Product: Vibragro Fish Food
Price: $5
Pros: Brings out the color in fish, appears to increase the rate that the fish grow at.
Cons: Can be difficult to get the fish to accept it, very expensive.

Fish foods are an area of the aquarium hobby that come under a lot of scrutiny. Depending on what you feed your fish, you will see a wide range of result. Many foods can make fish look more colorful, others will make your fish more likely to breed, and others are just more likely to keep your fish alive. No matter how you look at it, there is now way to keep fish without feeding them something. Hobbyists have very strong opinions about just which food is the best for your fish, and I'm no different. This month, I'll review one of my favorite foods: VibraGro.

The original story I heard about VibraGro is that it was created by Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute as they were trying to find a food that would help captive breed marine fish have the same color as their wild cousins. Even though I don't keep many marine aquaria, I was intrigued. Perhaps mostly because I had a friend who was an intern at HBOI and new enough about there connection with Walt Disney World's Epcot center to know that they were working heavily with captive breed marine fish. In any event, I was happy to try the product when it hit the shelves, and I've been a convert ever since.

Color (10)-To me, the most important thing a food can do is improve the color of a fish. While it's not always true that a colorful fish is a healthy fish, the two usually go hand in hand. VibraGro has greatly enhanced my fishes color. My Tiger Barbs always have bright, nearly fluorescent fins, and all my other fish that I feed VibraGro are equally beautiful. I've been feeding VibraGro for 3 years now, and feel there is a definite difference in the color between the fish that eat it, and the fish that eat other things.

Ease of Feeding (6)-The one concern that most people have with VibraGro is getting their fish to eat it. It generally takes about 3 days to customize a new fish to VibraGro. They frankly won't eat it. Why? I don't know. I've never ever lost a fish due to this period of reluctance, but it does scare some aquarists and they will stop feeding solely VibraGro before the 3-day period is up. Aquarium fish can go much longer than 3 days without food unless they are babies. Don't be afraid to go through the 3 days without eating. The results will be worth it. After that period, I've never had any problem with my fish ravenously eating the food.

Clouds Water (9)-In this day and age, I suppose that there are few fish foods that cloud the water. VibraGro does not cloud the water initially, but if your fish are messy eaters, ala cichlids, they will crumble up the pellets and spit thousands of particles into the water stream. This will make things a little cloudy, but it's normal and not due to the food itself. Anybody who has had cichlids, knows they do this with just about every food they eat.

Overall (10)-I personally feel that VibraGro is the best food on the market. I feed it to all my adult fish, and then I feed the leftover crumbs at the bottom of the bottle to my fry. It enhances color by trying to duplicate what the fish would normally get in the wild. The downside would be that the food costs a little more than your average food, but I personally feel that it is well worth it.

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