Abstract: The rate at which conventional fish food is converted to body protein by a wide variety of growing fish is increased substantially when the food contains 0.05 to 0.5% by weight, on a dry basis, of an extract from the blood or an organ of a vertebrate animal capable of catalytically enhancing cell respiration in animal tissue and hydrolyzate of native protein having an average molecular weight of 2000 to 50,000 in an amount of 2 to 15 times the weight of the catalytically active extract.