Microfood culture: phytoplanktons, Rotifers, ciliates, Artemia, and copepods

[djkms]

Starting to culture

Starting to culture

Hello all I am now starting to culture live foods. So far I have been in it about 2 weeks and have 2 bottles of Nanno going good and ready to split again. Once I get my Nanno cultures going good I will be moving on to roti's and tisbe pods. The place I will purchase the roti's and pods culture them together. Joey (the person who will send out the roti/pod starter culture) states that he feeds this nanno paste. He has been culturing the roti's/pods with this food for a long time now and says it is going real well and not crashing.

The problem is I am getting conflicting information. I made a post in the reef section and didnt get much attention so I am hoping to talk to the experts here.

According to this article here they recommend feeding nanno to the pods. Yet other places and people are saying that copepods dont feed off of nanno and iso is better. I am reading that iso is really hard to culture though. So who is right? The article or what others are saying on the forums. Also, how can Joey be so successful only feeding nanno? Is it possibly because the pods are actually eating the rotifers and not the algae? If this is the case is the copepods still as valuable nutritionally? If nanno is not the best option for tisbe copepods what is?

Another question in regards to algae. From my reading its not good to mix cultures since one algae will out-compete another. So why is it then that the big guys, Reed Mariculture for example ship out LIVE algae in a bottle with multiple types of algae? Wouldn't one algae become dominant in the bottle at some point? Or does this not happen because it is refrigerated and dormant?

Thanks for spending the time answering my questions, im sure I will have some more!

 

[billsreef]

Joey (the person who will send out the roti/pod starter culture) states that he feeds this nanno paste. He has been culturing the roti's/pods with this food for a long time now and says it is going real well and not crashing.

That's the product from Reed's. Brineshrimp Direct is a reseller. Both Reed and BSD are great places to do business with. Haven't dealt with Joey, so can't comment on him.

According to this article here they recommend feeding nanno to the pods. Yet other places and people are saying that copepods dont feed off of nanno and iso is better. I am reading that iso is really hard to culture though. So who is right? The article or what others are saying on the forums.

Part of the differences are different species of pods being cultured. Iso is harder to culture than nano, but it's still doable by the hobbyist. The big tricks to Iso are splitting cultures early and often and being on top of sanitation of your culture equipment...the sanitation is very important. Iso just isn't as forgiven of slacking off as nano is. If you only could culture one phyto, my recommendation would be Iso as it has an excellent nutritional profile. If you have space for culturing two strains, raising a mix of Nano and Iso seems to work very well for rot cultures...better than using a single strain.

Also, how can Joey be so successful only feeding nanno?

Nano can work well for rots.

Is it possibly because the pods are actually eating the rotifers and not the algae?

While I've known culturists to raise some species of pods on Iso, yes pods do also eat rots. The later is why most people culturing rots try and keep the pods out of the rot culture

If this is the case is the copepods still as valuable nutritionally?

Yes, so long as what the pods are eating has good nutrition

If nanno is not the best option for tisbe copepods what is?

Again, if only getting to choose one species of phyto, I'd go with Iso.

Another question in regards to algae. From my reading its not good to mix cultures since one algae will out-compete another. So why is it then that the big guys, Reed Mariculture for example ship out LIVE algae in a bottle with multiple types of algae? Wouldn't one algae become dominant in the bottle at some point? Or does this not happen because it is refrigerated and dormant?

Those mixed bottles are sold to be used directly as feed, not start new cultures. You'll generally feed off the bottle long before the species mix and alter much, if at all.

 

[djkms]

Bill,

Were you just born awesome or is that something you learned over the years?

Thanks for the clarification. I actually have room for multiple cultures and I do have a tetra disk sitting in my closet. FAF was out of ISO. So let me understand this, would you say to feed the copepod/roti culture ISO and feed the DT nanno? I guess my question is this, is nanno the best overall phyto to feed a reef and ISO is best overall to feed a copepod culture? I honestly dont care as much about the roti's as I do the pods, maybe I should? What about tetra? Will copepods readily consume tetra like ISO or will I have face the same issue as I would nanno? I only ask because of how difficult ISO can be to culture and I want to have a food source ready to go if the ISO crashes.

So if I culture multiple phyto's I can then split the culture and mix the split of multiple phyto's into the same bottle and place in the fridge with no issue?

Thanks Bill

 

[billsreef]

Might as well culture up that tetraselmis also, it's good stuff and is known to have some antibacterial properties when used in larval fish culture.

If your going to feed phyto to your DT, might as well do a mix there as well. In fact, most filter feeding critters in your tank are likely to prefer the larger phytos such as the Iso and Tet

If you want to store some in the fridge, yes you can mix it for that. Though I've never managed to produce enough to need to store it. Too many hungry mouths

 

[walleyebum]

should i use a heater for them? and what about water changes?

 

[billsreef]

Those phyto's will do fine at room temp, even basement temps With the pods and rots, I change water as I harvest...i.e water poured through my sieve goes into a waste bucket, and replaced with fresh aged SW into the culture container. Every couple of weeks I start a new culture and break down and clean the old culture container once the new culture is up to snuff.

