Your water needs to go green before adding the starter culture of pods. You can add some live phyto and a little plant food to help establish the green culture water. If you start with live phyto only add about a 3" piece of banana skin then remove it once your water colours up. Your pods need plenty of food and warm old tank water to breed prolifically.I'm planning on doing this, and even found the exact same rectangular containers that the OP had... found them at Staples.
I have (2) bins like the OP has. I have (2) bottles of tigger pods on the way, which should be here tomorrow.
Can I simply add the banana peel and the pods to some used tank water and call it good? or does the banana peel need time to break down in the saltwater before adding the pods?
I also have some phyto feast (dead phyto) and some live phyto, when do I add phyto to the container?
Unless I'm told differently, I plan on adding a few drops of phyto feast, a few drops of live phyto, the banana peel, and the bottle of pods to the container of my used tank water... I will do this to both containers and try to maintain two cultures in case one crashes.
I guess I'm not clear if the culture needs time to "marinate" before adding the pods, or if it can all be added on day 1 ?