# Any one dosing Vit. C in freshwater tanks?



## BioG (Oct 12, 2008)

Just curious as to whether or not folks are dosing vitamin C in their fresh tanks? If so, what product are you using?


----------



## kmuda (Nov 27, 2009)

If your going to dose vitamins, it should be via the food. Contrary to manufacturer claims, vitamins dumped into water are a borderline worthless (if not outright worthless) effort. It sells product but it does not do your fish much good.

That said, I commonly use Boyd's VitaChem injected into either Frozen Krill or SeaChem NutraDiet mealworms. I use a diabetic needle (procured at Wal-Greens). An alternative method is to simply soak pellets or freeze dried krill in it. But if soaking, be advised that you don't want to soak past a few minutes otherwise you start to degrade the quality of the pellet (or freeze dried food) instead of improving it.

I should clarify, I keep South American Cichlids, so my choice of vitamin enriched foods (mealworms and krill) may not be acceptable to feed to your fish.

A common method with Oscar owners trying to cure HITH is to crush a vitamin c pellet (same ones you would take), dissolve it in water, and then soak the food in this solution. I've had mixed results doing this as it changes the flavor of the pellets to a point where the fish may spit them out.


----------



## BioG (Oct 12, 2008)

The reason I ask is because I recently read an article which followed the progress of an extensive study where marine fish were tested to see how much vitamin c was present in their system after it being presented to them via respiration. It seemed pretty evident in the study that adding buffered, pure vitamin C to the marine aquarium improved the health, immunity and was, at the very least present in acceptable amounts within the blood.

Is there any reason those results would differ in freshwater? I haven't found any vitamin c for freshwater so I got to thinking...


----------



## kmuda (Nov 27, 2009)

Marine fish drink water, Freshwater fish do not. Freshwater fish get their water intake via osmosis (it's absorbed through their skin). The question would be would the Vitamin C be in a form where it could pass through this fish's skin via osmosis.

I would say that is unlikely, although I cannot provide a definitive answer to the question.

I would also have to read the study in question. Most animals, excluding Primates who have lost this ability, can manufacture their own Vitamin C. So a Vitamin C deficiency in a fish would be unusual, although I do not doubt the beneficial effects of supplementation. But the fact that fish can produce their own vitamin C leads to many questions associated with the study.

One thing is certain. If vitamin supplements are taken orally by the fish, they will get where they need to be and do what they need to do. In all likelyhood, a quality pellet will provide enough Vitamin C supplementation that additional supplementation is unnecessary.


----------



## BioG (Oct 12, 2008)

great point. If you ask me it sounds like supplementing the water of marine fish is a waste of product when you could just soak food or something and use much less product.


----------

