# How important expiration date on the fish flakes and other food?



## ppaskova

Hi

I just noticed that my "Omega One" and "Tetra" flakes have expiration dates on them in the middle of this year. As those are big cans I'll not finish them by the date of expire. Can I use them beyond this date and for how long ?
I also noticed that I have same expiration issue with Hikari algae wafers. So the same question applies to them as well ?


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## bob123

I would use my fish food until it's gone, as I keep all fish food in the fridge to help keep it as fresh as possible.


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## pyrrolin

if you just leave it out around like I do, then its iffy. If you usually have high humidity in the house then I would not go over the expirey date as each time you open the container you let in a tiny bit of moisture and that would add up over time and could cause problems when going past the date.

Another solution is to buy a few more tanks and stock them up to be able to use the food by the expiry date.

Flake food is relatively cheap so best bet would be to just buy new food at that time. Better safe than dead fish.


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## cliff

I don't see a dry flake/food changing much over time, other then the moisture content. I'll let someone with more experience/knowledge comment on nutritional changes in the food over time.

One thing you may want to do is portion out of the main container, so in my case I refill a 1oz container from the 8oz main food container. That way only a small amount is being exposed to air when feeding, helping to keep the food that remains in the big container fresh(er).


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## pyrrolin

I like that idea Cliff


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## Riceburner

Just use up the food...it's not like it goes bad as soon as the exp. date passes.


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## ppaskova

cliff said:


> I don't see a dry flake/food changing much over time, other then the moisture content. I'll let someone with more experience/knowledge comment on nutritional changes in the food over time.
> 
> One thing you may want to do is portion out of the main container, so in my case I refill a 1oz container from the 8oz main food container. That way only a small amount is being exposed to air when feeding, helping to keep the food that remains in the big container fresh(er).


This is exactly what I'm doing. I have small container from which I feed the fish and I refill it from the big one when it is empty. But my big one is half full with flakes and I do not want to through it out when it expires. Also my algae wafers expires at the same time and they are not cheap to buy and I also do not want to through them out as well.


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## SmokeSR

I use expired flake and dry (algae wafers, shrimp pellets, etc) food well beyond their expiry. None of the fish seem to care and they're healthy. Been doing this for years.


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## ppaskova

SmokeSR said:


> I use expired flake and dry (algae wafers, shrimp pellets, etc) food well beyond their expiry. None of the fish seem to care and they're healthy. Been doing this for years.


Good. Thank you. Now I don't have to though out $30+ worse of food in the garbage


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## cliff

took a look at my flakes, 5.3oz (still have lots - my earlier post was a bit high on the size estimate), turns out they just expired - but still fresh, no hesitation on continuing to use it up.


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## Fishfur

I have a cousin who tosses anything that is even close to expiry.. she drives me nuts. Expiry dates are generally just a guideline.. they don't automatically mean the item is unsafe to use once the date has passed. 

But that said, the big problem with many food items is the fats. Fats go rancid over time and rancid fat is very bad news. Which is why they usually put some kind of preservative in, the popular one these days is Vitamin E.. usually listed as tocopherols.

Best thing to do, at least, what I do, is put the majority of a package of food into a ziplock bag, freezer weight, not sandwich kind. Press all the air out and then, if it's a new package I'll put the bag in the fridge, and if there is a lot of it, most will go in the freezer. Freezing will dramatically extend the life of fats. Simple refridgeration will also extend their life quite a long time past the date. 

But leaving any food containing fats out in room temperatures is the best way I know to hasten the process of fat going rancid. You might not even notice a change in the smell of the food, but rancid fats are dangerous to consume as well as being unpalatable. Unless you have a LOT of fish, buying large packages of food is false economy. Buy small packages that you will use before they expire, unless you are willing to freeze the larger amounts in small packs to prolong their life. Fresh is always best.. and bear in mind, in this country there are NO laws governing what goes in fish foods, nor even the order the ingredients appear on the label, and we certainly have no way to know how fresh any given ingredient was when it was incorporated into the food.

Rancid fats cause a lot of free radical damage. That uses up abnormally high amounts of whatever antioxidants are in the diet, so they're not available for other bodily functions they are needed for. I have to admit, once upon a time, I used to think the term 'free radical' was some sort of vegan propaganda speak, but they do exist. They cause much of the damage associated with aging,such as inflammation, wrinkles and cancers. High levels of antioxidants are the way to fight free radicals that can't be avoided by eating a high quality diet and otherwise trying to live a healthy lifestyle.

