Culturing your own Phytoplankton

[TheDeepSandBed]

I was just wondering how everyone on the forum felt abotu the benfits/detriments of using your own phytoplankton cultures, and more importantly how they setup their colonies and maintained them.

Thanks

[Anthony Calfo]

While I think live cultures are the best assuming you culture them properly, know your species and if they are useful to your filter-feeders, specifically, etc....

I must admit that this aspect of the hobby (phyto culture) is way too tedious to me.

I prefer to use fresh, refrigerated, bottled commercial products. Its not mystery that I use, recommend, admire the quality products from DTs. The man (Dennis Tagrin) knows his business and science very well(!). To chat with him at any of the hobby conferences is impressive, if such science and industry interest you.

And so... with a talented culturist, and a blend of species in a bottle that I do not have the time or money (necessary culture equipment), the purchase saves me a lot of time and serves my purposes very well (enough).

That all said, live phyto culture is popular with many aquarists. Rather simple, albeit tedious for at least a couple strains of phyto commonly available. Of course... there is the issue too of finessing the cultures to manufacture maximum nutritional value in the final product (this aspect of phyto culture is VERY interesting. not all bottles of the same/given species are the same nutritional quality).

Do a search of the archives my friend... there are tons of threads on the topic you seek here.

Afterwards... do followup with specific questions if you still have them.

best of luck/life,

Anthony

PS - to be clear here too... I am not paid to endorse this or any product! And I am sure that I have taken less free samples than most aquarists do at industry hobby/trade shows through the years. I simply speak my mind frankly about brands/products. FWIW. Just my opinion :)

[moumda]

Anthony, is there any danger of adding too many toxic chemicals from the fertiziler to our tanks? I still culture phyto to raise rotifers but after talking to Dennis and Randy Reed I'm nervous about adding it to my tank. Just wondering your opinion on this.

[fishdr]

I read a post earlier where Anthony said that using miracle grow or another fertilizer was bad because it adds too many trace elements to our tanks. He sugeste using Urea which does not have the same chemicals as other liquid fertilizer.

[Hobster]

Here are some links to get you going on culturing. Too much effort for me.:D

http://www.sjwilson.net/reef/phytosteps.html

http://www.melevsreef.com/phytoplankton.html

[Anthony Calfo]

yep... as Hobster says: too much work for me :D

To do it right, that is.

Yes... contamination is an issue. Its the old adage, "you are what you eat"...

and using bulk, low grade lawn fertilizer to grow algae that you will feed your $20K reef tank... is a horrible idea IMO :p

Dennis is a wealth of information and very objective. He is a savvy businessman and knows that his best consumer is an educated consumer. And educated consumers realize very quickly that growing the best/safest phyto is more than a bottle of greenwater and a light bulb :D

[TheDeepSandBed]

hmmm the idea of using my pee to feed the phytoplankton would finally put to bed my roommates desire to pee in my fishtank :rollface:

[Bugger]

Athony If I run my phyto through packed cotton and then test the water for nitrate will that be good enough to see wether or not more or less furtilizer should be used.

Johnny

[Anthony Calfo]

hard for me to say, although the answer is likely no.

What kind of fertilizer?

[Moreta]

I culture my own phyto and feel a bit schizophrenic as I am constantly trying to grow alage in one place (the culture station) and keep it from growing another (the display tanks) ;)

[Bugger]

I use F2 from florida aqua farms

[Bugger]

Anthony is right it so diffucult and time consuming anybody that tells you its easy to grow is a liar.

[TheDeepSandBed]

So far the setup has been easy (and cheap <$100). Tomorrow the cultures go into their bottles and start the cycle. A few here have expressed concerns over how much work it takes and it seems to me (thus far) that getting the station setup is the hardest part.

