Plecocaine

[vriesea]

I've notice a new food that seems to really be catching on. It's call plecocaine and can be found on several internet auctions. I would like to get a history on it and if possible find out its contents. So far I have not had any luck on internet searches.

As I really care what my catfish types eat I am not about to experiment with my collection until I find out the value of the food.

Has anyone more information on Plecocaine and maybe it contents.

Thanks ,
Vriesea

[jerry58]

Hi vriesea
I had a search and found this don't know if info is true but sounds like what you might be looking for.

http://www.goldfishkeepers.com/forum/sh ... php?t=1087

http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgur ... N%26um%3D1

Sorry don't know of it and don't know anybody that has used it.

Hope this helps you.

Jerry

[Haavard Stoere]

If this is salmon food as stated in one of the forums you can use it with success to fatten up Hypancistrus species, tetras and predatory fish in general. Beware of obesity in the fish and possible indigestion. Some people experience protein/fat film on the water surface. I have previously used salmon food to fatten up Hypancistrus zebra, but only in periods, and combined with other foods. It is a real weight gainer.

If it indeed is salmon food it is totally inappropriate as main food for most plecos, but we have not yet confirmed that this is a fact. The low price of the product however supports the notion that it is meant for fish farming.

[jerry58]

Hi Haavard Stoere
Your post above makes good sense to me.

Jerry

[apistomaster]

I like earth worm pellets because they were developed for commercial aquaculture as a conditioning food for Channel Catfish. It does not cause any oily scum to form and is high in protein but not excessively so. It is an expensive food as aquaculture foods go. Feeding 10 pound Channel Catfish brood stock during conditioning would be an expensive phase of their commercial culture. But as a food for ornamental aquarium catfish species it is very cheap. A little goes a long ways and Hypancistrus spp or the larger plecos spp can't eat very much compared to adult Channel Catfish.
I think it is only about 48% protein. That is lower than many brand name fish foods. It has the bulk necessary for good digestion and that is important to all catfish, IMO.

[TwoTankAmin]

This is from AquaBid, email the seller with questions.

......................PLECOCAINE IS HERE......................

You have heard about it...Now is the time to treat your fish right..With Plecocaine...They will thank you for it...
This auction is for 1 pound of Plecocaine..More is available at auction price.
I feed all of my fish with Plecocaine...I would not waste my time selling this food if i did not believe in it and feed it to my own fish.
Plecocaine is a slow sinking food designed to stimulate growth in young fish..And it works.....You should see how big my granddaughter is getting.
There are 4 sizes of Plecocaine to chose from...

#01..............a powder for larger new fry...
#02............a granule for juveniles and smaller fish like tetras, barbs, danios and little plecos...
#03..........a small pellet 1/32" dia. for medium sized fishlike plecos,dwarf cichlids etc...
#04.........a medium pellet 1/16" dia. for larger fish...
if you would like; you could even get 2 one half pound packages of 2 different sizes....

Shipping for 1 pound of Plecocaine is $5.00 for USPS Priority Mail...A little more for larger quantities... I ship on Mondays and Wednesdays.. Method of payment is via paypal or USPS money order...But i do prefer paypal. paypal addy is..................lohachata@netscape.net ...
If you have any questions;please feel free to ask...

[lohachata]

hello...my name is john patakos.....AKA...lohachata....i am the guy that sells Plecocaine on aquabid..i have been using Plecocaine to feed all of my fish for the past 5 or 6 years.i have only been selling it for about 4 years....in that time i have never had a single complaint about the food..

first things first....Plecocaine is "NOT" salmon feed..this was originally suggested by someone on "goldfishkeepers" that had no clue as to what it really was.
please do not hesitate to ask me about it..i will be most happy to give you what information i can...(without divulging my sources of course)..
it is a very high quality ; high protein food formulated for rapid growth and optimum health.
check out my auctions in the "pellet" section on AQUABID......
i can be contacted at my e-mail address.................. lohachata@netscape.net..

[Proteus]

No offense but all plecos species have different diet requirements- theres no such thing as a magic formula that would fit them all in one food.

[apistomaster]

I agree. It takes two foods.
Earth Worm Sticks
Spirulina Sticks.
These two foods form an excellent staple diet for any plecos I have kept.
Frozen Blood Worms and Live Black Worms round their diet out.
I am really into simplifying my fishes diet and all fish I keep, including wild Discus and wild Angels, do well on this basic diet.
I stopped using beef heart blend a few years ago.
Apistogramma and the SA Tetras i keep and breed also thrive on this diet.

