Rotifers etc

[rsisvixen]

Hi

I was wondering if any Canadians on here could tell me where they get their rotifers and copepods from? Is there any place in Canada that sells and ships or will I have to order from the States?
I will be setting up a breeding system but want to get my live food sourced first.

Thank you

 

[ginpang]

Reef solution , Laval Quebec h7n1h8 L stand only.... Aquatica also has in pointe- Claire, Quebec ....I' ve seen Copepods in a bottle in Nature pet centres also in Montreal area. Back when I tried raising them though no one had around here... Ordered a kit and handbook from Florida . Don't remember on top of my head the name of the company , but should not be hard to find.

 

[rsisvixen]

I'm on the West Coast and other than tigger pods no one seems to have anything. Its rather frustrating to say the least.

 

[gogo7]

yeah living in canada has its drawbacks.
you can find tangerines and tisbes in big als. they get them in kitchener ontario every few weeks. i've asked them to see if they can get parvocalanus, but not holding my breath.
living aquarium in cambridge ontario has live rotifers, and three different types of live phyto. i think he ships if you're out of ontario.
if you're in ontario near kw, i've got tiggers, rotifers, and live phytos.
good luck and let us know if you find any interesting canadian sources.

 

[rsisvixen]

I'm in Vancouver so nowhere near close enough or I would take you up on your offer.

I've asked around at the local lfs but they don't do live foods other than the usual tigger pods, evidently not many people breed on the West Coast.
I only know of ReefAquatica, but shipping is really expensive.

I know that Reed and Algagen supposedly ship to canada, but not sure how well that will go through customs.

 

[gogo7]

i ordered the plankton kit from florida aqua farms.
http://florida-aqua-farms.com/shop/mini-culture-kit/
comes with phytos, roti cysts, 56 screen, a great plankton culture manual.
i've been using the same phyto for a couple years now. and the same rotifers as well. i still have half the vial.
hope this helps.

 

[ginpang]

i ordered the plankton kit from florida aqua farms.
http://florida-aqua-farms.com/shop/mini-culture-kit/
comes with phytos, roti cysts, 56 screen, a great plankton culture manual.
i've been using the same phyto for a couple years now. and the same rotifers as well. i still have half the vial.
hope this helps.

Now that I see the kit it's exactly that I had ordered 10 years ago.... Didn't get seized at Cbsa I' m guessing they don't consider Rotifera to be a bio-environmental threat since they grow everywhere.

 

[rsisvixen]

Thank you for the link, pity a person can't buy resting copepods.

A person would swear Canada was on another continent rather than across the border from the States.

 

[dartier]

Hi

I was wondering if any Canadians on here could tell me where they get their rotifers and copepods from? Is there any place in Canada that sells and ships or will I have to order from the States?
I will be setting up a breeding system but want to get my live food sourced first.

Thank you

There is a vendor in Toronto who ships (www.copepods.ca). He has all the usual suspects and, many more. He sells a blend, but I know he has some culturing separately.

50% Tisbe copepods
Acartia copepods
Parvocalanus copepods
Pseudodiaptomus coeppods
Tigriopus (Tiger)
Rotifers
Moina Salina
Nannochloropsis Phytoplankton
Tetraselmis Phytoplankton

I have not use him personally, but was still happy to see him startup after Reefcrew shutdown.

ReefAquatica (www.reefaquatica.com), in Markham, can also order in the Algen pods and has rotifiers.

J&L Aquatics is on the west coast (www.jlaquatics.com) and I think they also can order the Algen products. Last time I looked their website mentioned something about that.

Dennis

 

[dartier]

yeah living in canada has its drawbacks.
you can find tangerines and tisbes in big als. they get them in kitchener ontario every few weeks. i've asked them to see if they can get parvocalanus, but not holding my breath.
living aquarium in cambridge ontario has live rotifers, and three different types of live phyto. i think he ships if you're out of ontario.
if you're in ontario near kw, i've got tiggers, rotifers, and live phytos.
good luck and let us know if you find any interesting canadian sources.

Hey Gogo7, what types of phyto are you culturing? I am setting up a phyto culturing system and have Nanno growing fine (in testing), but want to try Tetraselmis once I have the system online.

Dennis

 

[C-Dragon]

You can purchase rotifers, Tigriopus californicus (Tigger-Pods) and Parvocalanus crassirostris direct on the Reed Mariculture website. They will ship direct to you anywhere Canada from California. Might be worth looking into.

 

[rsisvixen]

There is a vendor in Toronto who ships (www.copepods.ca). He has all the usual suspects and, many more. He sells a blend, but I know he has some culturing separately.

50% Tisbe copepods
Acartia copepods
Parvocalanus copepods
Pseudodiaptomus coeppods
Tigriopus (Tiger)
Rotifers
Moina Salina
Nannochloropsis Phytoplankton
Tetraselmis Phytoplankton

I have not use him personally, but was still happy to see him startup after Reefcrew shutdown.

ReefAquatica (www.reefaquatica.com), in Markham, can also order in the Algen pods and has rotifiers.

J&L Aquatics is on the west coast (www.jlaquatics.com) and I think they also can order the Algen products. Last time I looked their website mentioned something about that.

Dennis

Awesome, thanks for the link to the copepod.ca site, will check them out.

Spoke to JL already and they said they don't do live foods at all ( other than the general reef nutrition stuff )

I have seen Doctor Eco Systems Eco Matter about-contains
"L" Shaped Rotifers, Moina Salina, Nanno Phytoplankton, Copepods: Tigriopus, Tisbe, Parvocalanus, Pseudodiaptomus, Acartia.

Question I would have is can one sort out the copepods so you can culture them separately?