Anthony also commented that it takes more than a green bottle and light to grow a "good food" for yoru tank and I have to disagree. With the fertilizer from FAF and the cultures from FAF hwo would it be that much different from thier bottled product, relative to how much you are saving. If there is one thing this hobby has taught me is that strong science wins in the end, and the science here seems straight forward. Phytoplankton need two things for the most part: 1) light 2) supplemental nutrients via the medium. Seeing as the station is setup in a climate controlled area (my closet) temperature wont be an issue. And I have to belive that the bottom of the water food pryamid has to be at least moderately easy to grow with a little know-how. Afterall I do have a green thumb on land.

I have also learned that many thigns in this hobby are overpriced for what they are and I dont see phytoplankton being any different (DIY for the win!). Either way I will let you all know of my success/failure and what i have learned in the process over the next couple of months. Wish me luck!

:rollface:

[moumda]

I've been growing phyto for a year or two now and it's not difficult but it is time consuming. I have a predominately sps tank so I only use it to grow rotifers. There are some metals used in the fertilizer that I don't really want to add to my tank. DT's and Reed's phytofeast are centrifudged to dilute the metals in their product. Not saying you can't add it just don't add to much and skimm heavily. JMO.

[TheDeepSandBed]

I was also hoping that the feeding of the live phyto on a regular basis might help to grow some rotifers in the tank to help feed the corals. Now culturing rotifers seems kinda like a pain in the ***, but we will see where I am at in a couple of months.

[Puffer Queen]

Rotifers do require a lot of work. They are demanding & do require daily feedings & careful monitoring of water quality & culture densities.

Greenwater is not as demanding as the rotifers but does require feedings & frequent splitting to avoid crashes. Contamination is a real issue. Also keeping the rotifer cultures away from the greenwater to avoid accidental splashing or introduction of them into the greenwater cultures is essential.

It can be done but does require hard work & daily attention.....in other words time could be your limiting factor.

Hope this helps.

Kelly

[Puffer Queen]

If you want more information or want to check availability of greenwater, rotifers, etc - Florida Aqua Farms is great -https://3kserver7.com/~frank/secure/agora.cgi.

I would also recommend the Plankton Culture Manual & another book called Conditioning, Spawning and Rearing of Fish With Emphasis on Marine Clownfish. Both of these books are available through Florida Aqua Farms.

Best of Luck,
Kelly

[moumda]

I do rotifers a little differently. I have a 5 gallon bucket that I started a rotifer culture in. I feed the bucket daily. Every couple of days I take out 1/2 gallon, sieve it through a 53 micron filter, and add it to my tank. I then put in fresh salt water at 1.2 gravity. I don't get real high density cultures but enough to feed my tank.

[Shark Bait100]

I culture my own Phyto for the last 6 months, and I recently tested the water for Phosphates since a couple of my sps acropora were browning out. The phosphate were high, ~.3 ppm. I tested everything for phosphate, then tried the phyto cutures. They were loaded with phosphates. I run a 29 gal fuge with chaeto and recently added Phosban to lower the phosphates. Has anyone else seen high levels of phosphate in their cultures, whether they use plant food or not???

[TheDeepSandBed]

So am I wrong to think that adding phtyo to my tank will help to develop the rotifer population for feeding within the tank? Or is it necessary to culture them outside of the tank?

[Shark Bait100]

I was adding for that purpose, rotifers and pods. I'm not sure what to do next, I might be adding to much for my system, was adding 1/2 cup every day or so. Once my levels get down to.03, I will start adding again, but at lower amounts and monitor the phosphates more closely. I would like to know if people that are using DT's is having the same problem.

[moumda]

If you use dt's or phytofeast the nutients have been diluted down to the point of being immaterial. If you add your own home grown phyto you will be adding nutients to your tank. I add phytofeast to my tank for the copepods and feed my homegrown to the rotifer culture. I don't think you can grow much in the way of rotifers in your tank. There's just too many predators IMO.

[bvoss]

Culturing live food is fun and rewarding until you realize you can never leave your house for more than 24 hours for the rest of your life! I am looking forward to the time when we have good reliable planton reactors that run unattended for perhaps 2 days.

