Sticks are the everyday pond food, and the reason they float matters practically rather than aesthetically: you can see exactly how much goes in and exactly when the fish stop taking it, which is the only reliable way to avoid overfeeding a pond you cannot see the bottom of.

Pets Choice formulate these as a complete and balanced food for all freshwater pond fish, including koi carp, goldfish and other ornamental species. The analysis is crude protein 23.5%, crude fats 3.5%, crude fibres 3% and crude ash 5%, and there is stabilised vitamin C in the additives. The composition runs cereals, derivatives of vegetable origin with wheatgerm at 7%, fish and fish derivatives, vegetable protein extract, meat and animal derivatives, minerals, oils and fats and algae with spirulina at 0.04%. Pets Choice describe them as highly digestible and non-clouding.

• 5KG sack
• Complete food for koi, goldfish and ornamental pond fish
• Floating and non-clouding
• Crude protein 23.5%, crude fats 3.5%
• Wheatgerm at 7%, spirulina at 0.04%
• With stabilised vitamin C

Feed to the clock, and ease off as the water cools. Pets Choice's instruction is to put out only what is eaten within 10 to 15 minutes — overfeed and you cloud the water, underfeed and the fish hang at the surface looking for more. The point they do not make is temperature: pond fish digest far more slowly in cold water, so feeding a normal ration into a cold pond puts food into fish that cannot use it. Reduce as autumn comes and stop when the water is genuinely cold. Store it in an airtight container somewhere dry once opened.

Who it's for: ordinary pond keeping through the warmer months, and mixed ponds where one food has to suit koi and goldfish alike.