Do Fish Flakes and Pellets Expire?

Chrisk-K

Theodore P. Charles Fellow of AC
Dec 1, 2009
897
0
0
Maryland
I have a few different types of flakes and pellets that are more than 1 year old. They don't have an expiration date, but obviously they cannot last forever.

So, when should I discard them and buy new foods?
 
Many come with a use before date on them from what I see.
 
None of mine have a use-before-date except Hikari bloodworms.
 
Most food will go stale after a length of time. It depends on how well packaged and/or stored the food is.


Yea, my hikari wafers went stale recently... the fish don't seem to mind, they hit them HARD. Soaking pellets/wafers in a vitamin supplement does help restore nutritional values..
 
I would advise against using stale foods to fish. They are one of the many reasons why fish suffer digestive problems. IMO, if a package has been opened several times beforehand and had lapsed two months, it's time to throw that in the bin. A month for flakes since flakes by this time have degraded rapidly. Vitamins are easily destroyed by air and light alone.
 
I buy flakes and NLS pellets by the pound, store them in the freezer, and refill old flake cans every 2-3 weeks.
 
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