YWG - Day 6 and still kicking

[NicoleC]

To my astonishment, my baby YWG's are still alive here on day 6, and seem pretty vigorous. A few weeks ago, I lost my S-strain in a long power outage (I was busy keeping the broodstock alive instead). I had a weak L-strain culture, and I decided, what the heck, I'll try it. My larvae appeared to maybe be larger than Amy's; I know my parents are huge and fat. So it seemed worth a try.

I've been feeding the babies enriched L-strain and some frozen S-strain that I had saved earlier. I don't know which they are eating, but I would suspect it's the L. There may also be some ciliate contamination working as a first food.

I don't have as many as I did with the live S-strain, but I do have a goodly number, maybe in the range of 100-ish. (This hatch was excellent; I'd say 90%, so I had a LOT of babies to start with.)

I am busy trying to ramp up my L-strain despite the strains of feeding. I don't know if I will have enough food for these guys, but it is proving to be a heartening experiment.

 

[mano]

Congrats Nicole! Good luck with this batch!

 

[Armando]

Good Luck Nicole! Keep us posted.

BTW my pair is doing great. No color changes so far.. I won't attempt to raise the eggs but it is cute to see them together.

 

[TippyToeX]

Awesome to hear Nicole! Keep up the good work.

 

[Kathy55g]

great news! May the force be with you.

 

[spk]

Nicole,

This is fantastic. congratulations and keep it going and the updates flowing.

Steve

 

[NicoleC]

They seem to be a couple of days behind in their development compared to the last batch. But they are alive and moving well.

They MUST be eating the L-strain, because otherwise I should have a nice healthy L-strain culture in there otherwise, and before feeing time I can't see ANY rotifers. I am sure this means I am not feeding enough, but I am feeding all I can.

I'm going to stop adding the frozen S-strain and see what happens.

 

[ediaz]

Originally posted by Master Jedi kmleah
great news! May the force be with you.

I was seduced by the dark side to get better yields long ago...

Nicole, why don't you disect a larvae to see if they are eating?

Ed:strooper:

 

[Kathy55g]

Ew...

 

[Kathy55g]

/\ Comment from a biologist

 

[ediaz]

Why Ew?

 

[jnowell]

LOL - Ew, is that a scientific term?

Nicole,
Good luck on the balancing of culture vs. hungry babies. Not to be morbid, but I guess it will kinda have to balance itself out somehow. I keep lots of live nanno in my larvae tank and the rotifers almost sustain themselves, but I don't have 100 mouths after them either (only 16).

Great work, and good luck. Once I get these A. Clarkii's through, I want to try something a bit more challenging (not that they weren't a challenge). Reading your threads inspires me...thanks.

Jason

 

[NicoleC]

Nicole, why don't you disect a larvae to see if they are eating?

Well, I don't have a microbiology lab in my house, for starters. Kmleah has all the nifty lab stuff.

At this point, these guys are about the width of a standard razor blade edge, except the head which is a bit wider. Even if I had a 100x stereo dissecting microscope, I would just succeed in mashing them. I'm afraid to find out what .5mm diamond dissecting blades costs.

On the other head, if they weren't eating, they'd be dead by now. So I know they are eating *something.*

Just L-strain went in the tank this morning... we'll see.

Jason - I don't know if the idea that the larvae will thin out to the available food will work. Chronic sub-nutrition could take it's toll development-wise, which could kill them anyway or produce unhealthy/deformed babies that would need to be culled anyway.

I am NOT taking pictures or getting attached to this batch. I am NOT! I just keep telling myself, it's an experiment...

 

[spk]

Nicole,

Good luck with your experiment. Keep the updates coming.

Steve

 

[Kathy55g]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6436556#post6436556 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by ediaz
Why Ew?

You see? Ed never gets my jokes...

Ew, yuck, cutting apart a live larva! What if it bleeds?

 

[Kathy55g]

Sounds like a successful experiment to me! You could probably cut your rot propagation time in half, and only culture the L strain, which is more readily available. Very worthwhile experiment!

 

[spk]

Kathy, Nicole,

I remember reading a reply from Randy that if you harvest your rots they will grow quicker. Therefore the more that you harvest, frequency that is, the better the yield will be.

Steve

 

[NicoleC]

50% every 36 hours should be harvest enough! I have 3 buckets going and feed half of a bucket every 12 hours.

 

[Kathy55g]

Yes, I remember Randy's post of that information, and although I had read it before, it did not sink in to my brain until then.

Part of my problem with getting rots re-established from the refrigerator days, was that there were some dead rots in there. Dead rots rot, but they do not necessarily sink. I could siphon all I wanted, and still find dead ones when I sampled from the top. Rotting rots certainly slow the culture down, probably even worse than old rots do.

My next strategy for recovering a rot culture from the fridge, will be to keep the overall volume small for 3-4 days, but harvest 50% each day to remove the dead ones and the old ones, and allow the young population to take over. If I keep the volume to 1/2 gallon at first recovery, I can expand to 2 gallons starting 3 days before the clownfish eggs hatch.

In fact I am beginning an expansion tonight. I have 1/2 gallon of 150 rots/ml, perhaps 300 when I get home tonight. They look very healthy with lots of eggs and activity. For the next 3 days I will double the volume each day. I expect the clownfish eggs to hatch Sunday morning. Unless I am wrong... It has happened before.

Nicole, in keeping with Randy's suggestion, I assume you are taking rots from each of the three buckets at every feeding? If not, you might want to. It might help with the shortage issue. Just a thought...
Cheers, and best of luck. We are all pulling for you!
Kathy

 

[NicoleC]

I think harvesting 50% every day and a half is plenty. Density is increasing from the prior harvest, so I am getting better than population doubling in that day and a half.

It would triple my maintenance time and then some to restart every bucket twice every day. Plus I think it would increase the risk of crashing my cultures -- heaven forbid all at once!