Copepods - Podcast Episode 69

[Rob]

Copepods, you think you know them? well in this show im joined by Dr. Adelaide Rhodes, a world recognized expert on Copepods. Adelaide will take us though the in's and out's of copepods and what they mean to out tanks today, and in the future.

In this show we discuss
- What are copepods
- Identifying copepods
- What are copepods good for
- How to get copepods in your system
- Breeding copepods in and out of your tank
- And much more

Thread for Manny, looking for controller software

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[V]

now we're talking! these are the ones i like the most

[CarmieJo]

Gosh, I can't wait for this to finish downloading. I've enjoyed reading her website and have thought she would be a really interesting guest on the show.

[Small Fry]

waiting for d/l, sounds really really good. Cuz all i know about them is they are good eats for mandarins

[Danamck]

Rob -

Excellent show. Adelaide was a fantastic guest, with lots of great information. I plan on visiting her site next, if I can ever get off this one! I agree with Veriann - these are my favorite types of shows.

[Rob]

Originally Posted by Danamck

Rob -

Excellent show. Adelaide was a fantastic guest, with lots of great information. I plan on visiting her site next, if I can ever get off this one! I agree with Veriann - these are my favorite types of shows.

awesome, yes, make sure you check out her site, great stuff..
OceanPods

im glad you enjoyed it..
Adelaide was a great guest, and has agreed to do future shows if the listeners want.. just think up some questions and let us know

[bubbletip]

Great show Rob and informative as usual. It was good to hear from Adelaide as I purchased a bottle of Oceanpods about a month ago and placed them in my tank a few weeks before putting in my clowns. I was very skeptical when first receiving the bottle. I honestly only saw a few copepods swimming around the bottle. I could not believe it a few weeks later when I inspected the tank in the middle of the night to see more than I can count on the glass. I wish I had a refugium, but even without on I still have noticed that these little guys(Harpacticoid copepods) have multiplied big time. At night I can see a bunch of them mostly on the glass in the corners of the tank. I thought it was interesting that she mentioned keeping a bit of the glass with some algae as from experience these little guys flock to these areas of the tank. I will take her advice and stop cleaning at least a partial section of glass for them. When I look on the rocks, I rarely see them but I will pick one out from time to time. I am wondering if this has something to do with current in the tank. I have 25-30x turnover going on and I rarely see them anywhere but the glass.

Some LFS's have been selling an alternative copepod(Tigerpods - Tigriopus californicus). Not sure about the benefits of these little guys in our aquariums. What I have noticed is that the Tigerpods are much larger than the Oceanpods. The Oceanpods are really tiny.

I set up a mini refugium with sand(I guess not a good idea) to start culturing some Tigerpods. I think I will try the 1 G Rubbermaid method as it seems the current 5g refugium idea is going to be impossible to get them out. I am really interested in culturing these little guys. It is great to see these products out there these days as like it was said in the show, the mandarins really need these little guys to survive.

At the moment I have a couple questions regarding copepods in general:

1. In noticing Oceanpods mostly on the glass, would high water turnover(20-40x) effect the production of these little buggers in the aquarium?

2. In such a large system(our aquariums) in comparison to the size of these little guys, can someone explain how it is possible for such a small amount of live phytoplankton to be taken in by these little guys? I guess what I am getting at is if I am not seeing them much around the rocks and mostly on the glass, how are they getting to the phytoplankton if it is in the water column? I am turning off my skimmer for an hour after dosing phytoplankton.

Thanks again for the info, Rob. Can't wait to hear a few more out of the million copepod topics in the future.

[wildeone]

Great topic Rob, now I may actually be able figure out what is in my tank. I thought the photo below showed Copepods, but now I don't think they are. I also don't think they are Amphipods, because I have seen the photo of them. So after a little research my educated guess is they are isopods. Maybe sphaeromatid? What do you think?

A litttle history on the photo, sometimes Nori falls out of my clip and gets pulled into the overflow. I usually remove it, but when looking this evening, I saw these buggers all over it.



Whatever they are, they are doing a gereat job at cleanup!

[vanmo92]

WOW! what a great show.

[wwest]

very cool show. i love it. very imformative.. great job rob!!!!

