More fauna diversity

[skyshrimp]

Question is, what is the best way to achieve this. Such as mini brittle stars, bristleworms, amphipods, mini starfish, etc. ive recently switched from skimmer to ats bout 2 months ago and have seen a slight increase but only in pods. If anyone has any ideas please help.

 

[Amphiprion]

The first thing would be to introduce some (more) of them. Getting a bit of sand from some established systems, grabbing the occasional critters at the LFS, etc. go a long way. Maybe even consider swapping out a piece of rock, assuming the rock doesn't pose a risk as far as die-off is concerned. The second is food. Increase your feedings and vary the types of food you feed. The best results I had were when I fed everything from things like formula 1, pellets, phytoplankton, oyster eggs, cyclops, etc. I was feeding about 3-5 times per day and very heavily.

 

[skyshrimp]

I do well on the feeding different things, its just feeding heavily I get cold feet on. I gues ill have to kick it up a notch then.

 

[skyshrimp]

Based on the livestock in my signature will any of them predate on my fauna that I may already have.

 

[Amphiprion]

Based on the livestock in my signature will any of them predate on my fauna that I may already have.

All will to some degree or another. The worst of the bunch would be the "bullet" goby (if I am correct in assuming Amblygobius phalaena), which mostly survives by devouring any edible goodies in the sand bed and surroundings. The crabs and shrimps will be the next biggest offenders.

 

[rhdoug]

Check out Indo Pacific Sea Farms: http://www.ipsf.com/index.html

A bit pricey but you will get a lot of critters.

 

[skyshrimp]

Okay I figured the bullet goby may be a culprit so what if I remove him..thats if I can ever catch him. Would that have any significant effect on the fauna?

 

[LouH]

I have a 30 gallon tank with a snowflake eel in it as well as a damsel. There are also several sinularia and leathers in the tank. I recently went from a 75W MH to a 150W. The increase in light combined with a heavy feeding of silversides twice weekly has resulted in a massive briopsis bloom. When I pulled it out by the handfulls yesterday, it was full of small starfish and brittle stars. I don't think that is the route that you want to go. .

 

[Agu]

A friend of mine had ministars and I had none so I asked him for a few. He told me to come over in a couple of days. In the meantime he put a filter pad in his sump so water had to flow through it. When I showed up he had a fiter pad full of pods, minstars and worms that he put in a ziplock. ( a chunk of chaeto will also do the same thing.)

All I had to do was take it home and shake/pick the critters off the pad.

Another trick is to rubberband a piece of fish,shrimp, etc to a piece of rubble and drop it in the tank after lights out. Leave it in for an hour or so and you'll be surprised what comes out of the rockwork for a free meal. It also helps the population grow by feeding them when they're most active.