Do you need to buy phytoplankton for copepods?

[CyberGuy]

Instead of buying the phytoplankton, I can use the money to buy more copepods. So do I need to buy phyto for the pods? Can the pods just eat the food that I feed my fish and survive and reproduce?

 

[rapid]

small ones as for babies will need the phyto to survive if you want to establish a tank with pods faster.

They will eat all debrits in your sump algae, left over fish food, other pods, macro algae.

 

[rapid]

If you want the population to grow at a rapid rate phyto can be used to increase the population but they will eat whatever they can.

 

[CyberGuy]

When I scrape the glass I see a light green film comes off the glass. Could that feed the copepods, even the baby ones?

 

[rapid]

buy some more pods and eventually purchase some phyto too and dose like 30 ml into sump every now and then.

 

[rapid]

When I scrape the glass I see a light green film comes off the glass. Could that feed the copepods, even the baby ones?

they will eat it all lol

They wil eat whatever I only give phyto when i have extra cash to spend lol

 

[rapid]

also phyto is also super easy to breed\grow. Using a starter batch you can have a endless supply of phyto which will insure pods survival and population rate increase

 

[living_tribunal]

I wouldn't say it's 100% necessary to just have a small pod pop but to ensure the pod pop stays up and grows I think phyto is kind of necessary.

Phyto has a wide array of benefits aside from fortifying your pod pop. I consider it a must for my tank and culture pods & phyto externally.