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Nutritious daphnia?

JasonC

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
166
Location
Laurel, MD
So how can I tell that I am getting maximum benefit from my daphnia? I have noticed that the colony that I received as a starter was a lovely pink/salmon color, but now the colony looks pale white to clear. is this indicative of their nutrient load being low on something? I currently feed green water and live rotifers to the daphnia. Can I add something else to the diet to make sure I am getting maximum efficacy out of these guys?

Thanks!!
 

gerald

Well-Known Member
5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
Given the date and your location I assume you're growing the Daphnia and the green water indoors. Indoor green water has never worked too well as culture food for me; I suspect it tends to become dominanted by one or a few species of low-food-quality algae. My outdoor tubs in sunlight (with leaves, dirt, drowned bugs, frog & turtle poop, etc) probably maintain a more diverse and nutritious mix of algae and bacteria, and my Daphnia and Moina grown outdoors have darker color (which I presume is somewhat correlated with their nutritional content). When they're growing fast and the water gets clear, I supplement with dog food or pond fish food. Now is a good time to start some outdoor tubs. For winter indoor cultures, feeding Spirulina powder, yeast, and mashed sweet potato might beef up their nutrient content.
 

dw1305

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5 Year Member
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2,755
Location
Wiltshire UK
Hi all,
As well as the spirulina powder Gerald suggests, you could try feeding them any of yeast, Chick pea (gram) flour, Paprika and Astaxanthin based powder. This diet will make them grow, improve their nutritional quality and colour them bright pink.

If you do feed the Daphnia it is worth keeping 2 or 3 cultures as they are very prone to "boom & bust".

Have a look at this link from the excellent caudata.org <http://www.caudata.org/daphnia/>

cheers Darrel
 

JasonC

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
166
Location
Laurel, MD
Gerald, DW, thanks for the great info!

So when growing your daphnia outside, are you doing both them and the green water in the same container? Is the green water able to keep up production with the daphnia population? Also, when feeding the alternate items, how heavily do you feed? I have noticed that with this batch of daphnia that they are surviving better with me not vaccuming the scum (excess rotting food, molted carapices, etc) off the bottom of the tank... is this a justified observation? if so, should I allow a heavy layer of gunk to build up, or is "too much of a good thing" possible?
 

dw1305

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5 Year Member
Messages
2,755
Location
Wiltshire UK
Hi all,
I have noticed that with this batch of daphnia that they are surviving better with me not vaccuming the scum (excess rotting food, molted carapices, etc) off the bottom of the tank... is this a justified observation? if so, should I allow a heavy layer of gunk to build up, or is "too much of a good thing" possible?
It is "swings and roundabouts", if you have more OM you get more Daphnia, but the cultures are more likely to crash. If you don't mind sub-culturing them, you can keep adding the nutrients.

cheers Darrel
 

gerald

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5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
In a predator-free container the Daphnia or Moina will eat up all the good algae and then crash, so it's better to keep at least one container Daphnia-free for green-water production. A goldfish is useful for this. But if you're harvesting often and dont need to maximize production, you can maintain less-dense cultures with green-water plus supplementary yeast and/or food to generate bacteria. Feed enough to keep it slightly hazy-cloudy. When the water gets clear, the Daphnia are starving, although certain kinds are pretty good at bottom-feeding too.
 

dw1305

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Location
Wiltshire UK
Hi all,
thanks Darrel you always have good info on live foods
Cheers, I think it is because I'm too poor/mean to buy much food. I had my first tour of 2012 around the water butts on the allotments this morning (on the way into work), and I got a really good catch of Daphnia and I'm still feeling happy now.

I've been waiting until I can get some more Daphnia as an alternative live food, as my Grindal worm cultures have all got mites and need re-culturing.

cheers Darrel
 

dw1305

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5 Year Member
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Location
Wiltshire UK
Hi all,
I've never heard of the "Russian Red" strain, but they sound fine from the blurb. I might try feeding some of mine with Astaxanthin powder and Paprika and seeing if I can sell them for an enhanced price on Ebay.
some snails
I do this as well. The link is good as well, I always hope she will up-date her pages, but she never has. This <http://www.well.com/user/debunix/fish/LiveFoodCultures.html> inspired me to get some "Confused Flour Beetles" (Tribolium), but none of the fish have ever eaten either larvae or adults.

cheers Darrel
 

JasonC

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
166
Location
Laurel, MD
So I have been using the recipe mentioned in the quote for several weeks now and my otherwise dwindling daphnia culture sprung back to life for me. utterly amazing how fast these buggers can reproduce.

