Daphnia Culturing

[SwordZ]

Hey guys! Just to share a small success of mine! Currently have cocepods, daphnia, and tubifex all in the same culture kit! It isn't enough to sell but enough to feed your fishes once every 2 days

Here's what I did
1. Take out the old filter media (never washed before) and wash in a container filled with tank water (the container you'll be culturing them in)
2. Get some daphnia from your lfs and pour some into the container
3. Take a plastic bag (those from supermarkets to contain fruits) and poke very small holes on the top [To prevent mosquitoes from breeding]

How to harvest : Once you see enough daphnia at the surface of the water, just pour off that portion, leaving the rest to continue culturing!

Hopefully it helps!

[Bern C]

Good idea to use filter media bacteria to feed moina and at the same time cleaning the filter media. 1 stone shoot 2 birds. XD

[tetrakid]

That's a good idea. But I don't 'clean' my filter media.
The accumulated gunk on the filter media act as additional media surface, which is excellent because it is just dead decomposed matter.
I know all hobbyists normally rinse their media regularly, but I consider that a waste of a valuable tank resource. Bacteria are my best friends.
It will somewhat clog the flow but a slow flow is great for the bacteria.

Of course one can cultivate bacteria just to use for this purpose, and not for a fish tank.

[SwordZ]

@tetrakid the problem is my filter media is sometimes so dirty that the dirt particles flow back into the tank, so just occasionally I wash the media. Until now the culture kit has at least 2cm thick of detritus

[Bern C]

That's a good idea. But I don't 'clean' my filter media.
The accumulated gunk on the filter media act as additional media surface, which is excellent because it is just dead decomposed matter.
I know all hobbyists normally rinse their media regularly, but I consider that a waste of a valuable tank resource. Bacteria are my best friends.
It will somewhat clog the flow but a slow flow is great for the bacteria.

Of course one can cultivate bacteria just to use for this purpose, and not for a fish tank.

Shifu tetrakid is Bacteria Alchemist~

[tetrakid]

@tetrakid the problem is my filter media is sometimes so dirty that the dirt particles flow back into the tank, so just occasionally I wash the media. Until now the culture kit has at least 2cm thick of detritus

It is best to use a pre-filter at the inlet, like I always do without fail. Then the dirt on the media are of the fine type.
The course dirt on the pre-filter can be cleaned as usual. But I never clean up the dirt on the filter media itself.
Always be extra gentle when handling a clogged pre-filter, otherwise, the dirt will scatter all over the tank.

[tetrakid]

Shifu tetrakid is Bacteria Alchemist~

As a Daphnia culturer, you must also focus more of your attention on bacterial matters.

[Bern C]

As a Daphnia culturer, you must also focus more of your attention on bacterial matters.