Until then, I am a very happy user of golden pearls. The Acros don't seem to notice the difference

[Samala]

I feel like I am the only person here who has no issues growing phyto.. Isochrysis, Nanno or Tet. ?? Really odd.. I just have a few 2L flasks, an air pump and line and a strip light (40W 6500K) that runs 24hours. I pay attention to the cultures every four or five days when they start to bloom. Split them in half and give away or use the portion and add saltwater and ferts on top of the mother culture. It really hasnt been bad in my experience.

I also started making phyto paste on my own but I have access to some centrifuges so I guess I am cheating that way. ;)

Also, I tested the culture water after I had filtered out the algae cells tonight.. only one of the three had testable phosphates by the spec's terms, and none had testable nitrate. I did just split the culture, so perhaps all the nutrients were being used up anyway.

So I guess I will just continue to pray that my algae farms dont go south? I've been at this about eight months now.. we have no issues culturing diatoms at work either. Oh I should mention we use f/2 medium from Aquatic Eco in the dry mass pack form.

Hmm..
>Sarah

[Anthony Calfo]

another interesting issue is the inherent quality of the phyto dependant not only on the source of nutrition/fertilizer for it, but the very temperature it is cultured at! (mfgs culture commercial phyto in refridegerated rooms in part for quality issues.

As alluded to previously... not all phyto (same species in culture) is equal!

There is usually a significant difference in quality (not in our favor) between what is cultured at home in soda bottles versus matter cultured from a good lab/mfg. Really... it is a big difference.

[Shark Bait100]

Well I tested a new batch of cultures with increased light. They tested out with near zero on phosphates. I retested the original cultures I had in the frig, and they were off scale. This leads me to believe that I was not supplying enough light to fully eat up all the fertilizer, or I have to experiment with the shelf life of cultures in the frig.

[Moreta]

(nods at Shark Bait) I've found that higher/consistent light makes a huge difference.

[TheDeepSandBed]

Anthony,
I was wondering abotuyour comment of home grown quality versus lab grown quality of phytos. What exactly makes a "better" phytoplankto, and how would one go about measuring this quality to quantize exactly how much better these commercial products are?

I was also wondering, if there are anyways that you can store a culture (perhaps freeze it or something else) if you wanted to go on vacation for a couple of weeks that would be good if you wanted to start a culture back up from it in a few weeks?

[Anthony Calfo]

nutritional analysis... and expensive to have tested. But the same phyto on the same feeds, but grown at different temps (warmer/room temp is less favorable) produces a product of different nutritional value.

Hmm... I could be mistaken here, but recall reading this at length/often through the years as well as hearing the lab folks recite this.

I'll drop a line to some folks in the biz and see if we can''t find some data to clarify this.

My overall point though is:

lab/commercial cultured phyto is significantly more nutritious than home-grown

This is my belief. Now lets get some data and I'll reinforce that belief or learn something new ;)

[Anthony Calfo]

well... that was fast: Mr Tagrin from DT's replied promtly to a request for information.

his comments are pasted below here.

He has also shared a reference from Guillard who developed the F/2 formula and is with the (CCMP) Center for Culture
of Marine Phytoplankton! (next posts)

interesting reading:

----------------------------

At DT's Plankton Farm; we use advanced cell separation technology that was developed to harvest live, undamaged cells. This is a long, tedious, and expensive process. This same process is used to wash the cells by repeatedly adding and extracting clean saltwater. This product was developed specifically for use in the closed system environment of reef aquariums.

In contrast, centrifuging phytoplankton is a process used by some companies to make algae paste for commercial aquaculture. This process was not designed to harvest live cells and in fact, the cells are scraped out like clay. This method is fast and cheap, but it damages a large percentage of cells. Several companies are purchasing these algal pastes as frozen concentrated phytoplankton to use as ingredients in their marine aquariums
products.

Another concern in any phytoplankton product is unwanted elements resulting from the growth medium. Our concentrating process utilizes a cell washing procedure to remove nutrients and metals that are necessary to culture phytoplankton. This procedure is done by repeatedly adding and extracting
clean saltwater to remove most of the residual culture media. Nutrient removal is necessary because high nutrient levels in packaged live phytoplankton will cause bacteria blooms that will kill off some of the live phytoplankton, and quickly degrade the product while in storage. Furthermore, high levels of dissolved nutrients that contribute to unwanted algal growth.

