Copepods - Culturing

[Jorge O'Reilly]

Howdy

So I've just spent a couple minutes outside with a gauze bag, a fine net and a couple jars, and I've returned with an inordinate number of copepods and copepod-sized buggers in a two-liter jar. I'm at my parent's house, while my tank is at my flat downtown, I'm not going to be able to go there for a couple days. Which begs the question: how do I keep these alive? I know they filter-feed, but do they live off algae, period, or can I do something else? For instance, some yeast? Some wheat or corn flour? I want to have a suitable number so that I can give the tank a bit of a clean and replace hard-won microcrustacean population as it goes down the drain. Literally and figuratively.

 

[Mat H]

Any green water available, or green or brown algea? It's the only thing I can think of off hand.

Funnily enough I was thinking about this yesterday after setting up a Daphnia colony as I had also purchased some Copepods to feed the fish.

 

[Jorge O'Reilly]

Well, they've done fine throughout the night. I threw some yeast in yesterday. Hopefully I'll send them into the tank soon, it's got plenty of food available.

Here's my latest state-of-the-art piece of tech: a large two liter bottle with both ends cut off, and one end covered in gauze. A few passes in the pond and voila, thousands. Much better than previous iterations.

I did notice that pretty much only copepods get caught this way. I used a fine net before, roughly 30x20cm, and it caught up so much detritus that the end result had loads of smaller critters. With the gauze you only filter water and thus only get the freeswimming copepods. Also, it's easier to evade, thus you avoid having to chase small fish with your hands in order to re-release them.

The water is really cold this time of the year though, so catching the fish is rather easier. They'll be half stunned by the temperatures until spring...

 

[Jorge O'Reilly]

Any green water available, or green or brown algea? It's the only thing I can think of off hand.

Funnily enough I was thinking about this yesterday after setting up a Daphnia colony as I had also purchased some Copepods to feed the fish.

You should try it if your copepods crash. It must vary depending on where you're from, but twenty minutes' worth of work just gave me a jarful of 'em.

 

[Mat H]

You should try it if your copepods crash. It must vary depending on where you're from, but twenty minutes' worth of work just gave me a jarful of 'em.

I will, I actually live almost opposite a large lake so I may take a wander over and see what I can find, I have plenty of tubs for the critters to go in!

The Daphnia are doing fine, however I assumed the greening water was enough food, and it probably wasn't, so I've given them some yeast today. Per @dw1305 previous advice, I should probably put some Daphnia in my water butt too seeing as I spent the day, finally, rigging up an additional one to pick up over-flow as well as tidying up and reorganising the little hopper (filter) that feeds the first water butt - I've never wanted it to rain so much! 😂

 

[LondonDragon]

There is me trying to get rid of my million copepods and you guys trying to breed them! LOL

 

[Mat H]

There is me trying to get rid of my million copepods and you guys trying to breed them! LOL

Feel free to bag them up for me, I'm sure my Ember Tetra's would love them! 😆

I had an 'infestation' of them in one tank years ago, but these days even with me adding them to tanks and garden tubs they never last very long.

I'm all good for mosquito/midge larvae at the moment though, with a spirinkling of Daphnia.

 

[LondonDragon]

Feel free to bag them up for me, I'm sure my Ember Tetra's would love them! 😆

I had an 'infestation' of them in one tank years ago, but these days even with me adding them to tanks and garden tubs they never last very long.

I'm all good for mosquito/midge larvae at the moment though, with a spirinkling of Daphnia.

I keep catching hundreds with every water change and still cannot seem to thin their numbers! what is going on with my tanks and weird critters! lol

 

[Mat H]

I keep catching hundreds with every water change and still cannot seem to thin their numbers! what is going on with my tanks and weird critters! lol

Well it's definitely a step up from leeches in my book!

I can't think what it was about the tank I had the infestation of Copepods in, they really were out of control [maybe moss, lots of moss] but I can't seem to repeat it despite actually adding them now! - get eBaying, I think they go for about £20 for 1 ltr! 💷💷

 

[tam]

Bit late, but popping them in the fridge? They'll probably survive in there a few days with no other intervention as their metabolism would slow down. Works with the life food you buy anyway.

 

[Simon Cole]

It depends a bit on what kind of copepods you are doing, whether they are <free-floating (planktonic) or surface grazers>. I suppose that a mouth like this one, is more suited to grazing:

Assuming it is the grazing type , the food I use is a mixture of spirulina and bee pollen, the latter entirely optional. Good lighting and gentle flow helps because any loose food particles will get stuck to the preferably-slimy bottom and side of the tank. I find that java moss provides an enhanced spawning environment for copepods and can boost populations. Another trick is to collect slate and put that in a bowl of nutrient-rich water, in full sun, and after a few weeks these feeding surfaces can be swapped into the culture. I would say that lids (or clingfilm) and a safeguarding-approach is useful, as for most cultures, and because they are inter-species cannibalistic. And I would also recommend keeping them with tubifex worms, whom love the pollen and spirulina food, and for this reason help to break-down anything that could decay and might collected on the bottom of the tank; glass-bottomed is my preference.