Given a choice, fish, like most animals in the wild, eat very fresh stuff and would certainly not eat rancid fats unless they were starving. Given no choice in our aquaria, they eat what we give them or they starve. That's one reason feeding live or freshly prepared food is so good for them. But we can't always do that and commercially prepared foods are the usual staple for most fish. So the best way to help ensure good health is to try and make sure that prepared food has not gone rancid. 

If your food has already hit it's expiry, especially if it is a flake food, I'd toss it and start over. If they have only just hit the date, and you really can't afford to waste the food, seal almost all of it air tight and freeze it, in multiple small freezer bags, so you don't have to open the whole thing to get more. Keep out only enough to last a few days at a time. If you notice a change in the smell, get rid of the rest of it.

If you are the type who, for example, eats ground flax seed because it's so healthy, this also applies. The fats in flax go rancid very, very fast, compared to many other fats. If you buy ground flax in more than tiny amounts, say a few ounces, it will go rancid long before you eat it. Since you have no way to know when it was ground, it is often actually rancid when you buy it. The same is often true of flax oil and flax oil capsules. Even with added antioxidants, the fats just don't survive long. They're susceptible to light, heat, humidity, and especially oxygen in air. Even the stuff kept in the health food store fridge is often no better. It's much healthier and much safer, to buy whole flax seed, then grind just what you will use daily just before you eat it. 

If a fish food had flax in it, I would certainly not feed it past the expiry date, simply because I know it's a virtual certainty that the fats will have gone rancid. Animal fats are not a lot better in terms of stability either, though they do much better with freezing or chilling than flax does.

You may think this sounds a bit over the top.. they're only fish right ? But the same problem exists with kibbles for pets and with many prepared foods for humans. So far as I am concerned, I see no reason to feed potentially dangerous fats to animals who have NO choice in what they eat, any more than I'd eat it myself or serve it to anyone else.


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## ppaskova

Thank you Fishfur for such a detailed explanation. This is probably explains why my shrimps stopped breading as I was feeding them expired flakes (although I feed my fish with not yet expired flakes). Expiration date on my flakes and hard food like wafers is 4-6 months away from today. Because of it have a few questions:
1. I have half of large container of flakes (148g) which is sitting in my basement in dry place inside my fish tank stand. So I better to put it in the small Ziploc bags and freeze it, correct ?
2. I found still sealed small container of flakes that already expired 6 months ago. I should toast it, right ?
3. What should I do with hard food like wafers and dry frizzed warms ? Toast them after expiration or continue to use tmem?

Thanks for your help again


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## Fishfur

Pleased to be of help. Dry basement, which is likely cooler than the main house, is good. In contrast, my apartment is hell on earth hot, which is one reason I am a bit careful about storage. Stuff goes off fast in the heat here.

Storing it near the tank is likely to be more humid, which is not so good, though it's probably where most of us keep the fish food, right ? I'd freeze the flakes, in small quantities, in separate bags.. just put them all in one bigger bag to keep them handy, then feed from one bag 'til it's done.

Anything already six months old I'd toss, if it were me. If the expiration date is recent, say within a month or two, then I'd freeze as above and use as quickly as possible, PROVIDED that the food still smells the same as fresh food does. 

That 'stale' smell you get, with old bread or crackers or cookies, or pasta, is when starch is getting old. Not dangerous, but not tasty. 

If it were me, if it smells stale, I would not use it. But if the fats have begun to go rancid, the smell is stronger than stale bread, a bit more bitter, very unpleasant. If it smells fresh, chances are it is still ok to use. But if in doubt, I'd toss it.


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## monk21

my opinion would be to use them as you would use the food of your dog. I would never use something expired


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## ppaskova

Vangelis21 said:


> my opinion would be to use them as you would use the food of your dog. I would never use something expired


I don't know abound the dog since I don't have one but some food I do it after it passes expiration date


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## BJJBlackbelt

The reality is that expiry dates are mostly just calculations that are made with a certain amount of time added or subtracted for a worst case scenario.

If it expires in 3 months at an average temp of 82 degrees and you store it at 72 degrees, it might last 4 months...It might last 4.5 months.

You're nose is your best friend. Bad food smells bad.


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## Ryan.Wilton

If it looks funny and smells funny... don't use it. That's my solution.


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## smcx

The other problem with expiry dates is it usually means that an unopened container lasts that long. Expiry after opening may be significantly shorter (days to weeks after opening). Many labels do not give instruction for how long a product will last after being opened.

For example, an unopened can of soup might last in the cupboard for years. Open it and leave it on the counter or in your fridge and it'll be bad in hours to days.

(also agree that rancid fats are a big problem in our diets - commonly from cooking oils)

Sean.


