Promoting micro-organisms

If I am trying to establish a 30 gallon tank into a mini pond with an abundance of micro-orgasnisms, i would be better to take out the white cloud minnows, yes? I was thinking they would eat alot of the daphnia type creatures which I want to build up. The aim being to raise larvae in the tank with not much hand from myself at all. I like the fish but maybe they have to go, they wouldn't touch the larvae but they might eat all the food, what do you think?

any tips on creating my mini-pond are appreciated..
I am introducing a cup of pond water every week with the water change,,

In my microscopic analysis of my aquariums. My axolotl's tank has numerous planktonic just-visible-to-the-eye (0.1-2 mm?) organisms swimming around in there, while my mudpuppy's tank has very few of these. I only got lucky once to capture a dead one once and see it under the scope, clearly it was some ugly crustacean, but since it was dead, I don't know if it was specifically a Daphnia.

The main difference between the tanks is lighting. Mudpuppy has a run of the mill pet store chain light apparatus/bulb. On the axolotl's tank I purchased the light at a local aquarium shop that specializes in planted tanks and is ridiculously bright to penetrate the water.

Looking at the microrganisms that the plankton feed on, the tanks correlate well. My axolotl and mudpuppy's tank have the same diversity of organisms, (ameoba, algae (desmids, diatoms, etc), cilliates, nematodes, rotifers...) but the numbers present in the well lit aquarium are astounding.

Also in terms of transferring pond water. You always have to be cautious, since you don't know what you're going to get with that water. However, Looking at objects in the tank. Simple water seems to be relatively sparsely populated, while the surfaces of stones and logs are much richer. So you may get more bang for your buck if you move objects over water from the pond.

I never had cloud minnows, but I suspect these are going to work against your desire. Fish tend to eat everything they can in my hands.

In summary, I think lighting may be key if you want to establish your pond set up. Also you can read how people culture daphnia and try to work some of their tricks into your tank. But I think if you can get a rich plant life established in an aquarium, you'll have the right environment.

That's helpful, thanks Pete, I have a flouresent aquarium light along the length of the tank, when I get home from work I'll post some pics of my setup. I know that there are different intencity's of lights available, not sure which mine was, near the lower end I think, minimal heat.
There will be a cooler operating aswell, too simulate the seasons, and a timer on the light for correct photo-periods.

Does anyone have a standard set of photo-period scheduals over a year which are a good standard to stick to, or is it just up to me and which species of caudate I want to coax into breeding?
I was thinking maybe, just change the timer on the summer and winter soltice accordingly..

I agree the white cloud mountain minnows have to go. I have three tanks, two with axolotls one with white clouds. There are lots of a tiny daphnia like creature with the axolotls but none to speak of in with the white clouds. Plant wise water cress forms a vigorously growing floating tangled mess with the yellowing underwater leaves disappearing into a cloud of infusoria. It is fine with a single 15W tube in a tank of your size but two is better. I use a 16 hour light cycle on a timer but you should adjust this if your species require different photoperiods. Sorry it's not the best of pictures but is this the sort of tank you want to create?

Daphnia

I put wild daphnia into my tank, it was in there for about a week and now there is no sign of it.
I know that daphnia feed on dissolved organic matter/bacteria/detritus/microalgae and have read up on the methods of culturing them etc. I may just have to set up a seperate culture for them with a paddling pool on part of the downstairs roof, will get good light and no-one goes there.,,BUT

I would really like to have a self sustaining population in the tank, obviously I don't want my tank getting messed up with cloudy green water, nor do I want to effect the levels and water quality as the newts live in there.

Is there some kind of food which can be put in tank without fouling water or does anyone have any guidance at all?

A kind of slimey green stuff has been slowly spreading through the tank (NOT the dreaded blue green algae) and I thought this may help them survive, so I left it to grow, but no daphnia!

I did find multiple very small white worms cruising across the glass yesterday, they disappeared as quickly as they came (unless they're just hiding, they are very small)

If the newts are eating the daphnia, then I think there is no way to keep a population in the tank for any length of time. I have seen tanks where daphnia have persisted for many months, but in these cases I'm pretty sure that the newts just aren't eating them. Also, in these cases, there aren't many daphnia, just a few.

