Why can't I cultivate plankton?

[Seachelle]

Test the salinity. Bubbling air through water will quickly raise the salinity through evaporation.

To avoid this bubble the air through water before going to the algae culture.

How do you bubble the air through water?

 

[dolfanjack]

I had the same problem. I was contaminating my culture from rust from my metal lids. If you have any contact with your cultures and metal, try using another container.

 

[Spare time]

I'm not sure if they're bright enough. They were labeled as plant grow lights. The light bars are as close as I can to the jar.

You don't need a powerful light

 

[Spare time]

Mine used to crash until I started running the lights on during the day and off at night. I only rinse the pitcher to refill it with a bit of peroxide and that's it. The container was also rinsed a bit with peroxide at first. I use fritz f2 and do 2.5ml once a week (its a 5 gallon container)

 

[Spare time]

Is that spout metal? Maybe that is causing an issue? Not sure

 

[NatsRams]

Here is my set up. 3x1L plastic bottles along with airline tubing and under counter LED strip lights from Home Depot. The lights are on a timer and the air is on constantly. One bottle each for Tetrasamonas, Isochrysis, and Nanochloropsis. These are 24h old. They’ll mature in 3-4 days and I’ll put them in the fridge. Point is, nothing expensive is necessary.

 

[DaJMasta]

Some things that come to mind:

Maybe the salinity was different from the starter culture you had and killed it off (I did this accidentally with an isochrysis starter that was done at 1.015 salinity, it died in 12 hours and smelled bad doing so).

Increase the airflow - you shouldn't need to stir it, really (nannochloropsis does settle out somewhat, but not quickly), but higher aeration will stir it for you and generally increase gas exchange which can increase maximum density (not relevant for where your culture is at, but helpful eventually).

Make sure to rinse the vessel thoroughly after sterilizing it so there isn't residual sterilizer in it.

What's the volume of your vessel? I'm culturing my phyto at around 4-5mL of fertilizer per gallon, so depending on the volume, it may be on the low side.

And finally, nannochloropsis doesn't really have that tint unless it's really diluted (and even then, I don't remember it being so yellow), so whatever you've got may not still be nanno. It's also one that is a little on the fragile side in terms of culture contamination, so other strains of things can take over relatively easily if cross contaminated (probably not this case, but worth knowing).

You can try upping your photoperiod to increase growth rate - 24 hours isn't actually a problem, but something like 18-20h will give great growth with a still present resting period.

Also, if you started with a small quantity of starter culture (like 20mL), I wouldn't expect it to grow to full density in only a week, especially if the fertilizer dosing is a bit light. While I still think I'd expect darker color than what you've got, it will take a starter a while to get developed enough to give consistently high density. In terms of density, you probably can leave about 1/6 of the culture remaining and still get consistent replacement growth in a week's time (I run 24h lighting, fairly high airflow, leave about 1/6 of a gallon for the next culture, add 5mL of fertilizer each reset, and can harvest the 5/6 of a gallon every 6 days.)

 

[Dinkins Aquatic Gardens]

I would recommend high aeration, an 18-24 hour photoperiod, and making sure that you give the alcohol time to dry before adding water and innoculating. Smell the container, and if you can't smell the alcohol, you're probably OK. For larger volumes, it's best to sterilize the culture water as well, but that is generally skipped with smaller volume production. Still, it's possible your culture water is contaminated and you might want to look into sterilizing the culture water with bleach and then dechlorinating it before innoculating.

 

[TangerineSpeedo]

Totally unnecessary for phyto imo. If you are rich great but i literally put plastic tea bottles in the windowsill with a cheap air pump and it grows more phyto than I can find a place to put if I have more than 1 or 2 bottles active at a time. This is a shaded north facing window btw.

Lol. I get my Phyto from Holdfastaq, they aquaculture mussels and oysters from spawn. Their Phyto is top notch. My Phyto just sits on a "North facing" window sill, I shake it once a day and leave the tops on loose. If I am getting low and I know I won't be able to get over there in a bit I will just fill the bottles up with some tank water. I usually get TET and ISO from them. https://www.holdfastaq.com/store I have never had a culture go bad before I finish it. Their stuff is the Amazballs! I feed everyday and I know for a fact I have grown stuff from a planktonic stage in my temperate tanks!
I don't know where I am going with this, but I think my point is, if you have a good culture it is hard not to make it work.

 

[Dan_P]

How do you bubble the air through water?

You will need a container with an air tight lid, a water bottle with a screw cap could work. The idea is to partially fill the container with water and bubble air through it and then direct the air to your culture. That is accomplished by drilling two holes in the bottle cap, one for the air to enter the bottle and go under the water and the second is to let the humidified air out. The easiest approach is to use rigid plastic tubing, I think it’s 3/16 in OD, to bubble the water and a shorter second piece to connect flexible air line to the algae culture. The holes in the cap should be slightly smaller than the rigid tubing for an airtight fit.

It might be possible to use flexible tubing and skip the rigid tubing. You still need to drill two holes slightly narrower than the tubing diameter. The tubing from the pump is pushed through the cap until it reaches the bottom of the bottle. The tubing from the culture is pushed through about an inch.

 

[Seachelle]

Thanks to all

for the very informative, detailed responses! It is much appreciated!

I went away on vacation, and decided to add 2 ml more of F2 and turn up the air before I left. When I came back, things were noticeably greener! I'm just gping to let it ride ( adding more F2 than I have been) and see if I can get it to turn dark green.

 

[rainsong]

In the beginning I was having problems with contaminating the phyto from not cleaning what’s nice about these systems is you just throw the bag away and put another bag in there not much cleaning to do and everything is sterile for the next culture weekly. Also the system comes with filters that go on the airlines to help prevent contamination. I have 2 phyto and 2 pod tanks I harvest every tank 1x a week. The amount of pods is insane. I have found if I kept phyto growing longer then 10 days or so the likely hood of crash is higher. This is why I harvest every 7 days seem to be sweet spot. From each phyto tank I use about 2,000ml of tank for new pod culture then 250ml to start the new phyto culture with 2mlpart a fretalizer and 2ml part b fertilizer and then the rest about 500ml into my doser Reservoir to dose my system about 100 mL a day. Then to keep costs down I buy the replacement bags from Amazon and I cut my own air lines to replace from bulk water line tube from Home Depot. I do buy and use there fertilizer.

Hi:

Would you care to share links to your sources of replacement bags and bulk water line tubes?

Thanks!