Metals are removed to keep them from building up in reef aquariums. While many growth media exist, most phytoplankton culture media contains; ferric chloride, EDTA, cobalt chloride, zinc sulfate, copper sulfate, manganese chloride, and sodium molybdate.

While the potential harm the buildup of these chemicals may have is debatable, not knowing their potential detriment is enough reason to avoid repeatedly adding them to the small closed
system volume of a reef aquarium.

Culturing phytoplankton may be a good option if you are using
phytoplankton to raise zooplankton, or for fish culture. The effectiveness and addition of growth media used may depend on the culture, and their result in a reef aquarium may be variable, depending on the culturist. However, our efforts at cleaning phytoplankton are done to make it as safe as possible for
long term use directly in a reef aquarium.

[Anthony Calfo]

A significant message/reminder that I take from the above comments by Mr Tagrin as it relates to the home culture of phyto harkens back to the "you are what you eat" issue as well as concerns with residuals from the medium/"fertilizers" used.

To me, this is akin to the dreadful habit that too many aquarists have of not thawing and decanting the pack juice of frozen foods. Just dumping it in (frozen or thawed) brings in nutrients with each feeding that are like rocket fuel for nuisance algae! Its such an important matter that some public aquariums/fisheries will rinse and aerate their thawing frozen food in cold water to strip proteins and nutrients that contribute unduly to diatom algae growth on the viewing panels of the display aquariums.

I did not realize that DTs rinsed their product. Very cool/interesting.

[Anthony Calfo]

the Provasoli-Guillard National Center for Culture of Marine Phytoplankton (CCMP)

Recipes

f/2 Medium and Derivatives

(Guillard & Ryther 1962, Guillard 1975)

Below are recipes for f/2 medium, its derivatives (e.g, f/2 agar, f/2-Si, f/2 + Se, f/4, f/50) and related media (e.g., Black Sea). F/2 is listed first, followed by derivatives of f/2.

f/2 Medium
(Guillard & Ryther 1962, Guillard 1975)
To 950 mL filtered seawater add:
Quantity Compound Stock Solution Molar Concentration in Final Medium
1 mL NaNO3 75 g/L dH2O 8.83 x 10-4 M
1 mL NaH2PO4 · H2O 5 g/L dH2O 3.63 x 10-5 M
1 mL * Na2SiO3 · 9H2O* 30 g/L dH2O* 1.07 x 10-4 M*
1 mL f/2 trace metal solution (see recipe below) -
0.5 mL f/2 vitamin solution (see recipe below) -
Make final volume up to 1 L with filtered seawater and autoclave.
*Note: Autoclaved f/2 medium produces extensive silica precipitate. We delete silicate when it is not required by the alga (see f/2-Si medium below).


f/2 Trace Metal Solution
(Guillard & Ryther 1962, Guillard 1975)
To 950 mL dH2O add:
Quantity Compound Stock Solution Molar Concentration in Final Medium
3.15 g FeCl3 · 6H2O - 1 x 10-5 M
4.36 g Na2EDTA · 2H2O - 1 x 10-5 M
1 mL CuSO4 · 5H2O 9.8 g/L dH2O 4 x 10-8 M
1 mL Na2MoO4 · 2H2O 6.3 g/L dH2O 3 x 10-8 M
1 mL ZnSO4 · 7H2O 22.0 g/L dH2O 8 x 10-8 M
1 mL CoCl2 · 6H2O 10.0 g/L dH2O 5 x 10-8 M
1 mL MnCl2 · 4H2O 180.0 g/L dH2O 9 x 10-7 M
Make final volume up to 1 L with dH2O. Autoclave.


