Green Mandarin
- Thread starter jahel318
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SecretiveFish
Member
Simply, yes. We had to raise brine shrimp for our axolotl brood and did exactly that. The brine shrimp were actually growing too fast on phyto .... so the saltwater fish got to enjoy those!
SecretiveFish
Member
I have no doubt it would. Phyto is a very nutritious meal, especially nannocloropsis oculata which is fairly easy to culture and seems to be the most nutritious of the commonly cultured phyto. I can't prove it though... I think it is akin to gut loading insects before they are fed to pet reptiles.
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
you don't want to keep the brine shrimp around for long. they have very low nutritional value.
they're best fed within 48 hours of hatching while they still have their yolk sac attached. even better if you can get them within 24 hours of hatching.
once their yolk sac is depleted, they lose much of their nourishing potential and aren't a good food. even if they're gut loaded.
i keep my baby brine nauplii in two cultures, rotating about every 24 - 48 hours, so i always have some around. i drop 1 - 2 tsp in to my feeder every day in the morning before i leave for work.
as far as the pods, culture them separately. they take much longer to grow, and many of them do better at higher salinity than brine shrimp. typically i do not see significant populations of pods in my culture for at least the first 10 - 12 days. i am typically refilling their phyto supply in the culture vessel about once a week, and harvesting them to be placed in to the tank about once every 3 - 4 weeks.
i seem to get the best hatch yield on my brine right around 2.5% salinity.
also brine pollute the water immensely, with pods you want clean water with phyto and pods. although i have heard of people culturing pods and rotifers together, i would not culture brine and pods together.
you can also try supplementing your mandy's diet with live black worms and nutramar ova. mine goes ham for both of those. the black worms don't live long in salt water, we're talking minutes if that, but they usually don't tend to last that long anyways.
they're best fed within 48 hours of hatching while they still have their yolk sac attached. even better if you can get them within 24 hours of hatching.
once their yolk sac is depleted, they lose much of their nourishing potential and aren't a good food. even if they're gut loaded.
i keep my baby brine nauplii in two cultures, rotating about every 24 - 48 hours, so i always have some around. i drop 1 - 2 tsp in to my feeder every day in the morning before i leave for work.
as far as the pods, culture them separately. they take much longer to grow, and many of them do better at higher salinity than brine shrimp. typically i do not see significant populations of pods in my culture for at least the first 10 - 12 days. i am typically refilling their phyto supply in the culture vessel about once a week, and harvesting them to be placed in to the tank about once every 3 - 4 weeks.
i seem to get the best hatch yield on my brine right around 2.5% salinity.
also brine pollute the water immensely, with pods you want clean water with phyto and pods. although i have heard of people culturing pods and rotifers together, i would not culture brine and pods together.
you can also try supplementing your mandy's diet with live black worms and nutramar ova. mine goes ham for both of those. the black worms don't live long in salt water, we're talking minutes if that, but they usually don't tend to last that long anyways.
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
also, i am not using a tank for my culture vessels.
for the brine shrimp, i take empty 20oz soda bottles, wash them out real good, then cut the top off one and cut the bottom off another. then invert the one with the bottom removed in to the one with the top removed, and push it down inside.
for my phyto i use empty 2 liter soda bottles.
for my pods i use those big jugs that you can get pretzels or cheese doodles in from costco. they hold about 2 gallons.
for the brine shrimp, i take empty 20oz soda bottles, wash them out real good, then cut the top off one and cut the bottom off another. then invert the one with the bottom removed in to the one with the top removed, and push it down inside.
for my phyto i use empty 2 liter soda bottles.
for my pods i use those big jugs that you can get pretzels or cheese doodles in from costco. they hold about 2 gallons.
The costco jugs are a great idea..thanx! How often do you do a water change for the pods? do you have any live sand or chaeto in the jug for the pods? How much light do they need daily?