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## Fishfur

I remember, just after my Mom had to go into a nursing home, and we were clearing out her townhouse, we found at least 4 different bottles of cooking oils, all in the cupboard and all rancid as can be. She just wasn't able to smell or taste it, and wasn't able to read the dates on the bottles either, as her sight was not so good and she never thought to check with a magnifying glass. I was just horrified to think how long she'd been eating that stuff without knowing it had turned. 
I agree, if it smells off, toss it. One reason I advise keeping opened foods in small portions in the freezer is exactly what smcx mentioned, that once opened, stuff can go off much sooner than the date on the package might suggest. Packed air tight and frozen, things will last much longer.


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## solarz

I just ate some chocolate cookies that expired in July... 2010. I'm still alive and not in a hospital yet, so I'm not too worried about fish foods expiring.  Unless moisture gets into your bag and the thing start getting moldy. Then you should toss them.

I've read claims that nutrients will "degrade" over time. I'm not too convinced about that either. It sounds like a claim that sounds logical, but has never been actually tested. Like I said, cookies, expired 3 years ago, yum yum...


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## Ron Jung

I agree that you shouldn't feed with food that is like way past the expiry date or eat food that is way past the date but they have to put a use by date for lawsuit reasons. Most food can go way past the expiry date that is like canned or dry obviously not fresh meat and you can tell by smell. Just used your own judgment. If you have really expensive fish I would think twice. If you are feeding like guppies or really inexpensive fish then you might want to take a little more of a chance. Again don't feed anthing that is like 1-2 years past expiry date. That being said please read in the for sales section as I don't want hijack this thread and post for sales here but I have extra fish food and that is all I will say.

Ron.


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## SmokeSR

So I came across a situation on the weekend that made me think of this post. What about food without an expiry date? I have some freeze dried plankton that was purchased years (5+) ago that stayed sealed till 2 years ago. It has no expiry date and to me, it smells bad but my friend says it smells good. I've been feeding it to my turtles to try to get rid of it and 2 of them eat it but the picky eater won't touch it. 

Any idea on food without expiry date?


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## solarz

SmokeSR said:


> So I came across a situation on the weekend that made me think of this post. What about food without an expiry date? I have some freeze dried plankton that was purchased years (5+) ago that stayed sealed till 2 years ago. It has no expiry date and to me, it smells bad but my friend says it smells good. I've been feeding it to my turtles to try to get rid of it and 2 of them eat it but the picky eater won't touch it.
> 
> Any idea on food without expiry date?


Well, I think we put too much faith in the judgement of the manufacturer. Where do you think their expiry dates come from?

I think Ron Jung said it best. Use your own judgement. If it's frozen solid, then chances are it's still good.


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## SmokeSR

It's not frozen food. It's dry food:

Exactly this type:


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## solarz

SmokeSR said:


> It's not frozen food. It's dry food:
> 
> Exactly this type:


If it's still dry, then it's still good. If it has been contaminated with moisture and/or you see signs of mold, then toss it out.


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## Fishfur

I have to wonder why anybody would even consider eating cookies that old ? But the fact they didn't make you sick is not all that surprising. I am surprised you thought they tasted good. Didn't they taste stale ? Most modern packaged foods are made with large amounts of chemical preservatives, to give them highly prolonged shelf lives to begin with. I would not have eaten them, but, your choice, your body, right ? . 

Just because something is stale doesn't mean it's no longer edible. Most of us find stale food a lot less appealing than the fresh product, but you can still eat it. It just won't have all the nutrients it started with. Age in storage always means a loss of at least some nutrients, the most common being some of the vitamins. This includes the amount of time the flour was stored after grinding, before it was used to bake something. Water soluble vitamins, like C and the Bs can go quickly, along with water loss from foods. And I've run across more than one person who is simply not able to tell, either by taste or smell, that flour has gone rancid in storage. The rancid flour was still being used for baking. I honestly wonder how often that happens. It's really bad for most organisms to consume rancid fats, unless the creature evolved to be a scavenger, like a vulture.

But there has been quite a lot of testing done over the years, from complete nutrient analysis of most foods along with what happens to various nutrients after the food is harvested. What happens to each nutrient depends on what kind of food item it is and what happens to it after harvest. Was it fruit, grain or veggie, to start with ? Was it eaten immediately or almost so, or stored in some way ? Was it raw or cooked before eating ? Was it processed after harvest, perhaps frozen or canned, or shipped somewhere to be sold 'fresh' once it arrived at its destination, which might have been hours, days or weeks after harvest ? There is plenty of information on this kind of thing.

