Beef Eaters Tank...

[mlolm]

OK this is a strange request, I know.

I own a beef jerky company and still am making my jerky by hand. Which means I have alot of raw beef scraps I just throw away. I was just cutting up some jerky now, and realized maybe I could use some of these scraps as food. I have a new tank (Fluval Edge 2) that I will be building in the next 3 weeks. I have a betta and few snails that *could* go in it, but they can also stay in the nanocube.

So my question is, if you had little tiny scraps of raw beef readily on hand and you could build a freshwater tank around that type of food. What would you stock the tank with? (46L)

Obviously i would not need to feed them beef all the time, it could be more like a healthy/special treat for the tank community. Ideally everything would eat the beef, but i guess the snails are mostly algae eaters only. I think amanos would eat beaf scraps, but could be wrong.

I am not a pro, this is my second tank, so nothing too fancy. I will also plant the tank, not sure on what plants yet though. I'd like to have shrimp and snails as cleaners, but maybe some very small fish that are carnivorous, that could have a healthy symbiosis with 2 snails and a few shrimp, suggestions would be appreciated.

Maybe this is a bad idea, the beef could mess up water quality i guess. But i figured if I chopped it small enough...

 

[mlolm]

Of course they have to be small enough for a 46L tank.

 

[Munroco]

I'm not suggesting you do this, but just saying that nearly all fish are carnivorous.

 

[Byron]

Not a strange request...until you realize the perils. Not at all a good idea.

Nutrition for fish is considerably different from that of land animals. We might not think this, but it is the case. "Animal" meat can cause digestive problems, nutritional imbalances, and disease. It contains much more fat (even the lean) than fish contain; bits of shellfish for larger fish is as close as you want to get. Beef heart used to be suggested but I have not seen this for some time now, and I am certain I read an article in TFH on the problems now realized to come from even this ingredient.

It is doubtful most fish would eat such food anyway, and it would likely do nothing more than contribute to pollution. Snails obviosly would eat it, I assume, but as there is sufficient organics from the fish to keep these critters fed it doesn't seem necessary anyway.

Byron.