Growing your own live feed!

[killi69]

Catch your own culture! I went to local pond last weekend and was amazed at the amount of daphnia and cyclops i could catch with my little fishnet even at this time of the year. Much easier to catch daphnia if you can!

 

[Reuben]

So I got a culture of micro worms going. But the fish were not interested! Not sure why but the obvious explanation looked like the worms were way too small to be of interest?...

Have I got this wrong or do 'smallish' tetras not eat these worms...

Perplexed...

 

[NC10]

The micro, walter and banana worms are normally just used for fry. They're absolutely tiny, so I'm guessing even the smallest tetra won't notice it or waste it's time even bothering. Unless of course it's a baby tetra 😀

 

[BigTom]

I've never seen anything smallish not go mad for microworms. All my fish love them, up to and including my 3" peacock gobies.

 

[Fern]

I keep a couple of containers of vinegar eels on the go, and have daphnia in the summer. Micro worms etc give me the heebie jeebies!

 

[NC10]

@Tom - I tried mine with them and they just weren't interested 🙁

@Fern - Just done a quick search for the eels because I'd never come across them before. They look to be pretty much the same thing. The micro/Walter/banana worms are just nematodes too, like the vinegar eels.

 

[Edvet]

I am gonna pick up Walterworms, bananaworms and microworms tomorrow and i have some Lumbriculus coming in this week.
Now i need to find a spot where i can harvest Daphnia (i did put some in our pond but that is not a very good one)

 

[Fern]

The micro/Walter/banana worms are just nematodes too, like the vinegar eels

Yeah, but I think what puts me off, is the way you keep them. I like eating bread and oats (course I would, I'm Scottish 😉), Don't like vinegar 😉

 

[NC10]

lol Pretty sure you wouldn't want to eat the porridge after giving it a quick sniff

 

[John P Coates]

Hi Reuben,

For £1.25, you can get a bag of live Daphnia from Maidenhead Aquatics. There are lots of sites on the Net showing you how to keep the culture growing and bearing offspring. I feed mine on a weak solution of bakers' yeast and they thrive on it. Absolutely fascinating using a magnifying glass to watch them swimming around. My tetras love 'em!

JPC

 

[Reuben]

Mmm well it's definitely a 'no go' with the micro worms. They just aren't interested, not sure why, I'm starting to feel quite tempted to have a nibble at them myself - what's wrong with these fish!🙂

There are lots of sites on the Net showing you how to keep the culture growing and bearing offspring

Can you point me to a good one?

Catch your own culture! I went to local pond last weekend and was amazed at the amount of daphnia and cyclops i could catch with my little fishnet even at this time of the year

What did you do then? Just wave a net about in the water? dredge? What is all that stuff in the buckets? All Daphnia?

I've never seen anything smallish not go mad for microworms

I'd say Cardinal and black phantom tetra where pretty small, same for harlequin rasbora? Maybe they just prefer the dried food now....🙁

 

[killi69]

What did you do then? Just wave a net about in the water? dredge? What is all that stuff in the buckets? All Daphnia?

Yes, only daphnia and some cyclops. I just use a fine aquarium fish net. Dont dredge! You obviously dont want all the muck and anyway, if a pond contains daphnia or cyclops they will be free swimming and not among the litter at the bottom. The best method is to gently make a round '8' patterned trailing movement in the water which will create a slow current that will gently bring up daphnia swimming at any lower levels than your net can reach. Keep a good look out as after a while other debris might start to come upwards as well and then you just move up a couple of meters and start again.

It only takes me 5 minutes or so, even at this time of the year, before i have caught more than enough for one or two weeks and probably 100x or more of what you buy in one little bag at the lfs.

Recently i cut off the bottom 'loop' of the fish net and bring along a bamboo stick with me, as well as an empty 4 pint plastic milk bottle and a plastic jug as can be seen on the photo. At the waterside, i screw the net into the pole, fill the jug up with some pond water and spend a few minutes catching daphnia as described above. Empty net into jug, poor jug contents into bottle, and everything apart from pole fits neatly back into a bag. So all done nice and quickly. It is worth walking around and having a look at different parts of the pond as concentrations of daphnia do differ. In my pond some parts contain masses of large daphnia while somewhere else i catch much smaller ones together with cyclops. I keep the daphnia in a large bucket of rainwater. Happy dipping!

Regards, Andre

 

[killi69]

Apart from daphnia, i also treat my fish once a week or so to freshly hatched brine shrimp and earthworms. Hatching brine shrimp is really simple and most fish, certainly the smaller tetra sized ones, love it. The brine shrimp eggs do cost a bit but you only use very small amounts at a time so its live food at a minimum cost and no on-going culturing hassles. Just make sure you feed all the baby shrimp as soon as they have hatched as their nutritional value decreases after they hatch.

Earthworms- outside in garden i leave out a couple of plastic sheets and old mats. I collect worms from underneath. The worms get chopped up and grinded. The more you grind the smaller the pieces of flesh left. I then rinse everything through a sieve which is necessary as this gets rid of the earth which was previously inside the worms. A bit yukky but yet another way to provide excellent 'live' food for the fish without the need to maintain any cultures.