copepods!!!:(

squishifishi

Hopelesly Addicted Member
I had decided to leave them alone...they eat algea, nice.
but no more! My tank looks like a massive cloud of gnats, on a HOT, HUMID summer day. It's just gross.
I'm talking 30 per square inch of glass gross.
The problem is that this is a 2.5 invert only reef, so how can I get rid of them? Are there any shrimp/crab/snails or other small inverts that will eat them?
I feed very little food so there are not much excess nutrients.
Thank you guys!!!
 
It's normal to have an explosion of pods in a new tank. The population will self regulate over time with the availability of food.
 
You could try adding live tropical mysids, they should decimate them, but then you'd be left with mysis crawling all over the place.

Otherwise it's hard to find an invertebrate species that will fit in your tank and still actively and effectively hunt them.
 
Leave them be. The population will level off once there are too many. Are you spot feeding your corals with something copepods can eat?
 
:( i hate being patient!!lol;)
I guess I'll just wait it out though.
so, even if there are no inverts to decimate the population, is there anything that will at leat snack on them???
thanks so much!
 
The population will self-regulate. The population explosion will cause a drop in available food which will thin out the "herd".
 
ok, well, it is FINALLY starting to drop. just a bit.
i still wish there were inverts to eat them though...*sigh*
 
i think i lied. it looked like less, but then I dimmed the lights and...yup. still swarming.
I switched the pump on my filter to get some stronger flow going today. do you think this might help? before the water was pretty still, which I would think to be ideal for breeding, but I'm not sure.
It also occured to me that I sometimes feed my spot feed starfish with some liquid foodand that probably isn't helping either. I'll stop that for a while.
are you SURE no inverts eat them?
thanks!
 
The thing is that there aren't that many inverts that are fast enough to catch them in a way that makes a noticeable dent in the population. Many fish would, but most inverts will snack on the occasional copepod they catch but not actively hunt them. If you haven't noticed cops can be quick ;)

As I said, you could try mysids.
 
can't get a link, but I've got a thread going called "pictures at last"(do a forum search) of the pico. I'm gonna pick up some more stuff for it and add more pics while i'm on break this week.
 
This really is not a big deal and as others have said, they will level out. This is not a hobby for the impatient, grasshopper.
 
i have the same size tank and problem...did you find a resolution? one unfortunate twist is that i DO feed my corals, so there will always be a food source for the pods.
 
Back
Top