There's no question that there are nutrient losses that occur, starting almost immediately after harvest. Particularly, the levels of some vitamins and a few minerals begin to decrease from the moment the item is picked until it is consumed or processed. In some instances, the losses can be pretty dramatic. Consider the difference between fresh picked sweet corn and sweet corn that's a day or two old. There's no comparison, because in that short time, most of the sugars have already converted to starch, which is far less sweet and tender. Even the latest variations that are supposed to be as good a day or two later, really aren't.

One example; fresh picked green beans lose over half of their, iirc, it's Vitamin C, one week after picking. Beans picked from your garden at the right time and eaten quickly have not only the absolute peak nutrient content, but the best flavour and texture. 

'Fresh' beans from the store, having been shipped from California, Mexico or even farther south, will lose a lot of their flavour, some texture and quite a lot of vitamins by the time you get to eat them. In winter especially, frozen veggies are a better bet for nutrition because they will have far more of the most fragile nutrients than fresh ones at the grocery store do. Most are frozen within hours of harvest. That's why I advise freezing larger quantities of fish foods, especially here, where there are as yet no labeling requirements for fish foods. They will not only last longer but retain their values better than if stored at room temperatures for months.

Some produce does store quite well, and will last longer, but they all still lose some of their values over the storage season. Squashes, apples, roots and tubers, for the most part store well and retain most of their food value. But they still lose a percentage of their nutrients over time even in optimal storage conditions, and by the end of the storage season, apples are often mushy and tasteless, potatoes and onions are sprouting, while squashes are withering. Loss of water means loss of all the water soluble vitamins, etc., along with it. We have a pretty skewed idea of how long things should last because food is shipped year round from all over the world. If we had to live with our seasons for food, it would be vastly different.

How food is processed also affects nutrition. Cooking with heat destroys some vitamins. Boiling leaches water soluble nutrients into the cooking water. The standard advice used to say, always save the cooking water from veggies to use for soup, so you can recoup those nutrients. Some fats have very short lives once rendered, like flax oil. 

Bottom line is, nothing lasts forever in storage and the longer an item is stored, the less it has to offer in terms of vitamins and other nutrients. The food that lasts longest in storage while maintaining a majority of its nutritional value is whole seed. If properly stored and kept pest free, seed can last for many years. But once a seed has been broken or ground, whether it's a shelled nut or a grain flour, storage lifespan is dramatically shortened and nutrient loss is greatly accelerated from what it would have been when the items were still whole. Modern white wheat flour is not an outstanding nutritional bet, no matter what is made from it.. and I find it quite disturbing how much of the total world wide calorie consumption is represented by wheat alone.. about 20% of the world's daily total comes from hybrid wheat. And humans did not really evolve to eat grain, but that's a whole other topic.

Even frozen foods lose quality in every way, the longer they are frozen. Vacuum packing is the longest lasting type for freezing or dry storage for most items, but simple plastic wrap or bags are not so good. Usually you get freezer burn, which leads to unpleasant tastes and textures. I once ran across a frozen chicken, long lost in the bottom of my freezer. It was at least 8 years old, but the vac pac had held up so it was not burnt. I cooked it, because I was curious to see what it would be like. It was totally tasteless, soft & squishy, nothing like fresh chicken, but it had not gone 'bad' either. I tossed it. 

Canned goods not only have a lifespan, they can become dangerously toxic if the seal deteriorates. Taste, texture and nutrients all decline with time. I've had several cans over the years that got pushed to the back of the cupboard, where I lost track of them, which eventually swelled up enormously and leaked. Fortunately they didn't explode. 

Eating from a can like that could be fatal. Any can or jar that shows the least sign of swelling or leakage, including things like jelly or jam, should be thrown out because of the risk of botulism, which has no taste or smell we can detect.

Even under the most optimal storage conditions, foods cannot maintain all their nutrient values over time. But there are exceptions to everything. There have been a few incidences of stored seeds being found that sprouted and grew even after the passage of hundreds and hundreds of years, I think one might have been more than a thousand, iirc. They were whole seeds deliberately and very carefully stored, and as the centuries passed they had a lot of luck in terms of their environment.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and if you want to eat old, stale cookies, I'm not going to try and stop you. But I prefer my food fresh and as minimally processed as possible. I make the best efforts I can to give my animals the same.