One oddity though. After changing 50% of the water in the daphnia tank this afternoon, I am noticing a large quantity of small worms in the tank... maybe 1/8" long, white to translucent, and thread thin. they are all over the glass. Should I be concerned about this contaminant species? Parasite, or food source?


heres what i ordered from Aquabid thats supppose to be russian reds
http://www.aquabid.com/cgi-bin/auction/auction.cgi?foodl&1332016200
http://www.well.com/~debunix/fish/Daphnia.html
is a reciepe that I found that they say produces healthier dapnia and it talks about them being a healthy reddish color
just like w bbs
 

CopabX

Member
Messages
72
Location
NJ, US
One oddity though. After changing 50% of the water in the daphnia tank this afternoon, I am noticing a large quantity of small worms in the tank... maybe 1/8" long, white to translucent, and thread thin. they are all over the glass. Should I be concerned about this contaminant species? Parasite, or food source?

Those are detritus worms. They are usually a sign of overfeeding or a build-up of organic matter. They're harmless and easily rid of by a couple weeks of deep cleaning/filter changes. As a food source though, "you are what you eat."
 

dw1305

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5 Year Member
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2,755
Location
Wiltshire UK
Hi all,
I agree with Copabx, they sound like "Detritus Worms" (Oligochaete, Naididae), these are very common in organic substrates. Usually if they appear out of the detritus at the bottom of the tank, and are on the glass, it is because the substrate oxygen levels have fallen to very low levels and the bottom layer of water has become anoxic.

Because you had just changed the water low oxygen is less likely, but it may have been that the new water (tap?) had a high CO2 content, and the lower O2/CO2 ratio had caused them to leave the substrate.
using the recipe mentioned in the quote .......and my otherwise dwindling daphnia culture sprung back to life for me. utterly amazing how fast these buggers can reproduce
Which recipe? Are you using gram flour or spirulina etc?

cheers Darrel
 

Mike Wise

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5 Year Member
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11,202
Location
Denver, Colorado, U.S.A.
Since these are in your Daphnia growing tank, then just let them be. They are harmless and consume extra food that the Daphnia don't eat. They are a nematode that is harmless to the Daphnia and fish.
 

ste12000

Member
5 Year Member
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619
Location
Cheshire..UK
Ive only just caught up with this thread. I dont have too much to add but i followed the link to the Russian red daphnia and have to say that is the best bit of advertising ive seen in a long time! the same strain as those found in the Moscow Alligator pool in the 60's... Pure genius and well worth a few extra $$$$'s
 

JasonC

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
166
Location
Laurel, MD
Hi all,
I agree with Copabx, they sound like "Detritus Worms" (Oligochaete, Naididae), these are very common in organic substrates. Usually if they appear out of the detritus at the bottom of the tank, and are on the glass, it is because the substrate oxygen levels have fallen to very low levels and the bottom layer of water has become anoxic.

Because you had just changed the water low oxygen is less likely, but it may have been that the new water (tap?) had a high CO2 content, and the lower O2/CO2 ratio had caused them to leave the substrate.
Which recipe? Are you using gram flour or spirulina etc?

cheers Darrel


The O2 levels do sound reasonable. I dont use tap for my daphnia, but instead use aged water from one of my apisto tanks. I have killed numerous cultures in the past while using dechlor'ed tap, and after some reading on the net switched over to aged tank water and havent looked back. The worms are still out, though, which makes me wonder... does this mean they just are willing to come out for the detritus that is available, or could there still be an O2 level problem in the water? There is an airline in the tank, but I also noticed that it became heavily covered in a white stringy scum just prior to the PWC and the worms appearance... correlation? Coincedance?

re: which recipe, it was mentioned by animalmgc earlier in the thread: http://www.well.com/~debunix/fish/Daphnia.html
it is a mix of spirulina, soy flour, paprika, brewers yeast, and freeze dried peas (ground up, of course).

thanks!

Jason
 

JasonC

Member
5 Year Member
Messages
166
Location
Laurel, MD
Since these are in your Daphnia growing tank, then just let them be. They are harmless and consume extra food that the Daphnia don't eat. They are a nematode that is harmless to the Daphnia and fish.


Will do. Probably going to be much more aggressive with the PWC's to see if i can get rid of them though. I feel like I am extra paranoid right now... almost as if I am biding my time before my next mistake. Last thing I wanted was for this to be some form of parasite just waiting to be introduced to a fish colony. ;P

Thanks all!
 

gerald

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5 Year Member
Messages
1,491
Location
Wake Forest NC, USA
Except for leeches, there really aren't any freshwater fish parasites big enough to be seen crawling or swimming around in a freshwater tank. The free-swimming stages of freshwater fish parasites are mostly microscopic. Once they are large enough to see, they are attached on or inside the fish. (Some Argulus fish lice are visible and "can" leave their host, but its very rare to see one off a fish). Most anything you see crawling on the glass or rocks in a freshwater tank is either a grazer/scavenger or a predator on other tiny inverts. BTW, the little gray leeches that come with live blackworms are not fish parasites either; they eat worms.
 

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