I also use Tetra Color Bits for my Discus but not every day.
I like keeping the feeding as simple as I can.

[Hitch]

I feel like the "effectiveness" of this food highly depends on the habits of the hobbyist.

I am sure that most of us out there are giving our plecos a well rounded, above average diet. I have also read many good things about this food.

If I am a hobbyist that likes to simply my feedings and still get good results, then foods like plecocaine would be the food for me.

On the other hand, if I am a hobbyist that likes to change things up, mix and match, customize the feedings. Then I wouldn't need plecocaine when I have already have a smorgasbord of foods.

Like Larry, my fish pretty much get a mix of foods (frozen bloodworms, brine shrimp, prawns, muscles, zuccinis, yams, peas, hikari sinking wafers, NLS H2O, hikari algae wafers, earthworm sticks, spirulina sticks etc, with the earthworm and spirulina more or less the stable--since I too keep a lot of carnis.)

[lohachata]

thank you hitch for the kind words..i would like to add a couple of things here if i might.
i have only been in this hobby since 1973..still a novice ; but have learned at least a little.i am very aware that many species of loricaridae have different dietary needs..
i have never said that Plecocaine is the only food to feed your fish.all of my fish do get a well rounded healthy diet.and i always promote the benefits of a varied diet...
i never push anybody to buy Plecocaine..that is not how i operate..if somebody prefers to use a different food ; they certainly have the right to do so..
from reading some of the posts here and a couple of other places ; it kind of feels like i am being tried for some kind of crime..which is ok.i am used to it.
you made a couple of good statements hitch...if one wants to feed a simple diet ; Plecocaine is fine..
but the part about switching up eliminates the need for a food like Plecocaine....can you not make the same argument for the use of any single food out there..
there is a huge assortment of great foods available to us..some swear by one brand or type..somebody swears by another..it is all in what one finds that works best for him.
i have stopped feeding frozen bloodworms to any of my plecos because i lost 16 L-66 sub-adults after feeding them the frozen worms....seems like some kind of liver problem....
the only thing that has really bothered me is that a number of folks have made like this is a really bad food..without ever having tried it..kind of like a guy i worked with..i told him to buy his fiance some Godiva chocolates for sweetest day..his response..i have never heard of it ; so it can't be any good..

again....i have to agree that it is important to give our fish a good healthy varied diet of quality foods..be they 10 cent feeders or $1000 show fish...

thanks for listening to me guys..peace and blessings..

hey twotank..i haven't talked to you in ages...hope all is well...

[Hitch]

I dont think anyone is trying to "incriminate" the food or you, but this is kind of discussion is pretty common and pretty much expected from a new product. Its just somewhat like "if everything I have works amazingly, why risk the change" kinda thing.

My point with the mix and match is that if I have a varied diet that already provides all of the necessary nutrients, a new food is just that...a new formula. And yes any other food in the market would be the same...its just that some of us found a good niche of foods (I personally combine much of my dry foods in various proportions, mix in fresh foods and make my own wafers for grazing). To take this point to the extreme, if I can provide their natural perfect diet to my fish, then I wouldnt even think about using commercial products at all.

[apistomaster]

I think Hitch is right.
You are only promoting a fairly new and as far as I know a very good quality food but people get accustomed to their routines which produce perfectly satisfactory results hence have little incentive to change what they are doing or using. It isn't anything personal.
I'm sure along the way you have encountered some push back from reps or their proxies to discourage or disparage your products but that's just business as usual in the USA and I would try not to take it personally. I'm sure you would like to see a wide and quick acceptance on a large scale for your line of fairly new products but you also have to realize how difficult it is to overcome inertia.
I can only wish you success and continue to persevere. Maybe a few testimonials from Zebra pleco breeders who adopted your product then experienced a 200% increase in breeding production would help.
Seriously, it takes time to break into a field as competitive as the tropical fish food business and never easy no matter who you are or how great the product.

I think a better name than Plecocaine could have been chosen. It sounds more like a name of a medication than a food.
I'm sure it would sell well if it was cocaine but there is a connotation there that I would have avoided.

