Spirulina Powder for fish food

What is Spirulina?

Spirulina is actually a cyanobacterium, more commonly known as blue-green algae, and is a very small botanical algae; only growing up to half a millimeter in length.

It is a free floating cyanobacterium that can be found in lakes with an extremely high pH and very hard water. These lakes are to be found in Africa, Asia and South America. The name Spirulina derives from the spiral structure of the algae as it twists round like a spiral staircase.

Use of spirulina as a food stuff goes right back to the Aztecs who would call it by the name of “Teocuitlatl”, which translated means stone’s excrement. This will be explained later in the article. It grows wild in Lake Chad where the locals still make it into cakes and use it as an additive for their soups. Flamingoes in the African Rift Valley lakes filter spirulina from the water as their main diet; flocks of these birds are sustained as the spirulina is so easily available in these waters. It is a very active reproducer so spirulina stocks are never really exhausted.

Spirulina is classed as a high protein diet as it consists of 60% vegetable protein that is very easy to digest and obviously contains no fat or cholesterol that is contained in meat.

It does however contain essential minerals and fatty acids that will boost the immune system of the fish. Unlike other algae, it is extremely easy to digest as it is composed of soft cell walls that are made from complex sugars and protein, using these algae should prevent a lot of the digestive problems that some fish suffer with when offered other greens or other algaes

The main benefits of feeding spirulina to your fish are;-

Feeding spirulina will increase and give a more uniform growth rate for your fish.Spirulina will improve the digestion of your fish; more nutrition is also extracted from the food as there are no indigestible components.Spirulina will boost the immune system of the fish, it will also aid in the prevention of swollen abdomens due to blocked intestinal passages.Spirulina will enhance the production of special enzymes that break down digested fats into energy rather than letting them build up in the fishes body.It has been proven that spirulina will bring out the coloration of your fish better; this is due to the carotene pigments that are found in the algae.

Spirulina is commercially cultivated to meet the demands of the market. This is achieved by using open channel ponds with paddle wheels to agitate the water. The main spirulina farms are to be found in the United States, Thailand, India, China and Pakistan.

The long term benefits of feeding spirulina in the fish diet has certainly passed on to the human diet, there are millions of people all over the planet who are regularly taking spirulina tablets to aid their immune systems, there is even ongoing research that it may well help control cancerous cells in the body, but obviously this still has to be proven.