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
i don't have anything in there for them aside from a lot of phyto to feed them, and the rigid airline tube to give the water some movement.
usually i take out about a liter of water a week and replace it with green water. as they eat the phyto, the water will turn clear. those count as my water changes. unless you notice a funny smell or bubble build up on the surface indicating ammonia.
if i have more greenwater than i expected, some times i will change larger amounts, but generally i change enough and often enough to make sure the water stays fairly green.
the only light they get is ambient from the window and the cast off from the LED unit hanging over my small freshwater planted tank in the same room.
melev's reef has a good article on phyto culturing:
http://www.melevsreef.com/phytoplankton.html
some good pod culturing resources:
http://www.algagen.com/prod/?p=117
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/2/breeder
you can certainly use a tank, or home depot bucket, or pretty much anything else that holds water for your culture vessel. i found the pretzel jugs easy to get because myself and several of my coworkers keep them on our desk for snacks, so there are always plenty of empties laying around. also, they're clear. so it makes it easier to see when you need to add more phyto, or how they're reproducing.
usually i take out about a liter of water a week and replace it with green water. as they eat the phyto, the water will turn clear. those count as my water changes. unless you notice a funny smell or bubble build up on the surface indicating ammonia.
if i have more greenwater than i expected, some times i will change larger amounts, but generally i change enough and often enough to make sure the water stays fairly green.
the only light they get is ambient from the window and the cast off from the LED unit hanging over my small freshwater planted tank in the same room.
melev's reef has a good article on phyto culturing:
http://www.melevsreef.com/phytoplankton.html
some good pod culturing resources:
http://www.algagen.com/prod/?p=117
http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2003/2/breeder
you can certainly use a tank, or home depot bucket, or pretty much anything else that holds water for your culture vessel. i found the pretzel jugs easy to get because myself and several of my coworkers keep them on our desk for snacks, so there are always plenty of empties laying around. also, they're clear. so it makes it easier to see when you need to add more phyto, or how they're reproducing.
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
Yeah. As long as phyto feast contains live culture you should absolutely be able to use it.
MarineSniper
Member
To save money, you can buy a jar of spirulina powder at most any vitamin store. You don't have to culture any phyto and it grows my newly hatched brine shrimp to breeding size in under a month. I've hatched one batch of baby brine and it has been self sustaining now for 10 months. I'm about to begin mysid propagation and those require baby brine as a food source.
I also culture pods and, while their propagation is almost identical to brine...easier, actually; you cannot grow them out together. The brine grow much faster and would dominate the food consumption. Once you've grown brine, you'll have a decent base of knowledge for most of the others in this food category
I also culture pods and, while their propagation is almost identical to brine...easier, actually; you cannot grow them out together. The brine grow much faster and would dominate the food consumption. Once you've grown brine, you'll have a decent base of knowledge for most of the others in this food category
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
Treating him for what?
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
You might want to try posting in the disease forum for a more definitive diagnosis. Good luck.
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
Do you have live rock in the QT? Does it say how many pods are in each bottle?
12oz aren't a lot. Mandy's will destroy pods like you wouldnt believe. Mine registers a strike about once every 2 - 4 seconds when I observe her. So multiply that by all day. Obviously not a 100% success rate I'm sure, but it is still substantial.
I would dump both the bottles in QT.
Are the baby brine in a feeder or just floating in the water column? Most Mandy's are very benthic and will only rarely strike at things in the water column, much preferring yo peck at the rocks and substrate.
12oz aren't a lot. Mandy's will destroy pods like you wouldnt believe. Mine registers a strike about once every 2 - 4 seconds when I observe her. So multiply that by all day. Obviously not a 100% success rate I'm sure, but it is still substantial.
I would dump both the bottles in QT.
Are the baby brine in a feeder or just floating in the water column? Most Mandy's are very benthic and will only rarely strike at things in the water column, much preferring yo peck at the rocks and substrate.