[lohachata]

points well taken guys..i really do appreciate the input.and i certainly do understand how we are..having a system that really works well for you ,makes you very reluctant to change.."if it ain't broke ; don't fix it"....and i am very much like that myself.
funny you should mention the name"Plecocaine" apisto..the name is very much a big part of the draw..and the innuendo is that your fish will become addicted to it..such as one might become addicted to cocaine..i even have a customer in india whose fish prefer it over any other foods..and outside of frozen and live foods ,a couple of his fish will eat nothing else..

again.....thanks for all the input..

[Proteus]

I'm also concerned about the lack of information thats presented in the auction as this is a new product to me as well- I'm not seeing what makes it great- what is in it? what does it look like? that would also break some barriers down answering ?s from potential customers. To read something new I want to know the product throughly a to z. I have no clue what it looks like all I saw was a picture of a cute pleco.

I might as well be feeding ground cat pellet to my fish and be clueless- my fish of course would be eating it happily knowing that the enemy is gone from their domain. Its the fear of the unknown what I'm really putting in my fish tank. I do this with my personal food, my beloved pets food and my fish is no different either.


This is a great market if you got the formula down and fish really love it and the stuff in the product is good for the fish in the long run then you won a good customer base of hobbyists for years to come.

[jerry58]

Hi lohachata

Sorry if my thread above seems a bit on the negative side but when searched to help out they were the only things I found on the net and that I did state they may not be true which is a fare comment.
I wish you good luck with your product and probably if available in my area I would more than likely give it a go.
Just an idea but would it be a good thing to find a well known company that will promote your brand and even say introduce a free small sample with there product or just sell a small sachet as trial pack.

Best of luck

Jerry

[lohachata]

here is the ingredient list and nutritional information..some may like it .....some may not..not much different than most other foods...
hope it helps..

GUARANTEED ANALYSIS
CRUDE PROTEIN (MIN) 50.0000%
CRUDE FAT (MIN) 17.0000%
CRUDE FIBER (MAX) 3.0000%
CALCIUM (CA) (MIN) 1.5500%
CALCIUM (CA) (MAX) 2.0500%
PHOSPHORUS (P) (MIN) 1.2500%
SODIUM (NA) (MIN) .0500%
SODIUM (NA) (MAX) .5000%

INGREDIENTS
FISH MEAL, WHEAT FLOUR, SPRAY DRIED ANIMAL BLOOD CELLS, FISH OIL, FISH OIL
(LS), BREWERS DRIED YEAST, BETAINE, PYRIDOXINE HYDROCHLORIDE, LECITHIN,
CHOLINE CHLORIDE, L-ASCORBYL-2-POLYPHOSPHATE, CALCIUM PANTOTHENATE,
DL-METHIONINE, MENADIONE SODIUM BISULFITE COMPLEX, THIAMINE MONONITRATE,
BIOTIN, FOLIC ACID, CHOLECALCIFEROL, RIBOFLAVIN, DL-ALPHA TOCOPHERYL ACETATE,
VITAMIN A ACETATE, ETHOXYQUIN (A PRESERVATIVE), ZINC OXIDE, VITAMIN B-12
SUPPLEMENT, MANGANOUS OXIDE, FERROUS CARBONATE, COPPER SULFATE, ZINC SULFATE,
CALCIUM IODATE, CALCIUM CARBONATE, COBALT CARBONATE.

[Bas Pels]

Very honest

personally, I would not provide 50 % protein food - that is for vommercial trout growers and so - fish growin up rapidly, but not able to life very long - which will not matter, as the fish will be eaten anyway.

We, however wantto keep fish alife for as long as possible - and for ut, this does matter

Further, I dislike feeding fish blood (note the source of the bloodcells is not given, most likely the local butcher) and I think the amount of sodium is high - for fish from the Amazon, and West Africa

[Hitch]

interesting....didnt even notice the blood cells part.

what is the preparation procedure of the blood cells? do you isolate a particular types of cells? or is just the mixture of the various myeloid and lymphoid cells? Also, if you dont mind me asking, why add the blood cells (there must be a significance being the third ingedient and all)?

[apistomaster]

Beef Heart blends contain plenty of blood and they are excellent foods.

[Bas Pels]

Beef Heart blends contain plenty of blood and they are excellent foods.

Something we do disagree about

Breeding discus, at 32 C (approx. 90 F), beef might be digestable, but at 24 C it will not be digesable for fish - unless specifically adapted.

