked up a couple bags of the "new" Optimal winter feed to try out as the water gets a little cooler. I'm curious if there are opinions as to when to incorporate a new feed into the pond. Currently feeding 100% floating with Optimal BG through the TH feeder. Not sure if I want to auto feed it or hand throw the winter feed.

Any of you winter feeding experts have a plan that works well in your pond?

TH Feeder set at 1 sec per day at noon. It throws it in the open water that the winter diffuser makes.

I've fed Purina, Optimal, Triton, and Skretting over the years, and all of them are good. Trying to figure out which is the best for each pond owner is like splitting a hair. Region, water, habitat, density, volume of food fed, etc, all make a difference.

I have 2 questions. 1) Those that have grown out multiple, and repetitive, 2# BG in their pond, please stand up. 2) Next time you pick up fish at a hatchery, or even a fish truck, ask them what they feed.

I asked the manager of the Byron Oklahoma state fish hatchery, they feed AQ MVP.

Thanks. Is that what you feed?

I should have added one more question. Do you feed what the hatchery feeds, or what is accessible or recommended?

Haven’t made it to 2# yet but all my original stock CNBG are over .75# in the first year.
I feed MVP. Also hand throw Skreeting to my fish and the BG won’t touch it .
No idea where they came from originally.
Fish pictured were all stocked 9/29/23 as fingerlings

Yes, I feed AQ MVP. That is also where my fish came from.
I order online from Tractor Supply Company and have it delivered to my door at no charge.

I also agree with the previous statement that both are high quality feeds and should help any pond owner accomplish their goals.

I have been at a pond where the owner fed AquaMax 500 to all his fish (Sparkplug here on the forum). Throw out AquaMax 600? They won't touch it - they are so conditioned to eating that AM500 sized pellet.

Fly fisherman know the saying "match the hatch". it's true.

Hmmm. How would one know if the fish aren’t feeding on 100% sinking food?