[Astrivian]

This was a wonderful show man. I was wondering something while listening to it. If copie's are more nutritious than rotifers, might culturing copies be the key to sustaining the fry of other fish species? When we were talking rob, you mentioned that only about 20% of the clown fry survive to adulthood. If you are going to try feeding copies instead, maybe that number will increase. Let us know if you do so.

[Rob]

Originally Posted by bubbletip

1. In noticing Oceanpods mostly on the glass, would high water turnover(20-40x) effect the production of these little buggers in the aquarium?

2. In such a large system(our aquariums) in comparison to the size of these little guys, can someone explain how it is possible for such a small amount of live phytoplankton to be taken in by these little guys? I guess what I am getting at is if I am not seeing them much around the rocks and mostly on the glass, how are they getting to the phytoplankton if it is in the water column? I am turning off my skimmer for an hour after dosing phytoplankton.

my answers would be speculative, i will defer to Adelaide on this one

Originally Posted by wildeone

Great topic Rob, now I may actually be able figure out what is in my tank. I thought the photo below showed Copepods, but now I don't think they are. I also don't think they are Amphipods, because I have seen the photo of them. So after a little research my educated guess is they are isopods. Maybe sphaeromatid? What do you think?

A litttle history on the photo, sometimes Nori falls out of my clip and gets pulled into the overflow. I usually remove it, but when looking this evening, I saw these buggers all over it.

yes, think you are right in that they are isopods.

Originally Posted by vanmo92

WOW! what a great show.

Originally Posted by wwest

very cool show. i love it. very imformative.. great job rob!!!!

Thanks guys..

Originally Posted by Astrivian

This was a wonderful show man. I was wondering something while listening to it. If copie's are more nutritious than rotifers, might culturing copies be the key to sustaining the fry of other fish species? When we were talking rob, you mentioned that only about 20% of the clown fry survive to adulthood. If you are going to try feeding copies instead, maybe that number will increase. Let us know if you do so.

actually, what i as mentioning is that i had about 20 survive from my last clutch, people that do this more regularly can get hatch rates as much as 95-98% survival, but yes, it does involve properly enriching (gut packing) the rotifers. Copepods do sound like a great alternative food source, one i will be trying in the future

[BrianPlankis]

Originally Posted by wildeone

Great topic Rob, now I may actually be able figure out what is in my tank. I thought the photo below showed Copepods, but now I don't think they are. I also don't think they are Amphipods, because I have seen the photo of them. So after a little research my educated guess is they are isopods. Maybe sphaeromatid? What do you think?

A litttle history on the photo, sometimes Nori falls out of my clip and gets pulled into the overflow. I usually remove it, but when looking this evening, I saw these buggers all over it.

Whatever they are, they are doing a gereat job at cleanup!

I would agree these are isopods. Now I can't see all of them clearly, but one in the upper right corner of the algae is definitely a male sphaeromatid.

As long as your fish are healthy and not covered in bite marks I would say it is pretty likely they are all the beneficial sphaeromatids.

Brian

[ladygator]

Hey - that is a great picture of some isopods! Can I borrow it for a presentation? I would give you a credit on the photo.

Isopods are great little bugs, but sometimes they can be the parasitic kind, so be careful if you see anything like that latching onto your fish.

Some copepods are parasitic as well, so it is good to know where they come from when you place them in your tank.

Adelaide

[ladygator]

Originally Posted by Astrivian

This was a wonderful show man. I was wondering something while listening to it. If copie's are more nutritious than rotifers, might culturing copies be the key to sustaining the fry of other fish species? When we were talking rob, you mentioned that only about 20% of the clown fry survive to adulthood. If you are going to try feeding copies instead, maybe that number will increase. Let us know if you do so.

Hi - This is a great question, and one that many scientists and hobbyists are feverishly working on trying to find the ultimate copepods. I don't think that we will ever find one species of copepod that will be the 'Magic bullet' and solve all the fish breeders needs as far as nutrition, behaviour and size. However, we are getting closer with each try and I'd love to hear how Rob's fish do on the copepods.

Adelaide

[Rob]

Originally Posted by ladygator

...... However, we are getting closer with each try and I'd love to hear how Rob's fish do on the copepods.

Adelaide

ME TOO!!!..
but i have to get some copepods growing first..
which means i need to change out my phyto from Nano to ISO, or get a large piston powered air pump so i can culture both, as my little air pumps can barely hang with what i have today...lol

[ladygator]

"""""At the moment I have a couple questions regarding copepods in general:

1. In noticing Oceanpods mostly on the glass, would high water turnover(20-40x) effect the production of these little buggers in the aquarium?"""""