 

[Jorge O'Reilly]

Good Lord, I have not been able to look at their mouths lol. They seem to be the regular Cyclops sort of thing, dunno if that says anything. I considered Spirulina, I saw a couple of studies that used it to feed it to them, but I am seeking something more homemade. Spirulina is just not cheap enough to justify blowing it on micro-crustacean feed. Not terribly expensive, but more than I will spend on this, I'm not keeping them long-term.

I have since perfected my craft, with a series of sieves that allow me to ditch bigger fish straight back and retain copepods. I just toss four or five bucketfuls of water through the system and I have a week's supply. One of my tanks does not need further stocking, as Bettas have been bred into idiocy and my boy is absolutely unable to catch them. I've seen the shrimp catch half-stunned ones, after I dump them in and they try to understand what on earth is going on. However, the big tank is different, it has Jenynsias and they are the sharks of the pond. They eat through a LOT of copepods in minutes, 20 min after dropping literal hundreds in a 90 - liter tank there's no more to be seen and the fish are plump as can be.

They survive in the bottle just fine for several days, but I keep a reasonable amount in a big glass jar, separate. Those I feed with regular fish food, I expect bacteria feed on that and they on them. As for the ones crammed in the bottle, I toss some every day into the tank and replenish the water with aquarium water. I suppose it keeps the bugs from starving. It's winter here, so their metabolism must be working slow.

 

[Simon Cole]

@Jorge O'Reilly : Would you like to try some of my bee pollen, kale powder and chlorella powder when they arrive later this week, if you have a forwarding address in the UK?

 

[Wookii]

It depends a bit on what kind of copepods you are doing, whether they are <free-floating (planktonic) or surface grazers>. I suppose that a mouth like this one, is more suited to grazing:
View attachment 209030
Assuming it is the grazing type , the food I use is a mixture of spirulina and bee pollen, the latter entirely optional. Good lighting and gentle flow helps because any loose food particles will get stuck to the preferably-slimy bottom and side of the tank. I find that java moss provides an enhanced spawning environment for copepods and can boost populations. Another trick is to collect slate and put that in a bowl of nutrient-rich water, in full sun, and after a few weeks these feeding surfaces can be swapped into the culture. I would say that lids (or clingfilm) and a safeguarding-approach is useful, as for most cultures, because they are inter-species cannibalistic. And I would also recommend keeping them with tubifex worms, whom love the pollen and spirulina food, and for this reason help to break-down anything that could decay and might collected on the bottom of the tank; glass-bottomed is my preference.

I'm thinking of starting up one of these cultures, what sort of container size would you suggest? I have a small 20 litre tank, to which I can an old and in use sponge air-filter.

I have bee pollen and dry Spirulina and Chlorella already - how often and how much of this do you feed Simon?

 

[Jorge O'Reilly]

@Jorge O'Reilly : Would you like to try some of my bee pollen, kale powder and chlorella powder when they arrive later this week, if you have a forwarding address in the UK?

Would love to try it, but not really. I'm Argentine. If you do send them, though, add some Martin Baker ejection seats to the box...

 

[Simon Cole]

what sort of container size would you suggest? I have a small 20 litre tank, to which I can an old and in use sponge air-filter.

Perfect
I believe they can swim-up breathe from the air too, but with a filter you can also think about including tubifex. Tubifex would do quite well in there if you fed them on something like broccoli or courgette, shoving a leaf under each tangle every few days. People think of them as dirty, but they culture really clean, no lighting required.

I have been pollen and dry Spirulina and Chlorella already - how often and how much of this do you feed Simon?

I use about enough to cover the point of a pencil - it should spread over 1/3 to 1/2 the water surface depending upon culture density, perhaps once or twice a day, or even not-at-all... as required. It should lightly coat the glass bottom (what they can consume). I don't know whether copepods can synthesise vitamin K like we do, so it's preferable to include spirulina if you're not adding other vegetables. <Nutritional info of pollen, chlorella etc.>. I haven't tried boiled nettles yet, but I bet some copepod species would chow down on it like kebabs in Brighton.

 

[Liam]

The non filter feeding ones do eat spinach algae wafers and nettles, just about anything shrimp will eat. You can spot one on the nettle here with a baby shrimp.