Culturing copepods

Allmost

Allmost

New member
Hello all :)
so I have been thinking of starting live food cultures, mostly for my seahorses, and their fry.

so started with Brine shrimp and I cant keep up :P haha not enough room in my condo and not enough patience for me lol

so was thinking of copepods, so read some articles, and they all say, 10G tank, air pump, tank filled with phyto half way up, culture of copepods added and phyto added as the water greenish tan fades, and within months I should have alot of pods. yet many ppl argue that this method is EXPENSIVE ! I ask how ? and they cant answer !

so the costs that I can think of is the need of ALOT of phyto ! I can get DTs and I can also use the same DT stuff to start my own phyto culture? no ?

anything else I should watch out for ?

and best point is that I dont have to gut load the pods, and if not eaten they dont do anything bad to my reef tank :)

any suggestions/opinions are welcome
 
chimmike said:
culture phyto to feed yer pods!
Click to expand...

so why do ppl say its more expensive than culturing and growing out brine shrimp then gut loading them and ... ?

you dont even have to change water for pods ... so I really do not see how this is complicated or expensive lol so I keep thinking there is something I am missing
hahah
 
I culture pods, so perhaps I can offer you some insight.

Yes, the expense comes from the phyto. You have 2 options on the phyto you want to add. You can either get a ready-made mix (such as DTs or Reef Nutrition) - this is the best option, since it is a mixture of several strains of phyto which are known to be nutritious - not just nanochloropsis (sp?) which is easy to culture, but not very nutritious. This is the best option, but gets expensive after a while.

The other option is to culture your own phyto. This is relatively cheap, since all you need is a starter culture and a light source. However, when you do this you almost always end up with a single strain of dominant phyto, usually nanochloropsis (not very nutritious). Even if you start with a multi-strain phyto such as DTs, you usually end up with one dominant strain. I believe the way they do it at the factories is they culture each strain individually and then mix them together in the bottles. If they cultured all together, one strain would overcome the rest.

Personally, I use Phyto-feast (available here in Toronto - I can PM you for the location if you want) - I find it more concentrated than DT's and lasts a bit longer. I have used DTs as well, and it is pretty good too, though.

HTH
 
The process is pretty cheap. Phyto-Feast is my choice for pod food. Seeding with tigger pods at $22'ish a bottle can get expensive but in the end $100'ish will get you rolling.
 
Gonna go with Tiger pods.

they dont even need phyto :D

will post back how it went

they are benthic and eat deetritus ! perfect

only Issue is that seahorse fry might not eat them, oh well, worth a shot
 
I heard that tigger pods eat the smaller pod varieties though. That could be bad for your tank?

hmm.

I wonder if we could culture our own various varieties of phyto to feed normal pods. I.e. if they could be separated.
 
chimmike said:
I heard that tigger pods eat the smaller pod varieties though. That could be bad for your tank?

hmm.

I wonder if we could culture our own various varieties of phyto to feed normal pods. I.e. if they could be separated.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure about that,

I have in the past added tiger pods to my Fuge to boost up the population and I see different types in there now. (I could very well be wrong, my eyes just dont see that good lol hahah I need a microscope soon)
 
Hopefully the tigger pods work for you. They are fairly easy to culture. I originally tried them for my culture (which is for a mandarin), and the mandarin wouldn't touch them. Tigger pods are always swimming around rather than living on substrate and tank walls. So they were not the best choice for a mandarin. For your seahorse tank....I'm not sure. Another option (carried by the store I told you about) is the Reef Pods. These are more truly benthic pods. Just something to consider.
 
chimmike said:
I wonder if we could culture our own various varieties of phyto to feed normal pods. I.e. if they could be separated.
Click to expand...

