Difficultly of culturing daphnia?

[diamondlittle]

Hi everyone,
I recently moved and am having a hard time finding live food for my newts. I recently started culturing black worms (I don't know if their numbers are growing, but I've successfully kept them alive for awhile now), and someone suggested daphnia. My newts never tried them before, but I figured I could buy some online and go from there. I've read a lot about culturing them online, and am kind of confused. Some sites say that there is virtually no care involved in keeping them and that any water (other than tap) is okay, yet others say green water is necessary and that they are very fragile creatures. Can anyone who has had any experience culturing daphnia maybe clue me in to what is correct? At times I feel that I would successfully be able to care for them, yet other sites make me feel that it is hopeless. Thanks!

 

[diamondlittle]

After further looking into the subject, I have a few, more specific questions maybe you can help me with. I am getting the idea that there are two basic ways to culture daphnia, one method which uses aged water and yeast, and another green water. I am slightly hesitant to use green water as I think it would be best to grow the algae by leaving the container outside, and I am wary of mosquito and disease and all that. Can green water be cultured inside using a window and light?
If using yeast, green water is not used (I think, becasue the yeast is the food source vs the algae) and a yeast solution is mixed up and poured into the tank every few days? Is my thinking correct? Any info would be greatly appreciated!

 

[jewett]

I have never cultured daphnia, but I have cultured moina and I think they are similar enough I could compare my experience. I did not use green water but the aged water with yeast as food. My cultures seemed to get a faint unpleasant smell to me, but they did produce pretty well for me for a number of weeks. I kept the cultures in 1/2 gallon glass jars, and would dump 1/2 the contents of one jar through a brine shrimp net every few days and use that to feed my larvae. I would then fill the partially emptied jar with more aged or old tank water and add a very small amount of yeast. I had three jars going like this. I think my moina culture would have lasted longer, but I was impatient for them to reproduce more, and over harvested once. The culture never recovered from this, but they lived with this setup - they didn't die off this way and the culture only failed because I took too many for the population to recover.
Good luck and I do hope this helps, and that others can contribute as well.
Heather

 

[Jake]

I culture both Daphnia magna and Daphnia pulex in outdoor and indoor tubs. The oudoor cultures tend to produce higher numbers.

I just fill rubbermaid tubs with 6 inches of water. Then I add a handful of wood chips. I then pour in a few cups of water that has a mixture of axolotl waste and broken down trout chow. That sets in the sun for a few days, and I add a couple Daphnia. In a couple of weeks the tubs are blooming with them.

Indoors I just use a 30 gallon hexagon tank and fill it half way with tap water and let it set, and the other half with axolotl waste water (from when I do tub water changes). If I add a few Daphnia to it, they usually start to blossom in about a month.

Daphnia are fragile, but as long as you use a few methods with your starter culture, and split them up into groups (just in case one method fails), you'll get the hang of it.

Good luck!

-Jake

 

[Jennewt]

Yes, green water can be grown in a sunny window indoors.

I grow daphnia with dissolved yeast and a bit of spirulina powder. To keep an indoor culture going long-term, it's a bit tricky. I made my share of mistakes initially. Avoid overfeeding; it's really tempting to try to get them to reproduce faster by putting in more food, but this can cause total disaster. If you use yeast or other non-live food, add only enough food to barely cloud the water, and don't feed again until the water is crystal clear. And daphnia tanks need water changes, just like any tank.

Good luck!

 

[Ralf]

Let me remind you that there is also an excellent site on Daphnia within the caudata.org-family: http://www.caudata.org/daphnia/

 

[terrytherat]

i at first had trouble culturing daphnia but i think i have now got a fool proof method.
i have got 2 black dustbins that i grow green water in.
to start the green water process fill the dustbins (must be black) 3 quarters full with tapwater leave for 3 to 4 days then add 2 gallons of pondwater and about half a pound of lettace leaves leave for another 2 weeks and remove lettace leaves then add baby bio plant food or other plant food and leave in sunny place(this is to feed your daphnia).
get some clear plastic storage boxes,(must be clear) the size i use is 22x16x11 inches deep fill with tapwater and let them stand for a few days (if you can add pondwater its better) seed the plastic tub with daphnia and add enough green water to just make it cloudy,when the water goes clear just add more to make it cloudy again.
if you keep 2 or 3 of these going you will have so much daphnia you wont know what to do with it.
and i dont do water changes the only water change mine get is when it rains

 

[Otterwoman]

I'm working on trying to get some daphnia going and refining my techniqes so I'll have some for the spring. I have some going in a jar with a bubbler. How necessary is a bubbler (I'm asking before I split them in to more jars and create a smelly mess of jars full of death).

 

[coendeurloo]

I still have a culture outside going, even though it has been freezing at night sometimes. I just have a large tank outside, about 80x40 cm, filled with rainwater and some javamoss, and some dirt on the bottom. I also have a smaller tank outside in which i grow the green water, i do this by just adding a small cup of fertilizer every now and then. and then I just add one cup of that water into the daphnia tank every other week.