 

[gogo7]

Hey Gogo7, what types of phyto are you culturing? I am setting up a phyto culturing system and have Nanno growing fine (in testing), but want to try Tetraselmis once I have the system online.

Dennis

hi dennis. thanks for that copepod dot ca link. i hope they can help me. i never thought to put dot ca after the word copepod! oh boy have i got an order for them.
as for phytos, i'm currently growing nannochloropsis, tetraselmis, and dunaliella. i've got L type rotis and tiggers, but they're all too big for the gobies i'm breeding. i need small stuff . the link you provided could be the answer.
cheers alot.
martyn.

 

[dartier]

Hey Gogo7, what are you feeding your Tiggers? I can never seem to get them to bloom whenever I have tried to culture those. I have been searching for a source of Nitokra Lacutris without avail, so I may have to try Tiggers again.

Dennis

 

[gogo7]

Hey Gogo7, what are you feeding your Tiggers? I can never seem to get them to bloom whenever I have tried to culture those. I have been searching for a source of Nitokra Lacutris without avail, so I may have to try Tiggers again.

Dennis

hey dennis, i found out quite by accident. i had an artemia culture i let go, cysts and all. it was contaminated with a couple of tigriops. a few months later there were no brine shrimp, but you couldn't see the back side of the two litre cylinder vase. it was chock a block with pods. they were feeding on the bacteria from the decaying cyst husks. same goes for yeast feed. yeast based foods seem to make them bloom. light aeration, couple bubbles a second, half way up the vase. they've actually become a pest in my cultures.
the most infested jar is the tigger culture du jour. i feed them to my dv. my gobies eat them when i feed them to them. but they won't pick them off of the glass.
i've got a few rearing cultures i've set up for my gobies, but the tiggers have got their way in, even by actually trying not to introduce them. tiggers are not good fry food.
i really don't want them contaminating my new cultures until i'm comfortable with it.

i ordered a few cultures from copepods.ca parvo, their pod blend and s types. i'm kinda stoked.
i've had to rearrange my plankton culture rack to accommodate everything.
i'm up to about twelve litres of phytos, and thinking i might need to get another rack. i'll be splitting half the phytos tomorrow, reserving six litres for the new cultures. i've got s type rotis on the way and my L types are also in everything. i've cleaned up my cultures and isolated them under the dv, away from where i'm gonna culture the s types.but i've still got contamination. i even found tangerines bobbing around in my main roti vase. it thought i'd lost them.
auston gave me his twenty gallon that he wasn't using, so i'm gonna try a large poly culture. not sure how it's gonna go yet, baby steps. it's the largest water vessel i own!

anyways dennis, i'd isolate a few, put em in a two litre bottle with few bubbles and feed them a yeast based diet for a few weeks. a drop a day tops. keep them out of the bright light and it shouldn't take long.
sorry for the long post, it's friday night for me. cheers.

 

[dartier]

I think that is why I always failed with Tiggers, I was keeping them too clean. On another site, I was reading about a hobbyist culturing them in outdoors in Michigan in stock tanks. The density he was getting was incredible. The surface of his tanks was orange with the blooms of Tiggers.

I just had to try this, so I picked a couple of 40 gallon stock tanks. Of course now all the LFS seem to be out of stock on Tiggers.

I may just have to hit you up for a starter culture of tiggers, tetraselmis, and dunaliella.

Dennis

 

[gogo7]

I think that is why I always failed with Tiggers, I was keeping them too clean. On another site, I was reading about a hobbyist culturing them in outdoors in Michigan in stock tanks. The density he was getting was incredible. The surface of his tanks was orange with the blooms of Tiggers.

I just had to try this, so I picked a couple of 40 gallon stock tanks. Of course now all the LFS seem to be out of stock on Tiggers.

I may just have to hit you up for a starter culture of tiggers, tetraselmis, and dunaliella.

Dennis

yeah, i think clean is too clean too. it's just a matter of contamination. and what that contam is . i did keep a bucket of fresh water nanno outside one year that had all sorts of things in it that were fw. i could see doing a pod culture outside. free light is free light. here in southern ontario i think it's possible.
and yeah, any time you're heading down the fourohwun towards kw, let me know, i can hook you up. i'm in cambridge.
have you got anything on the go at the moment?
martyn

 

[dartier]

have you got anything on the go at the moment?

I have nanno culturing (who doesn't have nanno culturing?), and I have an outdoor culture of Tangerines (Arctodiaptomus salinus) that is blooming (or was last I looked). I could bring you a culture of those if you don't have them.

I am culturing the tangerines in a 20 gallon rubbermaid barrel. They apparently produce resting eggs and will come back on their own in the spring after going through a Canadian winter, or at least that is the theory. I got the idea from another poster who lives in Bavaria, Germany and does outdoor cultures that pretty much maintain themselves.

Dennis

 

[gogo7]

I could bring you a culture of those if you don't have them.

I am culturing the tangerines in a 20 gallon rubbermaid barrel. They apparently produce resting eggs and will come back on their own in the spring after going through a Canadian winter, or at least that is the theory. I got the idea from another poster who lives in Bavaria, Germany and does outdoor cultures that pretty much maintain themselves.

Dennis

yeah, definitely dennis, i'm up for trading pods. i've got a few six hundred mil pop bottles with rotis and tiggers. they're L type rotis. they're not that dense, but i can do a harvest and dense them up for you.
i read about tangerines on the mofb board. i tried mine on a higher salinity after reading it and the culture bounced back a bit, but i was focused on somethng else and basically lost them.
i'd like to try them again. i'm interested in your outdoor culture of these pods. i thought about an outdoor setup for this year, but i got busy.
pm me
i'm interested.