jwcarlson Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 Does anyone freeze or refrigerate excess dry foods to extend their shelf life? I'm sure I'm not the only one who tends to over buy fish food. Truthfully, I probably have well over a year's worth considering the Aquarium Co-Op fry food, Xtreme Krill Flakes, freeze dried blood worms, and various wafers/shrimp stuff. I'm used to oscars blowing through Hikari BioGold many years ago so this wasn't ever much of a concern. Any special guidelines for doing this? I can vacuum seal if that would be a better idea, but considering the almost non-existent moisture content, I'm not sure how much that would help. What I'm picturing is me having a smaller secondary container that I go put some frozen dry food into when I'm empty of a certain type. A couple weeks' worth or something like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppysnail Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 I use a food saver to seal most of each food as soon as I open it. As I need more in my little jars I suck the air back out and seal again so only a bit it exposed to air. I’m limited to one freezer shelf for frozen fish food repashy etc. hubby has the idea humans deserve more freezer space than fish 🙂 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwcarlson Posted January 31, 2022 Author Share Posted January 31, 2022 I have a dedicated raw food freezer for our dogs and cats, so that shouldn't be too much of a deal for me. Wife already knows I'm nuts. 🙂 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timQ Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 I usually bulk buy my "live" food and put it in my garage freezer. Brine Shrimp Mysis Isopods Bloodworms They last for quite awhile. I toss in rapashy too. Let it slowly melt off in the tank and all the inhabitants love it 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmurray407 Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 On 1/31/2022 at 3:02 PM, Guppysnail said: I use a food saver to seal most of each food as soon as I open it Do you seal it up in little Food Saver bags, or how do you do it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppysnail Posted January 31, 2022 Share Posted January 31, 2022 Yup. I buy food saver bags and use the food saver type machine to remove the air. It crushes flakes the perfect guppy size. Repashy as well both powder and after it’s made before I freeze it. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StevesFishTanks Posted February 1, 2022 Share Posted February 1, 2022 I buy the big bucket of sera discus granules. I store it in my chest freezer and fill and feed out of these 16oz squeeze bottles which is stored at room temp near the tanks. I cut the tip so the hole is much bigger. I feed this food to pretty much every tank. I see it as a higher quality staple than tetra tropical granules, a food that LRB feeds to pretty much his entire fishroom with much success. I have even put this food into a pepper grinder to make fry powder out of it. I have been looking into buying a vacuum sealer to seal up smaller portions of this food and aquamax. Any suggestions on brand or type? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwcarlson Posted February 1, 2022 Author Share Posted February 1, 2022 @StevesFishTanks I have a pretty old FoodSaver that I bought on sale probably close to a decade ago. I use it for sous vide, biltong, and longer term storage of stuff. I'd buy something affordable that gets good reviews. There's a lot more options now than 10 years ago. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Torrey Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 If you can't afford the food saver, you can also extend the life of dry goods by storing in ziploc bags and sucking the air out. I use the food saver, but before the food saver I divided food into snack bags with air vacuumed out, and stored the snack bags in a larger gallon bag. Vacuumed the air out of the gallon bag, too. Of course now I go through the food too fast, none of my dried food canisters lasts longer than 3 weeks. Good thing the fish are breeding in direct proportion to the feeding, they might not be paying rent but I definitely expect them to cover the cost of their food! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guppysnail Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 (edited) On 1/31/2022 at 6:05 PM, dmurray407 said: Do you seal it up in little Food Saver bags, or how do you do it? I just did a batch today. I used to do small portions in smaller bags now I do the whole amount then reseal as needed Edited February 2, 2022 by Guppysnail 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmurray407 Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 On 2/1/2022 at 11:39 PM, Torrey said: storing in ziploc bags and sucking the air out How did you suck the air out of the regular Ziplock bags? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dasaltemelosguy Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 I find these to be very effective if you can't create an actual vacuum: Oxygen-Absorber-Packets These will slowly remove all of the oxygen in the container and replace it with relatively inert nitrogen. If you need moisture as opposed to oxygen removed, these of course are better: Desiccant-Packets I save these from every bottle of whatever it is that has one as they really help with mold. I pop one in a zip-lock bag with vegetables, and they definitely can be stored for a longer period. Unfortunately, they can't be used together as the moisture packets negate the oxygen packets! 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chad Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 I freeze mine too. Keep the bottles in bulk frozen while keeping a little in a zip loc back in the fridge. I make sure to label and date them since I can forget what's what and how long they've been in the fridge or freezer. I have no idea if it helps, but I do know it hasn't hurt anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Suz Posted February 2, 2022 Share Posted February 2, 2022 On 1/31/2022 at 2:02 PM, Guppysnail said: I use a food saver to seal most of each food as soon as I open it. As I need more in my little jars I suck the air back out and seal again so only a bit it exposed to air. I’m limited to one freezer shelf for frozen fish food repashy etc. hubby has the idea humans deserve more freezer space than fish 🙂 I do exactly the same. Love that food saver. I'm certain it extends the nutritious life of the food. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jwcarlson Posted February 3, 2022 Author Share Posted February 3, 2022 Glad to see it wasn't just a wild idea I had. I have some sealing to do! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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