Photoplanton/brine shrimp hatcheries ?

[DLeAnnM]

I am a newbie just getting all my stuff together for my tank. I have

 

29 gallon/stand

Instant Ocean

RO/DI-Still need the pressurized tank tho

Coralife aqualight 130 watts

Test kits/hydrometer

Also have an old used wet/dry that I may use for a sump tho still looking into that

 

I live in NE MN where there are no petstores! The closest is Duluth which is 65 miles away. Even with this issue I am obsessed also with having a reef tank! I am just wondering do I need to have live food on hand? So my question is I have seen the pop bottles feeders(?) on peoples tanks and have seen brine shrimp hatcheries. Are these useful to me in my 29 gallon? How do these work? Does anyone utilize these things? Are they dependent on tank size or fish or corals?

 

I will be adding Live rock, sand. Will be purchasing skimmer, heater. Would like to have various corals and a few fish (blennie, clown?) though undecided on which ones. Any suggestions about my tank would be helpful. :)

[Reefer_Buddha]

you can grow your own phytoplankton with a plankton reactor but seems like more of a pain to do all that. Ive seen people make it with just pepsi bottles and put it under some intense lights. If i were you id just get DT's phytoplankton. Its live and supposed to be the best as far as buying phyto.

[1fish2fish]

As a person who has cultured phytoplankton as a job I can tell you that it may be more time and work than you want to invest. You may want to look into presserved algae etc. If you are dead set on growing your own a good place to start for info is the Plankton Culture Manual from Florida Aqua Farms

 

http://www.aquaculture-supply.com/

 

Personally, I would rather spend my spare time with my tank than with gurgling containers of phytoplankton, but thenit might be that I get enough of algae at work.

 

If you decide to culture your own stay away from diatoms. They tend to be a bit more of a pain since you need to supplement them with a source of silicate (plus you don't want extra silicate getting into your reef tank). Good species to work with are Nannochloropsis occulata, Rhodomonas sp., or Isocrysis sp. (Tahitian strain). Rhodomonas is also often referred to as 3C and of the above mentioned it is probably the easiest to grow and has a reasonable nutritional profile.

 

Keep in mind that to have long term success in algae culture generally requires that you be sterile in all aspets of the process and that you continuously start new cultures.

 

If you do go for it and have questions I'll be happy to offer any advice I can.

[DLeAnnM]

Thank you for the info. At least now I can check it out. Previous to this I had just seen pics and had no idea what or how it worked.

[aggiereefer]

for brine shrimp, ive read that you can use a plastic film canister. Poke a small hole in the lid of the cap. Drop in some BS eggs and put the lid back one. Drop it in the tank and once the eggs hatch, shrimp will swim out of the hole in the lid because they are attracted to light.

[1fish2fish]

Interesting idea aggie, I may have to give it a try. I would recommend putting the holes about halfway up the container and using a cup to rmove it when done. The hoes at halfway because some of the cysts will sink and some will float and you really don't want a bunch of cysts floating around your tank. The container for removal for the exact same reason as above.

 

Of course if you feel like it you can always decapsulate your artemia cysts as well, but thats just another step. hehe

[surfy]

Brine shrimp are very small when they hatch so they probably will only feed your corals and not the fish. Their nutritive value diminishes significantly after about 24 hours of hatching if they arn't fed.

 

Adult brine shrimp really don't have much nutrition for your fish to live on without supplements to inrich them. Plus they are hard to grow to adult stage. If you want to try it then you will have to grow your green water "plankton" so they have something to eat.