You can purchase single strain pure phyto cultures from places like Florida Aqua Farms, Aquatic Ecosystems, etc. That's how the pro's do it. No one is raising them mixed, they grow them separately and then mix them for retail sales to hobbyists ;)
 
I culture both phyto and pods. It's dirt cheap. I bought one bottle of Tigger pods, and one disc of tetraselmis culture from Florida Aqua Farms 3-4 months ago and I easily have 5-6 bottles worth of pods right now. $50 invested

I culture my pods in cheap Ziploc double size sandwich containers and it works great. The phyto I culture in 2 liter soda bottles. Since I started the first culture I haven't had to use the disc of starter culture since, I just keep splitting my culture.

My tank thread is here, it outlines my method a bit:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1835567

Don't use DT's for a culture...mine crashed. Get a single strain starter culture, so much more stable.
 
This is how i start my phyto. I get the smallest bottle of Dt's and let it slowly come up to room temprature, then pour portions of it in several containers and drip in some used tank water from water changes. Using this method I once grew a 140g tank full of it!
 
chimmike said:
I heard that tigger pods eat the smaller pod varieties though. That could be bad for your tank?

hmm.

I wonder if we could culture our own various varieties of phyto to feed normal pods. I.e. if they could be separated.
Click to expand...

That would be false. Mysids and amphipods however are very adept at hunting copepods.
 
jeremy K said:
Hopefully the tigger pods work for you. They are fairly easy to culture. I originally tried them for my culture (which is for a mandarin), and the mandarin wouldn't touch them. Tigger pods are always swimming around rather than living on substrate and tank walls. So they were not the best choice for a mandarin. For your seahorse tank....I'm not sure. Another option (carried by the store I told you about) is the Reef Pods. These are more truly benthic pods. Just something to consider.
Click to expand...

While that is partially true, it's also partially false. Tigripus californicus (Tigger-Pods) have both a benthic and a pelagic stage. The copepidites are benthic. I've personally seen plenty of Mandarins eat Tigripus californicus , in fact I think I can grab you some footage this weekend as I am house sitting where there is a pair of mandarins that love Tigripus californicus :) Hopefully I don't forget my camera :lol:
 
Allmost said:
Gonna go with Tiger pods.

they dont even need phyto :D

will post back how it went

they are benthic and eat deetritus ! perfect

only Issue is that seahorse fry might not eat them, oh well, worth a shot
Click to expand...

To get any real growth of a Tigripus californicus culture you will need a diatom. Otherwise you're culture numbers will be very low.
 
ok so spoke to many ppl from MOFIB and found out that the tiger pods reproduce much better if fed grinded pellet food ! since phyto is suspended in water and its harder for them to catch and eat it ! although at early stages of life tiger pods do swim around and can use phyto at that time, but I wont culture my own due to space limitations, might add Dts like once a week ... .

gonna start today, with a 10G filled half way up, some chunks of sponge, and a bottel of tiger pods and some grinded formula 2 pellets. next step is to find a way to see these *****s lol so I would knwo when they are reproducing lol, would magnefying glasses be fine ?
 
Allmost said:
ok so spoke to many ppl from MOFIB and found out that the tiger pods reproduce much better if fed grinded pellet food ! since phyto is suspended in water and its harder for them to catch and eat it ! although at early stages of life tiger pods do swim around and can use phyto at that time, but I wont culture my own due to space limitations, might add Dts like once a week ... .

gonna start today, with a 10G filled half way up, some chunks of sponge, and a bottel of tiger pods and some grinded formula 2 pellets. next step is to find a way to see these *****s lol so I would knwo when they are reproducing lol, would magnefying glasses be fine ?
Click to expand...

You can trust whom ever you like but you are not going to find that many people that have the experience I have with culturing them given I work for a company that produces more then anyone globally :) Phyto is very much needed *if* you want any real numbers. The copepidites pretty much require it. But don't take my word, do what I have done all my life and visit them in their natural environment. You'll find diatoms in every pool.

I went looking for your thread in the proper forum on MOFIB and could not find it... can you point it out to me please :) http://www.marinebreeder.org/phpbb/viewforum.php?f=144
 
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