live food for africans?

Isn't feeding live bait a way of introducing bacteria etc into the tank.
Seems like the cons outway the pros? Fish can thrive on dried food so why
mess with what works? I put new fish in an isolation tank before risking
exposing my big tank to disease. Why throw live food in? Just wondering?

In article ,
says...
In article ,
(Zimm44) wrote:

I know that Africans of Lake Malawi should eat a diet of predominantly
alga or
vegetable based food to avoid bloat. My question is whether anyone has
suggestions or advice on feeding blood worms and other live foods to
them as a
supplement/conditioning food? Any advice? I just bought some frozen
blood
worms. My frontosas in the other tank love them. Are they good for
Mbuna?


I thought this was an interesting debate until I saw the BBC/Someone* Wild
Africa program "Lakes and Rivers" which showed the Midge hatch over Lake
Malawi. Quick pan to under water - everything with fins going frantic
eating the blood worm pupae as they rose to the surface. Various
Pseudotropheus & Labeotrophues in there with the rest.

I've also seen a Scientific article on stomach content analysis of wild
caught Mbuna, lots of Algae, but lots of insect larvae too. The author
suspected that the insect larvae were picked up with the algae, rather
than separate from it.

So nature says it's OK. The mistake people make is Cichlid = Carnivore so
meaty diet, whereas for the Mbuna have a mostly vegetable diet. Nothing
wrong with adding a few bloodworm etc though.

* Something was a US co. might have been Discovery Channel

Roger Sleet
Roger's Aquatic Pages http://www.sleet.plus.com