The turnover is high, but if there are areas of the tank that are out of the current, the copepods will naturally gravitate there to cling to the substrate. Sand vacuuming will remove more copepods than water turnover, because the copepods are clinging to sand, live rock, macroalgae, etc.

"""""2. In such a large system(our aquariums) in comparison to the size of these little guys, can someone explain how it is possible for such a small amount of live phytoplankton to be taken in by these little guys? I guess what I am getting at is if I am not seeing them much around the rocks and mostly on the glass, how are they getting to the phytoplankton if it is in the water column? I am turning off my skimmer for an hour after dosing phytoplankton.""""""


Copepods are detritivores, so they will recycle their own waste materials, and they retain the nutrients of their food in their flest. The rotifers have to be refed because 1.) they only hold their food in their stomachs and then eject it after a few hours, .) they do not become more nutritious as an animal, they just hold the enrichments in their stomachs for short periods of time.

They copepods are probably grazing on detritus (waste materials) and tiny little algal cells on the glass. That is why it is good to have some phytoplankton in your tank growing on a surface somewhere - doesn't have to be the tank glass can be live rock or on macroalgae.

"""""Thanks again for the info, Rob. Can't wait to hear a few more out of the million copepod topics in the future. [/quote]"""""

Thanks for listening to the podcast. I really enjoyed the experience, and hope to contribute in the future.

Adelaide

[vanmo92]

well...first off, i loved the copopods show....but i did have some questions.
- How long dose it take them to reproduce?
- And how long after birth can they have babies
- how many babies at a time?
- How many times in a lifetime can the have babys?
- Assuming that they dont become something's dinner, how long do they live?

[Rob]

Thanks Vanmo
i will again defer these to Adelaide for the answers

[ladygator]

Originally Posted by vanmo92

well...first off, i loved the copopods show....but i did have some questions.
- How long dose it take them to reproduce?
- And how long after birth can they have babies
- how many babies at a time?
- How many times in a lifetime can the have babys?
- Assuming that they dont become something's dinner, how long do they live?

Hi Vanmo - Are you a biologist? I am so impressed with these questions!

Copepods are a lot like their cousins, the insects, meaning they reproduce rapidly if conditions are favorable. For example, my favorite species Nitokra lacustris, takes 7 to 12 days to reach maturity, then the females will have egg sacs every other day or third day for their adult life span. Nitokra can live up to 90 days. They will have 30 to 50 eggs in each egg sac, depending on if they are being fed well. They only have to mate once to have multiple egg sacs, because they carry the male's sperm around with them and use it like a time release capsule - pretty cool!

Adelaide

[kazam]

well i am new to the board and I love your podcast. I am learning a lot. I have 20 gal with a 10 gal refugium. My clowns have been breeding for the past year. Would love to c a podcast on how to raise a fry. I bought the book by Joyce Wilkerson which is great, but would still love a podcast on it.

thanx for the work Rob, great board

Derek

[Rob]

Originally Posted by kazam

well i am new to the board and I love your podcast. I am learning a lot. I have 20 gal with a 10 gal refugium. My clowns have been breeding for the past year. Would love to c a podcast on how to raise a fry. I bought the book by Joyce Wilkerson which is great, but would still love a podcast on it.

thanx for the work Rob, great board

Derek

Thanks Derek
this is something i have been thinking about doing for some time, especially after going through the process several times, and seeing how things may need to vary from whats in Joyce's book.

we'll see what i can come up with..

[Danamck]

Welcome to TR, Derek. Hope you learn a lot and have fun doing so!

[venn]

Wow. I too really enjoyed this podcast. I have been interested in these little creatures since reading about the difficulty raising the centrogpyes. It sounds like there are several groups in Hawaii that have been looking for the magic bullet to solve the first food problem when raising small fry. Is anyone aware of published research that describes their findings in more detail than news bites? Once again. Great show.

[vanmo92]

No I am not a biologist. In fact I an 14 years old, and have only been doing saltwater for about a year, but the first 7 months I was doign everything wrong so i only consider it about 5 months. I just love our mini-oceans so much and spend ALL my free time doing it. Even while I am at school, I listen on my ipod, to these great TR shows and other podcasts about reefkeeping.