 

[walleyebum]

should you harvest them everyday? or wait between harvests?

 

[billsreef]

Rots I do a 50% harvest every other day.

 

[Zooid]

I harvest rots twice a day. I've noticed they tend to reproduce faster when I use a heater to heat a water bath that the culture containers sit in.

 

[djkms]

Get off my lawn Zooid!!






wait, im on your lawn....


I know I know you want some iso

 

[Zooid]

lol
gimme some ISO!

 

[herring_fish]

I harvest a total of one quarter per day but a pint come out every three hours.

My rotifer tower is in the garage. It is comparatively well insulated but the temperature is something that I have not had to deal with because I haven't gone through a winter.

What is the best temp and what is a good safe range? Finally, what is a good range for optimal production?

 

[GreshamH]

Rots I do a 50% harvest every other day.

We do 30% to 50% daily to keep our population young and producing eggs At times we'll harvest more then that if a hatchery needs a few billion. Our systems recover very fast though given our approach to growing rotifers.

 

[GreshamH]

That's the product from Reed's. Brineshrimp Direct is a reseller. Both Reed and BSD are great places to do business with. Haven't dealt with Joey, so can't comment on him.

Sort of correct but incorrect at the same time. BSD mixes their own blend (both preservation and algal mix) so while it may be sourced from us, it really is not our product.


Part of the differences are different species of pods being cultured. Iso is harder to culture than nano, but it's still doable by the hobbyist. The big tricks to Iso are splitting cultures early and often and being on top of sanitation of your culture equipment...the sanitation is very important. Iso just isn't as forgiven of slacking off as nano is. If you only could culture one phyto, my recommendation would be Iso as it has an excellent nutritional profile. If you have space for culturing two strains, raising a mix of Nano and Iso seems to work very well for rot cultures...better than using a single strain.



Nano can work well for rots.

Ok whats's NANO Bill? I expect more from you my friend :lol:

While I've known culturists to raise some species of pods on Iso, yes pods do also eat rots. The later is why most people culturing rots try and keep the pods out of the rot culture

some pods eat rotifers,

Yes, so long as what the pods are eating has good nutrition



Again, if only getting to choose one species of phyto, I'd go with Iso.



Those mixed bottles are sold to be used directly as feed, not start new cultures. You'll generally feed off the bottle long before the species mix and alter much, if at all.

Many mixed bottles with nanno in them you can start the nanno. That stuff is nearly bullet proof.

 

[djkms]

Ok I did my 4th split today of Nanno. I decided to pull out the density measurer and its reading almost exactly at 2cm. I used a tall glass in the kitchen with pretty bright light. I wanted to be on the low end. According to the chart thats 61.4 million cells per ml. Is this good after 4 weeks or should I be higher?

I started out with a nanno disk from FAF. I premix salt into a 5 gallon bucket using 0 TDS RO/DI water with Reef crystals salt at 1.020. I add 1ml of micro algae grow on every split and do the splits every Friday. Lights are on 16 hours a day. No crashes so far however I think I need to turn down my bubble rate. On my last split it started foaming at the top and now I have "scum" in my recently split culture, hasn't crashed yet though. It seems the thicker the culture get the more I have to turn down the bubble rate so it doesn't "skim". I also just did my first split of Tetra, so far so good there.

The picture was taken 1 day after split

I have zooplankton cultures going in a couple 5 gallon buckets. I received 2 starters. One with Roti's and Tisbe's, the other with Roti's Tisbe's and Tigriopus pods. I don't think adding my phyto is working well, I need something more concentrated. I have been splitting a 16oz bottle of nanno between the buckets per day. This is however adding too much water. I ordered some algae paste from brine shrimp direct. Any thoughts or suggestions appreciated!

by the way, I am really enjoying this aspect of the hobby!

 

[philosophile]

So I'm culturing tisbe copepods in a 2 liter bottle. Its about two weeks since I've started, and I'm running into a problem. I've got copepod detritus building up on the bottom of the bottle. I did a water change, but in order not to lose the pods, I filtered them through a 53 micron screen, but that also caught all the detritus. So instead of giving them a pristine bottle of water, they got clean water and all of their poop.

Should I just siphon out the detritus, and whatever pods I get and maybe throw them all into my sump?

I know if I did that, I'd lose a lot of pods, since they seem to like to hang out at the bottom of the bottle, and since I just started the culture, I'm a bit afraid that I would lose too many pods doing this. Suggestions?

 

[billsreef]

For a 2L bottle culture, I'd probably just shut off the air for a bit to let stuff settle. Then carefully decant most of the culture into a new bottle. Should leave most of the detritus behind

 

[philosophile]

Okay, I'll give it a shot. Thanks!

 

[hvacman250]

Where is the best place to buy rigid airline tubing and micron sieves at?

 

[aquaph8]

I got my sieve off ebay, there were a few sizes available. Any aquaculture place should also see them. The rigid tubing, I found at Petco right by the airline hose.