Fish Roe as a food source?

Hey yall. I know that many fishes are egg predators and eggs are packed with nutrients.
Basically, I was wondering if there is any concern with feeding roe to our fish in aquaria (transmission of disease). I know that gar roe are toxic, but is there any concern with feeding roe from other fish like catfish. I know that toxins from wastewater effluent are stored in fatty tissues, are they found in the eggs as well?

I have been cleaning many flathead catfish the past few weeks, and have been keeping the roe of the females (they are practically swimming gonads with mouths). The eggs are large, ripe and I thought they would make a good high protein 'treat' for my sunfishes.

Any special preparations? Should they only be fed fresh, or can they be frozen and thawed as needed. I have had channel cat roe before, and I figured if I can eat it, then my fish can eat it...

Any insight is welcome. Thanks!
Willie

Edited by UncleWillie, 06 May 2011 - 08:10 PM.

Well, I'd freeze it and feed it. Done it before. I don't know about toxins in roe, but figure if they were really that bad it would've shown up in development and recruitment of the population by now.

Thanks for your response. I fed some fresh flathead roe this weekend to a few longear sunfish that are not yet trained to pellets, and they went bananas over this stuff. I froze the remainder of the eggs (A LOT) to bring out later.

I am not worried about contaminants from these fish, but wondered if anyone knew about this from waters near waste-water effluent - just in case anyone else wished to try feeding roe. Anyway - thanks!

FWIW I've used bluegill roe to feed rainbowfish and never had any issues with using it "raw". I also can't remember ever offering it to a specie that refused it!

Me and Bumpy netted fish in Mass last year and we got a bullhead that spat eggs out of its mouth (and abandoned them when released) and the sunfish nesting near bye eagerly ate them. I also heard sunfish sometimes raid bass nests.

Thanks for your response. I fed some fresh flathead roe this weekend to a few longear sunfish that are not yet trained to pellets, and they went bananas over this stuff. I froze the remainder of the eggs (A LOT) to bring out later.

Wow, I am glad they liked it. And to think that I thought that only the wealthiest fish get to eat caviar.

Thanks. After the initial feeding of roe to some finicky longear sunfish, they immediately took to pellets the next day when they previously hadn't. I reckon a big orange egg was all it took for them to switch to a big orange pellet.