f/2 Vitamin Solution
(Guillard & Ryther 1962, Guillard 1975)
To 950 mL dH2O add:
Quantity Compound Stock Solution Molar Concentration in Final Medium
1 mL Vitamin B12 (cyanocobalamin) 1.0 g/L dH2O 1 x 10-10 M
10 mL Biotin 0.1 g/L dH2O 2 x 10-9 M
200 mg Thiamine · HCl - 3 x 10-7 M
Make final volume up to 1 L with dH2O. Autoclave and store in refrigerator. Note: Vitamin B12 and biotin are obtained in a crystalline form. When preparing the vitamin B12 stock solution, allow for approximately 11% water of crystallization (for each 1 mg of Vitamin B12, add 0.89 mL dH2O). When preparing the biotin stock solution, allow for approximately 4% water of crystallization (for each 1 mg of biotin, add 9.6 mL dH2O).

[TheDeepSandBed]

Anthony first of all, YOU ROCK! Thank you for the very interesting/informative posts (utilizing great contacts). I guess what I have taken from all this discussion, is that grow phytoplankton seems to be only a viable option if you are growing rotifers. In light of that I have decided to expand my experiment and try my hand at raising rotifers as well. However I still plan on trying to add a portion of my home grown greenwater to my tank - perhaps using a slightly modified methodology of doing a sort of water change on my phytos. Anyone have any idea how large of a filter I should use on the phyto? I am guessing around 20 um (cant do the nano symbol) since rotifers are around 52-56um.

Thanks a lot for all the info everyone - that is why there is no other better source for information than RC.

RESTECBA!!!

[Anthony Calfo]

very welcome my friend.

And indeed... this is not to say that home-grown phyto is bad. Its not a matter of good versus bad. But rather (IMO) good versus better. What is "better", though, is to be determined by the end user. For me... it is time savings and edge on quality that draws me to commercially produced phyto. If I needed (very) large quantities, or simply liked the challenge of tinkering, I may well indeed culture my own.

As for rotifers... yes, please! Do always culture zooplankton when possible. Copepods too (see the Marini article in Adbanced Aquarist e-zine, and the Rhodes article on copepods in the Conscientious Aquarist e-zine).

A majority of the corals we keep are carnivores and will benefit by such plankton.

FWIW... I culture my live copepods on bottled phyto :p

I will keep digging for the info on temp influence on nutritional value of cultured phyto.

[Moreta]

I use the phyto as a culture for both 'pods and to occasionally grow out brine shrimp, as well as dosing (some of) my tanks.

I really do like the DTs product, it's just too darn expensive.

Please do keep digging on the temp/nutrition aspect, as I culture in my basement which is usually 65 degrees or so. I get around that by putting mu culture bottles into shallow water in 10 gallon tanks and use a small heater to raise it to 75 degrees.

It's worked well, but I'd love to know how to tweak the nutritional content via temperature.

[Anthony Calfo]

another fab reply from Mr Tagrin/DT's (very good of him to share the tips/insights to phyto culture):

------------------

Most hobbyists who are culturing phytoplankton are growing
Nannochloropsis oculata. Nannochloropsis will be at its highest nutritional value if grown at a temperature of 20C ( 68F) or lower.

When grown at temperatures above 20C to 25C the EPA levels drop and the culture growth rate was unaffected.

Salinity is also important, a salinity between 25-30 ppt will produce the highest EPA levels. If it is cultured with a light dark cycle the algae divides fastest in the dark cycle and accumulates fatty acids better in the light cycle.

We grow it with 24 hour lighting because it will always have high EPA levels when harvested.

One other very important aspect is the potency of the vitamins. The B vitamins are very important in the production of EPA.

Vitamin potency is affected by temperature and different
vitamins have different minimal storage requirements. We use tissue culture grade vitamins that I get from Fisher Scientific. The B12 has to be stored refrigerated the Biotin is frozen and the Thiamine is at room temp. We make a stock solution of B12 and Biotin in doses to make up 2 liters for culture media that is kept in frozen storage. The daily dose of vitamins are mixed daily from frozen stock along with the Thiamine.

It is easy to culture green water but producing quality phytoplankton is not a simple process.

