Follow up on foods/additives; info from Dr. Shimek

[Alice]

On the thread "Newbies and not so new" (i've brought it to the top)we were discussing things we add to our tanks and where was the line between additives and foods. I didn't want to misquote Dr. Shimek so I emailed him and asked him to clarify some of the points of his talk at MACNA for me. He was nice enough to respond:


Everything we put into a tank is an additive. Foods can be considered to be
all purpose additives, other additives more specialized by either hype or
design. Lime water or kalkwasser is definitely a useful additive as it has
a defined and known metabolic pathway. NO other additive does.

One point of my presentation was that most every food tested possesses far
more of the chemicals tested for than do the additives that I tested for
(the exception being Coral Vital which was fairly similar to frozen brine
shrimp). The amount of most trace materials and all nutrients in the foods
ranges between 100 to 10000 times the amounts in the additives. On a
similar vein, one might consider the cost of the materials in the additives.
Combisan was shown to be less than 1 percent dissolved solids. The rest was
simply fresh water. If you figure the cost per ounce of the solid material
in such additives, anyone that purchases them pays significantly more than
they would pay for a similar weight of gold. In my opinion, most tanks
would look better if the hobbyists simply saved their $$$ for a while,
purchased some gold coins and dropped those in the tanks.

Given that all the foods add more far more "additives" than do the tested
additives, why add such materials? The needed materials in foods go
directly to the organisms that require them and are utilized, and excesses
are transferred to other animals either by excretion or diffusion.

Actually one of the take home messages was that the concentrations of some
of these materials are likely approaching dangerous levels in our systems
and that additional additives are definitely not necessary and in fact may
be detrimental and that perhaps water changes should be done to REDUCE trace
element accumulations. Atkinson and Bingman showed that alll of the salt
mixes used in the hobby are significantly enriched in trace materials.
Unless exported these materials remain in the tank and adding more of most
trace metals simply goes to boost their concentrations.

On the other hand, in the additives I tested, the concentrations of their
components were so very low that they are really pretty harmless. They
simply contain so little materials that it is unlikely that they would boost
the concentrations of anything that could be a problem.
<end quote>

Dr. Shimek's study will be published in the February issue of FAMA, I believe. I'll double check on that. In the meantime, I'll dig out my notes and see if I managed to write down all the foods and additives that were tested.

~Alice

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Reefkeeping is my life; I can't afford a hobby too!

[horge]

Hi Alice,

I have Ron's additive-assay data, both in raw text and in Powerpoint slide formats. Let me know if you want a copy --I'm guessing Ron wouldn't mind me sharing his stuff with you. I can't pre-empt the publication of the article by posting evertything here on the board, ya know

However here's a snippet that provides a list of materials tested, and how:

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Prepared Frozen Foods:
Ocean Nutrition ™ Products: Formula One™, Formula Two™, Prime Reef™

Frozen Natural Foods:
Gamma Foods™ Lancefish™, Oregon Desert Brine Shrimp Company™ Silversides™,
Sally’s San Francisco Brand™: Frozen Brine Shrimp™, and Frozen Plankton/Krill™
Brine Shrimp Direct™ Tahitian Blend™ Cryopaste.

Prepared Dried Foods:
Brine Shrimp Direct™ Golden Pearls™ and Plankton Gold Flakes ™, Vibragro™
Saltwater Staple™, Dried algae or Nori purchased from a supermarket, Nori is generally a species of the red algal genus Porphyra.

Liquid Additives:
Combisan™
Coral Vital™
Marine Snow™

All of the above products were analyzed by analytical chemical laboratories. For each liquid product, at least 0.5 to 1 liter of the material was tested. For the dried or frozen products, at least 500 grams of the product was tested. Products were purchased by mail order (for Brine Shrimp Direct products, Marine Snow, and VibraGro Saltwater Staple) sent directly to the analytical laboratory, or were purchased at a marine aquarium store, Salt Water City, 13626 NE 20th Street, Bellevue Washington, 98007, and delivered directly to the laboratory.
The primary laboratory was:

AM-TEST LABORATORIES, INC.
14603 NE 87th Street
Redmond, WA 98052.

They did the metals analyses and subcontracted the Conventionals analyses.

Nutritional or conventional compositions were determined by:

Food Products Laboratory, Inc.
12003 N. E. Ainsworth Circle, Suite 105
Portland, OR 97220

The following methodologies were used for calculation of nutritional compositions:
Fats: AOAC 14th ed.: 18.044 Acid Hydrolysis Method
Protein: AOAC 15th ed.: 981.10 Block Digestion Method
Moisture: AOAC 15th ed.:
Fish and Shrimp: 950.46B,
Liquids: 925.23,
Flakes and Powders: 925.10
Ash: AOAC 14th ed.:
Fish and Shrimp: 24.009,
Liquids: 16.035,
Flakes and Powders: 10.178
Carbohydrates: 100 ﷓ (fat+protein+moisture+ash)
Calories:
100 ﷓ (fat x9) + (Carbohydrates x4)+(protein x 4)

Conventional analyses gave the percent of the product which was categorized as either moisture, carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, or ash (basically minerals). The caloric content in Calories per gram was also determined.

Metal concentrations were done by:

AM TEST LABORATORIES, INC.
14603 NE 87th Street
Redmond, WA 98052.

The concentrations were determined by Inductively Coupled Plasma Emission Spectrometry or ICP Scan, EPA method 6010.

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Thanks again to Ron for the schlepp.
If you want the data, folks, I encourage you to buy Ron's article

(or ask Ron if I or he can give you the raw goods, hehe)
horge

[Alice]

Thanks Horge!

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Reefkeeping is my life; I can't afford a hobby too!