Live food?

g01ngog · Post by **g01ngog** » Wed Mar 09, 2011 11:35 pm

Is Frank Cowherd on the forums? How do I contact him?

bussardnr · Post by **bussardnr** » Wed Mar 09, 2011 11:50 pm

his user name is Frank Cowherd on both boards, Jim Long also dabbles in live food

pleurothallid · Post by **pleurothallid** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 2:01 am

I've been culturing Moina for a few years now. They're similar in culture to Daphnia but much smaller and they can reach densities much higher without crashing. Here I can raise them outside all the time (though in the winter they die back) but when the temperatures warm back up they're in full bloom. I feed a slurry of yeast (active dry yeast and warm water shaken) until the green water takes over, after that just supplement and they'll reach high densities, enough to feed daily. I've bred a number of killifish and others (like Apistogramma, etc.) feeding with them. They culture indoors the same as outside, just feed more yeast and clean the bottom of the tank often.

Bgssamson · Post by **Bgssamson** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 11:10 am

How do you clean the bottom of the tank? I gave up on them as its a pita to maintain indoors. Maybe you can share your technique? I use to kept mine in a home depot bucket with airstone and feed it with this powder thing that comes with a starter culture I got from ebay.

I am also interested in getting other kinds of live foods!

-Brian

pleurothallid · Post by **pleurothallid** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 12:04 pm

Living in the South now the temperatures are more amenable to just doing it all outside (which you guys can do soon), but indoors it's very possible. I feed the yeast slurry (just enough to cloud the water) every day or two. I also put a light on over the tanks (doing more than one gives a buffer is one crashes) and put some moss and snails in with them. I then just siphon off the bottom of the tank sludge at the bottom every week or so and do regular bi-weekly water changes. Using two little 2 gallon tanks I had more than enough to feed all my fish. It takes a bit of playing and keeping an eye on them, but there's no reason why you can't be successful with keeping them going indoors as well as outdoors.

DonkeyFish · Post by **DonkeyFish** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 9:30 pm

Sounds like a great topic for our DIY workshop later this year

Jim Miller · Post by **Jim Miller** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 9:41 pm

This is all good information but I think I'm going to stick to just hatching out brine shrimp occasionally. The amount of work and attention required to keep another bunch of critters healthy is a little overwhelming. Perhaps a DIY workshop might reduce the fear factor.

Thanks

Jim

FrannyB · Post by **FrannyB** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 11:08 pm

Julio Melgar finds them in the wild. He sunk a rubbermade container in the ground and left 4 inches showing. All he fed them was watermelon rind. I'm going to try it this year.

kerokero · Post by **kerokero** » Wed Apr 06, 2011 3:21 pm

I think it should be noted that the Daphnia that shows up in the mentioned places is Daphnia magna and not the smaller species Daphnia pulex. The Moina I believe are even smaller. I had to scrap my D. magna culture because the main species I was trying to feed them to couldn't handle the adults because they were too big! This included Betta concinnea and some young Boraras urophthalmoides. I won't keep the larger Daphnia for Boraras sp because I'm too lazy to sort for size and want even the adults to be edible in size.

After I got the Daphnia going though the culture really didn't require that much work... less work you put into it the less you get out of it is really the deal.

I've collected Mosquito larvae in the warm months just by leaving still water outside, and pulling it when I saw little tiny wigglies which I promptly fed. I fish usually got them pretty fast, but I always did worry about some not getting eaten. I started pulling them out and freezing them instead, but it doesn't work if the food HAS to be alive.

I'm also particularly fond of using some live foods typically reserved for my more terrestrial critters

Most fish that go anywhere near the surface won't turn down fruit flies (which range in size depending on the species), crickets (ranging from a few mm to adults around an inch), houseflies (larger fish obviously), and springtails (which the adults range around 2mm). I've got frogs that are very picky on the small side, which is handy for the micro sized fish I'm fond of as well!

Rick Dotson · Post by **Rick Dotson** » Wed Apr 06, 2011 5:46 pm

I have grindal worms that we feed to our small fish. They are a little trickier than some live food but still reasonable. I will try to bring a culture next meeting.

Live food?

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