[TheDeepSandBed]

Does anyone know if there is a reliable way to make a preservable culture at home that you can use in case of crashes (rather than reordering a new culture)?

PS what does EPA stand for?

-Ben

[APFish]

OK, bottom line is that I believe some of the above information provided but w/o out the money to test the theories I have nothing to stand on. First of all, I believe a large amount growth rates, size of particulate matter and basically the genetic make up is just that genetics. When I started growing phyto I asked these same great questions to my local reef club with no response. I am finally glad to see an open discusssion. As generations increase, it would be my theory that several things would come into play. I would have to know the basic root of the chain and to where it was multiplying, I don't. DT's has done great research to find out how to get a range of different size phyto into their mixture. At the same time if one was to use their mixture would they not in fact end up with the same mixture or do they cross generate and therfore develop an entirely differnt breed of phyto. I hate little things. When a black cow breeds with a red bull, black is the dominate charecteristic and most of the time you end up with a black calf. My thought is, can a black pyhto of size 20 cross with a red bull of size 50 and end up with a size 20 calf most of the time. Will they even cross?


After all that, here is my two cents. I don't have the money to spend on DT's. So,I grow my own. I raise them at about 68 degrees. I place week salt water, almost brine, in a jar. I place some DT's where I break down once every couple of months and buy some, in the jar. Next, I add a squirt of fish emulsion and some trace minerls. Finally, I shake it up and put a air stone in the jar. I put it in front of a grow light, that is on for about 14 hours a day and shake it in the morning while I do the three S's of american manhood.

Could I be slowly killing my reef? I guess but it hasn't shown in any of my basic tests and I frag probably more than the average bear. Bottom line is, it is working for me. I am in this hobby because I like it and this works for me. I don't sell anything I raise and don't have the money for expensive theories.

[Samala]

What is this red bull calf question? Are you asking if different species of phyto grown together will result in hybrids? All I can say is most likely not. Sexual reproduction of phyto.. particularly the diatoms.. is a very badly understood process.. mostly because it is a fleeting occurrence in nature. Most of the time phyto's are reproducing vegetatively.. one cell splits into two daughter cells.

In diatoms this actually leads to a reduction in size because they are reproducing their silica shell, which is shaped like a petri dish. So, one daughter cell always works off the larger 'lid' of the petri and one of the smaller 'dish'. As they divide they get smaller.. most research points towards sexual reproduction in diatoms, which restores the cells to the 'normal' size, being triggered when the cells hit 35% of their original/normal size. That could be an easy way for DT's to assure you that you have a range of sizes in the mix if they are including diatoms like Thalassiora weissflogi or Chaetoceros gracilis. There are others.

The DSB - You could conceivably make your own algae plate. I routinely make up f/2 agar for algae plates in the lab using f/2 medium and adding an appropriate amount of agar on top, usually a 1.5% solution is good to keep the algae going. I'm wondering if perhaps you could substitute plain gelatin for agar at home. Heat the f/2 to get the gelatin to dissolve and wait until it has just start to set and inculate with the algae cells, they can take some heat without dying IME. Just an idea... kind of crazy but it might work. I stick the plates into a commercial growth chamber, I'm thinking you could leave the plates like this for awhile sitting near your lights if you have them on a timer. You'd certainly need to test it out first. ;)

>Sarah

[Qwiv]

You guys raising phyto and rots, have you read Clownfishes, by Joyce D. Wilkerson
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1890087041/qid=1123732378/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_sbs_1/104-9583070-4296725?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

I read it a while ago and she mentions keeping phyto and rots in a constant, low density culture outside in some sort of container. She does absolutly nothing to them and they grow. Anyone else tried this? I am going to try when I get my breeder setup done... one day. She says it does not make for production qty but is a great back up in case of a crash.

[TheDeepSandBed]

Sarah,

So you think in the gelatin idea that I should store them at room temp with lights? (I was thinking perhaps the freezer....Walt Disney style :P ). I guess I will have to do some tests once Im up and running.