The saltwater hobby has a concept of the "refugium", which is a separate mini-tank attached to the main tank that provides an area where small food organisms can proliferate w/o being eaten. But in the case of daphnia it seem to me it would be a lot easier to just culture it in a separate container.

Might I suggest some additional invertebrates to play around with adding to your tank, but you always have to be careful with diseases:

Hoglouse/waterlouse - the aquatic equivalent of woodlouse
Planaria
a whole variety of small aquatic worms similar to tubifex
fresh water shrimp

You can play around with different species, not all will be suited for your aquarium, but at least a few species of each of the animals I've listed has managed to survive along side newts in one of my aquariums (hoglouse get eaten pretty quickly if there aren't plenty of rocks to hide under though).

When taking invertebrates from the wild, always be careful to take invertebrates from ponds that are similar to how you want your aquarium to be - for most newts this would be heavy with oxygenators and other water plants, slow current, partially shaded, shallow, and not too much algae. Invertebrates from other sources will either die under these conditions, or alter the aquarium in ways that may be undesirable. If you're looking to really boost your invertebrate population, take soil samples and plants from a pond or multiple ponds and put them in your aquarium.

Thanks Ben that's helpful, I already have quite a lot of plants form other ponds. I was thinking of taking some leaf litter from the bottom of the ditch where I found schools of wild daphnia to bed the sand bottom in my tank, there's a lot of gunk comes with them, but maybe this would all settle down after the initial mess?

Well if it proves to be too much of a mess, then you can always leave it in for a week, and then remove it giving the animals time to move to other parts of the tank. Also leaf litter is a little bit nasty because it's rotting and it puts tannins, acid, and excess nutrients into the water, be cautious with it, especially avoid pine needles. I'd suggest taking maybe a small amount of leaf litter, but also taking a small part of the soil beneath it, you could put the soil in a tray or something so you could remove it easily if it became a problem. I think I remember somebody using natural substrates a couple years back, but I can't remember who.

The title of this thread reminds me of when I was in nursing school taking microbiology,
I wanted to get a shirt that said,
"Can you eat? Thank an autotroph"

and start a club called "Friends of Microorganisms"; I'd sometimes say
to my classmates, "Hail, fellow chemoheterotroph!"

*sigh* I didn't really fit in.

I think you are going to have a very hard time maintaining micro-invertebrate populations at levels that would sustain caudate larva. To get populations of things like daphnia you are going to need suitable levels of food for them. I would recommend higher lighting, possibly sunlight, to grow algae. You need a good base of producers if you want large populations of consumers. They need to consume something.

I still think that any number of caudate larva would be too many apex predators for such a mini-habitat.

otterwoman said:

The title of this thread reminds me of when I was in nursing school taking microbiology,
I wanted to get a shirt that said,
"Can you eat? Thank an autotroph"

and start a club called "Friends of Microorganisms"; I'd sometimes say
to my classmates, "Hail, fellow chemoheterotroph!"

*sigh* I didn't really fit in.

Click to expand...

Why didn't we go to school together, Dawn?

Abrahm said:

Why didn't we go to school together, Dawn?

Click to expand...

Amen to that!

I have a happy population of Daphnia in a 10 gallon aquarium. I add waste-water from my tanks, and seeded with a small population of daphnia and a large population of greenwater. I put the aquarium next to the window with a fluorescent strip, and it's been thriving. Slowly, all sorts of things have appeared, including some shrimp-like thing. I'm not sure what that's eating.

In the past I have setup a 10 gallon aquarium with a fine layer of gravel and a sponge filter. I then "seeded" it with some plant material from a local pond and added some java moss as well. After several months I saw various small invertebrates. This was my emergency larvae tank. That summer I did have some unexpected Salamandra larvae which I put into this tank. They all did very well in the short amount of time that I kept them. I agree that this type of setup would not permanently sustain a sizable population of larvae however it worked great for an initial food source. As a matter of fact part of my to do list includes setting up several more this spring. As already mentioned though there is a risk of introducing some potential predator and/or parasite.
Chip

thanks for the input, there's gong to be a paddling pool on the roof I think.

I'll be in ''friends of microorganisms'' Dawn, if you be in my ''shark club''

I thought you had a squid club?