wayne said:
Yellow labs aren't herbivores. Nor are most mbuna. They spend most of their time trying to feed on microcrustaceans, but in the process eat a lot of algae 'incidentally'.
If you beef up normal flake and other foods by mixing in large amounts of spirulina you'll be fine.
You have it backwards.
Mbuna feed on algae and invariably consume the micro-organims living in the algae. This mix of food (the majority of which is algae) is called aufwuchs.
Mbuna's intestines are long, indicating that most of the food they consume and require is high in fiber. Longer intestines to digest this "rougher" food. Fish with short intestines are generally fish that quickly digest easily broken-down foods. Foods high in protein.
Labs mouths are modified to pick and feed at these tiny foods better than the majority of wide-mouthed raspers but should still not be fed proteins in excess. I've killed labs by feeding them too much protein as easily as I've killed a zebra type with it. The teeth of mbuna are made for rasping the algae off rocks, P. acei are found more commonly rasping the algae off fallen trees and wood near shorlines in the ake. The Labeotropheus sp. have modified mouths that allow them to feed off algae without having to go vertical. Metriaclima crabro are not as algae effecient. They've developed color-changing tactics that allow them to hang around a large Malawian bagrid to steal their eggs when they breed. Several other mbuna are specialized in picking and feeding off scales and fins of other fish or stealing eggs or eating crustacea and aquatic insects but these are smaller in number than those that feed primarily on aufwuchs.
Even some haps can suffer by feeding heavily on animal proteins. Hemitilapia oxyrhynchus feeds on plankton and can be found following sand sifters around picking up any food they uncover but their mouths are actually modified for scraping algae of the edges of Vallisneria leaves and this type of algae makes up the bulk of their diet. Feeding them on something like Tetra's tropical fish diet as a long-term stape would eventually cause them to bloat in the aquarium.
If I keep labs with other mbuna I don't risk bloat and keep the Labs to a herbivorous diet. Well rounded formulas (like NLS) makes it so you don't have to worry about comprimising the health of one fish for the other and every fish gets what they need.
Fish like red zebra and cobalts remain healthier if you stick to strictly herbivorous staple diets (spirulina and veggie diets) and suppliment them with a high quality general formula.
http://malawicichlids.com/mw01100.htm#moll
Hope they are going to be ok.