[Samala]

DSB - Lemme try keeping some plates out this week and next at room temp and just adjacent to some of the timer-operated lights I have on my tank at home.. and I'll report back. I know that you can fridge them for a bit without them going bad.. so I'll have to try with the gelatin idea and see how long you can really push it. :) I was thinking of growing them a week and then fridging a week in a dark container so they dont get any light when I go to snack on something. That should mimic a vacation decently. I'll let you know - if you try it too we'll compare notes.

>Sarah

[TippyToeX]

Microfood culture: phytoplanktons, Rotifers, ciliates, Artemia, and copepods (http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=135137)

[Anthony Calfo]

and more info from DT:

---------------

EPA is Eicosapentaenoic acid one of the most essential omega 3 fatty acids.

DHA is Docosahexaenoic acid, another essential omega 3 fatty acid.

Although animals can synthesize one from the other it is not as efficient and the goal from our continued research is to find a species of microalgae that would be a good source of DHA that survives refrigerated storage.

Note: Isochrysis and Pavlova are dead within 2 weeks of refrigerated storage.

People are being mislead by claims that they survive in
refrigerated storage.

[Kathy55g]

So one would need to replace their DT's 2 weeks after they go in the fridge. Does DT date the bottles as he refrigerates them before shipping, and being stored in the fridge at the LFS? Two weeks total, and then the bottle we buy loses 2 species!

My nannochloropsis survived quite well in my fridge, and began to grow again right away. I think I had them in there a month. Nanno may be different this way than Iso and Pavlo.

It's quite clear to me that DT's is a superior product, and one would need to pay for the expertise, skill, and research it took to get this superior product,

unless one does not need such finesse.

[Bugger]

Here's an overview. Nannochlorpsis oculata holds EDT best at 20 degrees and salinty 25-30. Dt's refridgegerates vitamin B12 and adds it separtly.
Can you find out anymore about there washing process? Do they make there own furtilzer from strach? How much does it cost to analize phytoplanton? Are there physical difference's between strains of the same phytoplanton or is chemical analyisis for the most part called for?

Great information I only wish I had more to share.

[Anthony Calfo]

A 'lil bit more info...

I will also follow up with Mr Tagrin for more info he can/will share relating to new questions. For now:

--------------------
(response to Andy's concern/question)
"DT's does not contain Isochrysis or Pavlova because they do not survive storage. DT's has been proven to maintain good nutritional value through 5-6 months and to stay alive for many months beyond. (Toonen 2002). The shelf life is based on the feeding trials published in the 2002 Marine Fish & Reef Annual. DT's must be maintained in refrigerated storage and will be highly nutritious for 5 months from harvest. Dennis"

[ezhoops]

No doubt that DT's has the science and technology to provide a very high quality product but.......if you spent about 10 minutes a day you too can grow a great phytoplankton like I've been doing for the past couple of years. I'll be the first to admit that my phytoplankton isn't as good as DT's but then it doesn't cost me an arm and a leg to feed my tank.

As far as contamination goes, IME as long as you don't over fertilize (which will kill your culture anyway) you should be fine. IME it is extremely difficult to poison your tank by overfeeding phyto. for experiemental purposes I've dumped a 2 litre bottle of phyto into my 29 gal and notice no changes in any params. I did have many filter feeding organisms in the tank (no sps) to consume it though.

I agree I would first purchase and read thoroughly the phytoplankton culture manual by Flordia aqua farms. before I began a home culture.

Also, if you want to deal with serious science and phytoplankton check out the university of texas phytoplankton dept.
here's a link to their site and many others.

http://www.bio.utexas.edu/research/utex/index.html

and others

http://www.botany.utoronto.ca/utcc/Links.html

Home culture is relatively easy and inexpensive, figure it this way (and I'm not knocking DT's at all, its a awesome product). for about 3 - 4 16oz bottles of DT's you can grow your own phytoplankton, probably more than one species, and feed your tank as often as you like, and give away extra to fellow reefers.
How can you go wrong?

