I've been having trouble getting my apocyclops culture to produce, and I suspect the reason is salinity.
I culture pods at 35ppt, since my display is at 35ppt. This is fine for rotifers, tisbe, and tig pods. But it doesn't appear apocyclops reproduces at any significant rate under full salinity. A brief lit search found recommended salinity range of 20 - 25 ppt for Apocyclops panamensis culture. One study I found that actually tested at 35 ppt had more than 90% reduction in population for 35 ppt vs 20 ppt.
So...why are we buying apocyclops pods again? As a feed alone I suppose they would be fine. They do survive at 35ppt. But that's expensive food and I doubt they are any better as a feed than other pods. If they do not reproduce at 35ppt, people are wasting money trying to "seed" a display tank at 35ppt with apocyclops. They won't establish a population, at least not in any significant numbers, in a typical reef display.
Is there something I missed here? A lot of vendors are selling these and I never knew they were a low salinity species. I doubt most of my fellow reefers know either.
I culture pods at 35ppt, since my display is at 35ppt. This is fine for rotifers, tisbe, and tig pods. But it doesn't appear apocyclops reproduces at any significant rate under full salinity. A brief lit search found recommended salinity range of 20 - 25 ppt for Apocyclops panamensis culture. One study I found that actually tested at 35 ppt had more than 90% reduction in population for 35 ppt vs 20 ppt.
So...why are we buying apocyclops pods again? As a feed alone I suppose they would be fine. They do survive at 35ppt. But that's expensive food and I doubt they are any better as a feed than other pods. If they do not reproduce at 35ppt, people are wasting money trying to "seed" a display tank at 35ppt with apocyclops. They won't establish a population, at least not in any significant numbers, in a typical reef display.
Is there something I missed here? A lot of vendors are selling these and I never knew they were a low salinity species. I doubt most of my fellow reefers know either.