Raising Daphnia - my story / advice (Part 1) - I'm doing this in two parts, since it seems like there's a limit on the size of one post or actually now I think it was the eBay link that turned out to make it not work ... oh well, here's the two parts.
I've been raising Daphnia indoors in a 5 gallon and 20 gallon tank (shown below just after I fed them) for about 3 months now (and did tons of research) and I've learned some do's and don'ts about what worked for me, that I thought I'd share if someone else wanted to give raising Daphnia a try.
1. What to raise them in - First of all, I had to decide what I should try to raise them in. You can raise them in just about anything, from what I read. I heard, after many, many hours or research on the net, that you should always have at least two cultures of Daphnia going at the same time, in case anything happens and one of them "crashes". My first choice was easy, a 20 gallon tank I had hanging around. The second one is a 5 gallon tank I bought at my local Fish Store. I have the pictures of the tanks shown below, right after I fed them, to give you an idea of how murky the water should be after feeding them.
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2. Why - My Neolamprologus Brichardi go nuts over the Daphnia !!! ... and I've always like giving my fish some live food as a treat, plus to practice their hunting skills. I use these only as a supplement to my normal NLS Flake food ... http://nlsfishfood.com/
3. Bubbling – I tried different methods of aerating/moving the water and ended up with an airline weighted down with a ceramic door knob zip-tied to it. It puts out about 2-3 bubbles per second. The research said to not have too much aeration, since the air might get stuck in the Daphnia’s shells and kill them. So keep the bubbling to a minimum, which I’ve found is tricky getting the air valve set just right.
4. Feeding – This is the tricky part, since everyone has special formula they use. The best food is "green water" or algae water, which is really the best food for them, but I could never get it to work for me so I finally gave up on that about a week ago and now feed them once a day 1/16 teaspoon of Active Dry yeast and 1/4 teaspoon of Spirulina powder (for my 25 gallons of Daphnia). I tried just yeast at first (which a lot of folk recommended) and it really didn't work well for me. They didn’t breed and frankly almost died off, but when I added the Spirulina powder they really started breeding ... big-time !!!
![Image]()
![Image]()
5. Culling the herd – They say you should make sure to get rid of some of them, even if you have to flush them down the drain. This keeps the culture healthy and breeding.
6. I leave the light on all the time – There are different theories/opinions on this, but I leave my light on all the time. I really don’t know if it helps any, but I read it might help … so I leave them on.
(Part 2 continued below)
I've been raising Daphnia indoors in a 5 gallon and 20 gallon tank (shown below just after I fed them) for about 3 months now (and did tons of research) and I've learned some do's and don'ts about what worked for me, that I thought I'd share if someone else wanted to give raising Daphnia a try.
1. What to raise them in - First of all, I had to decide what I should try to raise them in. You can raise them in just about anything, from what I read. I heard, after many, many hours or research on the net, that you should always have at least two cultures of Daphnia going at the same time, in case anything happens and one of them "crashes". My first choice was easy, a 20 gallon tank I had hanging around. The second one is a 5 gallon tank I bought at my local Fish Store. I have the pictures of the tanks shown below, right after I fed them, to give you an idea of how murky the water should be after feeding them.
2. Why - My Neolamprologus Brichardi go nuts over the Daphnia !!! ... and I've always like giving my fish some live food as a treat, plus to practice their hunting skills. I use these only as a supplement to my normal NLS Flake food ... http://nlsfishfood.com/
3. Bubbling – I tried different methods of aerating/moving the water and ended up with an airline weighted down with a ceramic door knob zip-tied to it. It puts out about 2-3 bubbles per second. The research said to not have too much aeration, since the air might get stuck in the Daphnia’s shells and kill them. So keep the bubbling to a minimum, which I’ve found is tricky getting the air valve set just right.
4. Feeding – This is the tricky part, since everyone has special formula they use. The best food is "green water" or algae water, which is really the best food for them, but I could never get it to work for me so I finally gave up on that about a week ago and now feed them once a day 1/16 teaspoon of Active Dry yeast and 1/4 teaspoon of Spirulina powder (for my 25 gallons of Daphnia). I tried just yeast at first (which a lot of folk recommended) and it really didn't work well for me. They didn’t breed and frankly almost died off, but when I added the Spirulina powder they really started breeding ... big-time !!!
5. Culling the herd – They say you should make sure to get rid of some of them, even if you have to flush them down the drain. This keeps the culture healthy and breeding.
6. I leave the light on all the time – There are different theories/opinions on this, but I leave my light on all the time. I really don’t know if it helps any, but I read it might help … so I leave them on.
(Part 2 continued below)
