Live Food Discussion Thread

[leahfiish]

I just started my first one, hope I did it right.

 

[WesleyC]

The color doesn't look right. What you have in there?

 

[leahfiish]

Just phyto(ocean magic), saltwater and fertilizer. Do I need more phyto?

 

[WesleyC]

Not necessary. Even one drop of phyto can be multiply to a full bottle. The color just seems off. Maybe because of your background color.

You just need strong light on it now.

 

[leahfiish]

Not necessary. Even one drop of phyto can be multiply to a full bottle. The color just seems off. Maybe because of your background color.

You just need strong light on it now.

It has 2 4' 6700k T5HO's on it so it should be okay. I do still have some phyto left over so I might experiment with different fertilizer amounts for another bottle.

 

[WesleyC]

If your fertilizer is the Florida-aqua-farm Micro Algae Grow F/2, you just need 10-15 drops for that 2L bottle.

You can also start a new bottle of salt water at 1.016 (instead of 1.018) and just put a dash of the phyto in there. You'll be amaze of what a simulated "contamination" can do to a bottle of clear water.

 

[leahfiish]

If your fertilizer is the Florida-aqua-farm Micro Algae Grow F/2, you just need 10-15 drops for that 2L bottle.

You can also start a new bottle of salt water at 1.016 (instead of 1.018) and just put a dash of the phyto in there. You'll be amaze of what a simulated "contamination" can do to a bottle of clear water.

I was originally going to use that but ended up getting something by Fritz which is supposed to replicate it with 2 bottles (a and b), I followed the recommended dosing on the bottle. Also I used 1.025 saltwater because that's what Ocean Magik is at. Should I make another bottle at a different sg?

 

[WesleyC]

I think they put the phyto to 1.025 for the consumer to just dose it into the tank. The problem is, if you culture it like that, by the time your bottle is ready in a week, quite a bit of water will be evaporated, and the salinity will be even higher. That's why I like to start it at 1.018 or lower.

Since the iso and tet are motile organism, I'm afraid it may have salinity shock. I've never tried to change that much salinity for the culture before. You'll have to try it out.

 

[leahfiish]

I think they put the phyto to 1.025 for the consumer to just dose it into the tank. The problem is, if you culture it like that, by the time your bottle is ready in a week, quite a bit of water will be evaporated, and the salinity will be even higher. That's why I like to start it at 1.018 or lower.

Since the iso and tet are motile organism, I'm afraid it may have salinity shock. I've never tried to change that much salinity for the culture before. You'll have to try it out.

I'll make a few bottles tomorrow with different salinities to try it out. Thanks for your help.

 

[WesleyC]

Good luck!

 

[leahfiish]

@Flippers4pups how are your pods doing?

 

[Flippers4pups]

Very good. Have harvested many times since starting.

 

[leahfiish]

What is your method for harvesting?

 

[WesleyC]

They reproduce every 10 days or so. You may not want to harvest it too often unless they are overcrowded. My first video earlier in page 1 shows the most dense I like to keep mine. I transport mine usually once every week or 2. I try not to feed them too much to slow down their growth rate.

This is on my display tank today.

Zoomed in:

 

[Philt56]

I've been feeding blackworms every day due to my fussy copperband. He occasionally pecks on the sand bed and live rock. Everything in the tank goes for them. Wrasses, clown, dartfish, pajamas.

 

[Larry L]

Thanks for creating this thread @leahfiish , good info!

Blackworms I feed every day and have been using them about fifty years but only 46 years in my reef.

"Only". LOL

It takes about 5 or 10 minutes a day to hatch the shrimp

@Paul B , what is your routine/setup for hatching brine shrimp?

I prefer smaller tank. Easier to get higher food density. Yet, big enough to have places for them to clang on and hide.

@WesleyC , what is your routine/setup for culturing the copepods? It look like you have a ton of them in there.

 

[Larry L]

Has anyone tried hatching decapsulated brine shrimp eggs right in the tank or sump?

 

[WesleyC]

Yes. I used to just throw in the decapsulated brine shrimp eggs on the live rocks in my mandarin tank

 

[WesleyC]

@WesleyC , what is your routine/setup for culturing the copepods? It look like you have a ton of them in there.

Yea, I used to breed fish by keeping cultures of various strains of phyto, rotifer, and pods. I have lot of experience with them. Even some lazy shortcut. Now that I don't "have" to do it, I find it quite fun to do it in a smaller scale.

To culture pods, without buying more products, you first need to keep a good culture of phyto. The easiest phyto to culture is nano. Iso is better for copepods, but they'll eat anything when they are hungry. All phyto work perfectly fine. Just use whatever you have. Once you have a constant supply of phyto, you can start culturing pods. It will require a much bigger post on the routine and setup though.

 

[WesleyC]

A quick and dirty setup for pod for home aquarium, in my opinion, is a small 6 gallon fish tank. Here is the reason. Pods prefer slow flow. So they are not going to like anything small or cylindrical while you have the air bubble pushing the entire container of water flowing. A rectangular fish tank allow them to have a quiet side to hang out, while you bubbling away on the other side.

On the bubbling side, put a bright light shining through the entire tank from the side. At the beginning, fill the tank with water and your phyto as much as you can afford from your phyto culture. As you can see in my first video in page 1, the water is green color. You do not have to fill up the tank. 1/2 tank or less will do. And that's it. That's the set up.

The bright light will keep the phyto reproduce a little bit before they are all eaten by the nauplius larvae. The bigger pods will eat anything. You have some 5 years old brine shrimp flakes? They love it. Left over mysis shrimp? They will eat them up.

After the initial setup, make sure you feed them at the same frequency with the same amount. The pod population will get denser and denser. Make sure you harvest it. Don't be lazy, or they'll die, and stink up your tank and could crash your culture. Periodically suck up the poop at the bottom of the tank as well. That's the water change while you sucking out the water with their pops and dead bodies.