Perhaps that explains why people think so differntly about feeding beef heart: we think in other ranges of water temperature.

[apistomaster]

I used beef heart on Discus but not exclusively. When I had my fish shop I fed it to all the Tetras and cichlid which I kept at 78*F.
I raised 3 baby Arowanas mainly on beef heart to 20 inch specimens in as little as 18-20 months. I found it to be a very versatile food and it was a mainstay for the many Killiefish I used to raise and I kept most Killies at 75*F. I also sold large amounts to my customers who saw me feeding it to many of our fish. I often cut up 6 beef hearts at a time to have enough on hand for my use and retail sales. I never kept Discus at 90*F unless they were being treated for some disease. Normally I keep Discus at 84*F. Back then I only kept and bred wild Discus.
So I don't understand your point about beef heart going hand in hand with elevated temperatures.

[Jackster]

Very honest

personally, I would not provide 50 % protein food - that is for commercial trout growers and so - fish grow in up rapidly, but not able to life very long - which will not matter, as the fish will be eaten anyway.

We, however want to keep fish a life for as long as possible - and for us, this does matter

Further, I dislike feeding fish blood (note the source of the bloodcells is not given, most likely the local butcher) and I think the amount of sodium is high - for fish from the Amazon, and West Africa

With my knowledge of fish foods (primarily thanks to Ken Menard), I would say that this product is very closely related to what I would call Trout chow. I've known many people
who have used Trout formulas for Hypancistrus species but I definitely wonder how long
lived their fish were since most of those breeders have all but disappeared from the
internet. Also just curious about the L066 deaths. Did these fish get Plecocaine as part
of their staple diet? The ingredients don't look that bad to me except the fat content,
which IMO is way to high. I once used OSI shrimp pellets way back when and I saw a few
of my fish die from eating them which looked very similar to the way the L066 looked
after they died. I also have been told that fats in foods for cold water species are different
then the fats that should be used for tropical fish kept at much higher temperatures,
in other words, cold water fats are not recommended for tropical fish food formulas.

http://www.aquaboards.com/viewtopic.php?id=7301

Some of the breeders I work with use both frozen bloodworms and brine shrimp with
absolutely no problems, while about half of us (including myself) don't use any frozen
foods whatsoever. One of our group uses live baby brine shrimp heavily and seems to
achieve much better growth rates for Hypancistrus and Ancistrus fry then the rest of us.
Personally I know the fish that I raise have great longevity and I attribute that to their
exclusive dry food diet. Before a parasite disaster about 5 years ago, I had quite a few
fish in the 8-12 year old range, so now I have several fish in the 4-5 year range since I
had to start the clock over after losing around $1500 worth of fish all in one shot.

Let me end by saying that John (Lohachata) is also a great guy and I'm sure one can find
a lot of people who will rave about his product. In my case, besides the fat content,
it's just a personal choice for me not to use it and since I have access to dozens of
types of other high quality fish foods there is really no need for me to try anything
different since it goes back to the "if it works, don't fix it" thing.

[Proteus]

Interesting in what's in plecoaine.

makes sense about what was said about this and trout chow-

my questions are so many since this just opened a can of worms for me


1) didn't I read somewhere that a research was done with beefheart/mammalian based diet vs fish/chicken whatnot non/mammalian- with discus and how discus didn't live long with beefheart/mammalian based diet vs others? no idea if this is valid study or not or just bs study someone just said to make their recipe for discus better. (I even can't find beefheart anywhere with my local butchers-food stores/foregin stores!)

2) I am really curious on how long this has been out and what would the different fish's longevity be on this high protein diet versus others diet. It would be interesting study.

3) I do not believe the sodium is that bad- look at market shrimp/prawns people feed their big guys from SA actually have higher sodium than anything as smelt etc... (learned it somewhere in monsterfishkeepers.com recently) they just had discussion on that

4) the source of fish meal and the blood is what worries me as there is no control on what is the fish or what is the blood

5) fat is one of the biggest factors- I'm not sure how well fish can digest oil or fat since they got shorter lifespans than people wouldn't it affect them faster and die faster?

[apistomaster]

I have much more experience raising Discus than I do with catfish; 4 decades.
I have seen Discus raised and maintained on a primarily beef heart diet still breeding at 10 years old so I am inclined to discount negative claims about beef heart as a fish food.

[Proteus]

then that one is more likely a BS thing then, thanks Larry!