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## ppaskova

WOW. A lot of interesting conversation regarding the topic I started a month ago I just spoke with my friend who has been in fish keeping business for over 20 years and runs one of the BA stores Nad he told me that as long as the food is opened before the expiration date it still good for 2 years from the time it has been opened. He feeds the food to his fishes as well at his home tank and his fishes are very expensive ($30 the cheapest his cost )


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## solarz

Fishfur said:


> I have to wonder why anybody would even consider eating cookies that old ? But the fact they didn't make you sick is not all that surprising. I am surprised you thought they tasted good. Didn't they taste stale ? Most modern packaged foods are made with large amounts of chemical preservatives, to give them highly prolonged shelf lives to begin with. I would not have eaten them, but, your choice, your body, right ? .


No, they weren't stale at all. They were quite tasty in fact.

There's a big difference between fresh food and dry food. You can't say just because fresh food loses nutrients and goes bad over time, that dry food is subject to the same process. Cookies and dry fish flakes are not the same thing as apples and potatoes

http://www.brewplus.com/preserving/freeze-dried-food-super-long-shelf-life/

"Freeze dried foods have a shelf life that ranges between two years and 25 years, depending on the particular type of food and the humidity in a given location. The wide variety of shelf life stems from the type of foods available and the changes in climate conditions that might alter the ability to maintain the maximum shelf life.
Foods like fruits and vegetables are notable as having the shortest shelf life of freeze dried foods because it only lasts about two years before going bad. In areas with a high humidity rate, the fruits and vegetables might last a little less than two years as the direct result of water content.
*Grains are among the foods with the highest shelf life because freeze dried grains, rice and similar foods can last up to 25 years or more in the right storage conditions.*"


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## Fishfur

Freeze drying is unquestionably very effective. I didn't mention it in my earlier posts because it's not a process that the home consumer has access to. I was trying to address storage methods available at the home level.

I only mentioned fresh foods to illustrate that nutrient losses certainly do occur after food is harvested. In some cases, within hours of harvest, significant changes can occur, and everything that's made to be eaten, whether boxed, bagged, baked or frozen, is made from something that began as freshly harvested food.

Time does affect the quality of foodstuffs, especially fats. Rancid fats are dangerous to eat and many of the preservatives used are to prevent fats from oxidizing. I truly have met people who cannot tell the difference between rancid and fresh fats. I have been offered rancid butter, rancid salad oil, even rancid baked goods, among other things. Didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings, but no way was I eating those things.

Of course there's a big difference between fresh and dry foods in terms of shelf life. You can get UHT milk, which lasts for a whale of a lot longer than the fresh stuff does. The high temperature treatment makes it taste quite off to me so I don't care for it myself.

Even basic dry pasta, without eggs in it, does not last forever - I made the mistake of storing some in a bin over the fridge. It's hot up there, and the packages on the bottom were there for too long and were inedible when I got around to them. Smelled bitter, tasted terrible. If they'd been in a cool cupboard, away from heat, they'd have been fine, even long past their dates, I am sure.

If you read the labels, there are a lot of preservatives in most packaged dry foods that prolong their shelf life far beyond what it would be without the chemical additives. I'd prefer not to eat those chemicals, and I'd rather not feed them to my pets, if it can be avoided. But as for what's actually in our food, our labels leave much to be desired for those who really want to know what is in the package besides the actual food, whether it is for you, me, a dog, a cat or a fish.

"[/QUOTE] *Grains are among the foods with the highest shelf life because freeze dried grains, rice and similar foods can last up to 25 years or more in the right storage conditions.*"[/QUOTE]

Your last sentence confirms one point I was trying to get across, which was that the conditions in which you store perishable items are critical to produce the desired result. I wasn't thinking about trying to store freeze dried grain for a quarter century, but that would certainly be the way to do it. High quality vacuum packing also vastly prolongs storage life, so long as the seal remains intact, and cold temperatures are very useful too.

But this thread originally was about the lifespan and storage of fish foods, after the expiry date or after they were opened. Maybe it got a little off that track. But you can't compare storing an open jar of expired fish flakes with storing freeze dried whole grain.

We all have at least some choice as to the products we consume or use, and Kraft wouldn't have their 40+ billion dollar annual profit if millions of people were not chowing down on their snack foods. I don't eat snack foods, in part because I have extensive food allergies, but also because there's no real nutrition in those bags, but that's just me. Clearly, millions disagree .

But no matter what is inside it, once a package of food is open, it's subject to oxygen, heat & humidity, all of which can cause deterioration of quality and potential losses of some nutrients. So I think it makes sense to store it air tight and freeze if possible, to maintain the best possible quality.

Everybody makes their own choices about this kind of thing, and there are always going to be conflicting opinions.

I have my opinion, but that is all it is. I feed my pets the best I can afford to feed them, and I store all my pet food in a way that I have reason to believe will maintain it in the best possible condition before I feed it.


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