need some advice on cheato setup

[mikebeasley]

I got some cheato from someone in my area and I have it in a 5 gallon tank with a hob filter and a regular florescent light. I'm thinking about swapping the bulb for something in the 6500k range and adding a powerhead but the only one I have for it is a maxijet 1200.Seems a little too strong for that tiny refuge but I'll try it tonight and see.I don't have any sand or LR in the tank. I'm wondering what I should do to help it grow nice and fast. Is it best to let it rotate and if so what's a good way to make it rotate? I was pondering some kind of setup like a string or something that can keep it up high and spinning in the flow. Any advice? thanks

also I'm tossing in some phytofeast everyday but not sure if it will help it grow. I've heard that iron supplements can help. I'll try that soon. What about tossing in fish food once a day or brine shrimp?

 

[Limbo]

Just wanting to confirm, but are you keeping the cheato in a dedicated tank? It's not pumped into anything else? A single 5G closed system?

Are you planning on this being a permanent setup?

Basically, to grow it will need water, light and food. It should tolerate high or low flow, high or low lighting. For food you might want to look at adding pure nutrients such as KNO3 rather than food which will need to break down, go through the cycle and potentially promote undesirable algae. You could also look at "feeding" it by using change water from another tank as it's change water, rather than "new" water. Depends if you want to also support critters in there, pods etc.

 

[mikebeasley]

Yeah I am planning to keep it solo from the main 90g tank and just get pods from it to feed stuff in the display tank. I like having it seperate to make sure nothing goes sexual in my main tank. I have a golf ball size amount of cheato in there now and I can see tons of little pods running around. I want to see how fast I can get it to grow and hopefully be able to give away clumps of it to people in my area who need some.

 

[Limbo]

If you want to maximize your pod numbers then you will need to feed them. Regular flake, pellet, etc would be fine. You should maybe consider adding some form of bio filtration though, rock, bio balls etc., though maybe bacteria on the cheato itself might be enough. Also the amount you would need to feed would be so small I doubt you would actually need any additional filtration. What's in the HOB?

Have you thought about gravity feeding it into your display so you get a constant supply of pods going in?

Cheato doesn't "go sexual" so the risk of polluting your display is almost nothing. Not in the same way I think your thinking anyway.

 

[Limbo]

Have a look at Amphipod Heaven! (Cultivating Amphipods In a Dedicated System) 8/31/05

 

[mikebeasley]

thanks for the link. yeah I think eventually I'd like to have it flow into my display or sump then get a mandarin to feed on them. I just want to experiment and see if I can grow it well before that option is open. the filter is just a cannister filter that is old. I can see a filter inside and from the looks of it the pods would easily survive running through it.I'm just hoping to grow it right the first time so it flourishes well since It's hard to get ahold of cheato sometimes.