Is it safe for a fish to eat chaeto?

[FishAreFriends2]

I just got some free chaeto and dont have a refugium and I didnt watnt to throw it in the trash can. So I stuck it in the tank for the meantime. I noticed my dwarf angel eats it and poops it back out as white. Is there any harm for a fish to consume Chaeto?

[billsreef]

Nope. It might not be an easy algae to digest, but it won't do any harm

[lecher]

I feed some to my foxface every now and then. He seems to like it.

[BeanAnimal]

yeah, the foxface eat just about anything. As bill said, no harm in a fish eating the cheato.

[akaatomic]

Chaeto is said to absorb harmful nutrients, phosphates, nitrates, etc... If you feed it to your fish, don't those substances get re-released into your tank?

[billsreef]

Nutrients aren't harmful per se, they are just nutrients. They get into your tank via the normal breakdown of food. The chaet just reassimulates them into food. Feeding the chaet to your fish just recycles the nutrients, much the way nutrients are recycled on the reef

[sunfish11]

I don't feed cheato because it isn't easy to digest and can bind up the digestive tract. My Naso was eating a lot of cheato and got bound up. He didn't poop or eat for 3 days. When it finally came out it was a mess of strings of undigested cheato. At that time there was a gentleman that posted a thread about his angel and a tang that died. When he autopsied them thier gut was so full of cheato that he attributed that to the cause of death. I would rather be safe than sorry so I don't allow them to eat it anymore.

Lisa

[acrylic_300]

It's even better the second time around....my fish chase each other around eating out of each others butts

[impreza619]

Originally posted by acrylic_300
It's even better the second time around....my fish chase each other around eating out of each others butts

hahaha sooo true seen it happen in my tank too.

[west co reefer]

I would think that it does no harm, but after sunfish's post, I would just steer away from feeding it.

[hahnmeister]

Originally posted by akaatomic
Chaeto is said to absorb harmful nutrients, phosphates, nitrates, etc... If you feed it to your fish, don't those substances get re-released into your tank?

Dont take this the wrong way... its a rant of sorts, but not towards you. You have a good question. But many people ask this, or suggest that if you dont remove your algae on a regular basis, or if your fish eat the plants, that you will be releasing a 'bomb' of some sort in your tank.

Phosphates, nitrates, etc... they get absorbed by plants, yes. But they get converted! Just like the human or fish metabolism changes proteins, carbs, and plant matter into fertilizer for plants, the plants convert our waste back into food for us. Its not like when we eat veggies and fruits that they are high in phosphates and nitrates... quite the opposite actually.

My Red Sea Purple Tang seems to like eating cheato... maybe I should be concerned...

[Ooulophilia]

That was me that necropsied the fish a while ago- on inspection both a big French and big Naso that had been in captivity for many years were all bound up with the chaeto after a few weeks of me feeding it to them. The French had eaten and passed some strange things in the past;an algae pad, a big rubber band, so I steer clear of feeding the cheato now - go to the asian market and look for gracilaria if you you want to feed something fresh