Culturing Phytoplankton - Do you want to?

Have you ever wanted to culture your own phytoplankton?  There are numerous reasons for using live phytoplankton is this hobby let alone in the marine fish, coral and invertebrate breeding.

After attending the last wmas meeting and hearing Robert Di Marco discuss clown breeding and seeing his phytoplankton cultures I would like to share some of my phytoplankton with everyone.

I will give you a starter culture to start your own cultures of live phytoplankton.  Excellent food for culturing copepods, rotifers, brine shrimp and an occasional treat for your reef tank.  If you have bivalves (those beautiful clams) this is perfect.

Disclaimer * yes it's easier to buy it, doesn't take up as much room as culturing and almost as cost effective as culturing, if you can pick it up from a major manufacture (BSD) but what fun is that.

Bigger disclaimer * my personal source material and facts are from Ph.D . Frank Marini's article from Breeder's Net  http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/aug2002/breeder.htm among other places where I gleamed the info.  I also use Marc (aka Melev) Levenson setup http://www.melevsreef.com/phytoplankton.html.  I've been culturing for the last 5 years in NY before moving to Utah and following both Frank and Melev's methods have been very successful in this endeavor.

I culture three isolated strains of phytoplankton to feed my copepods, rotifers and enriching brine shrimp.

My main and easiest culture of phyto is Nannochloropsis, it's a pretty small 2-4 micron green flagellate.  IMHO a great food source for rotifers, copepods and brine shrimp.  It's known to be high in EPA but low in DHA (EPA / DHA are fatty acids important for human and fish development among other things).  This is the most common strain.

My second phyto culture is Tetraselmis, it's a slightly bigger 9-14 micron green flagellate and has equal DHA / EPA ratios but not as high as Nannochloropsis in EPA.  But this phyto has been linked to * (according to Ph.D. Frank Martini ) "produces two antibiotic-like compounds which have been documented to increase survival in larval fish feed on prey items enriched with this phytoplankton".

My third phyto culture is T (Tahiti) - Isochrysis.  This is not a green phytoplankton.  It's a golden yellow to brwon phytoplankton.  It's slightly bigger in size (4-7 micron) to Nannochloropsis but smaller than Tetraselmis.  The Tahiti strain of Isochrysis contains a high level of EPA but is low in DHA.  I believe this is a very good compliment to Nannochloropsis which is high in DHA but low in EPA.  I only just started up this culture so I don't have any to pass along.  This one in my opinion is still pretty rare but you will start to see breeders start to carry this strain.

(Have I bored you to death yet?) 

Btw, I use Micro Algae Grow (dry form) it's cheaper then the fluid and you get more.  It will last you a long time.  Melev uses Miracle Grow Plant food, it looks like it works too but I don't know enough of what it will do to your tank but Melev has a kick @ss system that is the cat's meow.

So in conclusion, yea you can buy live and dead phytoplankton.  You can buy concentrated phytoplankton paste.  You can say the same for live copepods (not cheap), live rotifers (not cheap) and live brine shrimp (yea it's cheap, I'll give you that).  But what fun is it.  This hobby should be fun IMHO.

Ok, I do have a ulterior motive to giving away starter cultures.  As in this hobby, I will on occasion crash my primary culture, maybe my secondary culture and backup starter culture and will need a handout from someone who has live phytoplankton.  I believe in paying it forward.  These things are relatively cheap to culture, but a pain in the rear to buy and ship especially the last two strains considering it's not as popular in the home aquarist yet.

Also if you have other isolated strains let's talk. 




Edited by sterling18 - April 04 2010 at 11:46pm

Adam Blundell wrote: Hey Peter- just wanted to say I'm glad you made it out here.  HVRK is great, but having you here is better.   Adam

Thank you for the warm welcome.  Good to be here.  Hope I can be an asset to the board.

sterling18 wrote: Disclaimer * yes it's easier to buy it, doesn't take up as much room as culturing and almost as cost effective as culturing, if you can pick it up from a major manufacture (BSD) but what fun is that. (yea it's cheap, I'll give you that).  But what fun is it.  This hobby should be fun IMHO.

 

I've gotten afew responses for Phyto, awesome.

Edited by sterling18 - April 07 2010 at 11:01am

That's awesome Joe.

Can't wait to see your results on your tank and the new system you put in.

If you guys ever have any extra I'd buy some.

maxpwr wrote: Peter, thanks for the starter culture of phyto.  I harvested 3 liters of it last week and put it in my fridge (if anyone wants phyto let me know).  I have 3 more liters ready for harvest now.  I appreciate your advice for setting up; it seems to be working very well so far.  The setup was very easy.  A few of the supplies I already had on hand, but I spent another $20 or so between Walmart and Petco.  Took me about an hour to set everything up. I’ve been feeding some of the phyto to baby brine shrimp and hope to start a rotifer culture soon.  Thanks again for all your help!

Kent,

feed please!

post pictures of your set up 

I too would like a starter of greenwater, and pods. Let me know, wheneve. THANKS

Dustin