One last thing, I wonder if Dennis can really explain the smell of DT's?

does anyone here who has grown their own phyto have that terrible smell to it? Mine doesn't even when it goes bad.

[Kathy55g]

What does it smell like? If it is sulphurous, it may be that sodium thiosulphate or some other sulphur compound is added to deactivate ammonia or chlorine.

[ezhoops]

it is a sulfurous smell but from what I figure phyto consume ammonia and so that would rule that out. Chlorine would kill phyto.

[ediaz]

No doubt that DT's has the science and technology to provide a very high quality product but.......if you spent about 10 minutes a day you too can grow a great phytoplankton like I've been doing for the past couple of years.

AMEN!!

[ezhoops]

Or maybe us Michiganders are just a bunch of phyto loving fools, huh ediaz. I'll be out your way this weekend, Saugatuck

[Kathy55g]

In reply about the smell: Yep. You right!

With all the talk about trace metals and fertilizer being dosed with the home grown phyto, I wonder if people are taking into consideration that the phyto consume these things, and that it doesn't dissappear. Even if you feed washed phyto to your tank, your phyto eating organisms are getting a dose of whatever the phyto consumed, and they consumed f/2 or whatever the phyto was grown on. So the trace contaminants in the water the phyto is grown in, is a small concentration when diluted in the tank water, compared to the amount the phyto eating corals and inverts are getting from the phyto itself. Who knows if this is not a required nutrient for them anyway?

I hang out with pharmacologists, and the expression goes, "Dose is everything."

Cheers,
Kathy

[ediaz]

Send me a PM if you wanna to stop by...

Ed

[TheDeepSandBed]

So it has been almost a week. My cultures look great (an opaque neon green) but not the intense dark green I have seen in other cultures. How long does it ussually take to reach that point? Also how can you tell if your culture crashes?

PS: My rotifer cysts came today, cant wait to set them up!!!

PPS: Can we sticky this thread for future culturists? (search is not my friend on this site :( )

[ediaz]

It takes a while for the algae to get used to your water. Keep it clean to avoid crashes.

Get a loupe to see the rotifers when they hatch, the first time its hard to spot them.

if the culture crash, most times it will turn like a dirty yellow, it will foam a little and you will see sediment on the bottom of the culture container.

There is a sticky at The Fish Breeding Forum, with articles on live food cultures by Dr. Frank Marini, a must read.

Ed

[Fredfish]

Exceptional thread. It should be stickied.

Anthony. Thank you for taking the time to ask questions on our behalf and reporting back here. I must say it was very generous of Mr. Tagrin to share his knowlege with us.

I was dismayed to learn that phyto looses its DHA/EPA content above certain temps. I have no way to keep my phyto cool. We have been above 30 C for the whole summer.

It will be interesting to see how the temp affects seahorse fry survival rates.

Fred

[ezhoops]

just a note, don't waste your money buying a florida aqua farms or any other brand of plastic mearuring stick. Their pretty much useless. No accuracy whatsoever.

[Luis A M]

Originally posted by ezhoops
just a note, don't waste your money buying a florida aqua farms or any other brand of plastic mearuring stick. Their pretty much useless. No accuracy whatsoever.

No kidding?I find it very useful.Much more accurate than a visual estimate,and much simpler than a cell count.

[Bugger]

I've noticed alot of algea growth in my display when adding home cultured phyto (but) I only added on one time so my system probally coulden't handle it.

[ezhoops]

Wow, well if you ever need a new measuring stick let me know. plus it only tells a range of amounts it doesn't tell you exactly how much algae are really present.

Bugger - yeah you might see some new blooms, cause phyto does have some amounts of phosphate and other things, you should be fine, just take it slow at first.

[shanekennedy]

Originally posted by Bugger
Anthony is right it so diffucult and time consuming anybody that tells you its easy to grow is a liar.

phyto is easy to grow.

i spent several weeks reading numerous articles on the subject. it sounded very difficult, but i thought the same thing about maintaining a saltwater tank as opposed to freshwater. i spend less than 5 mins a week maintaining the culture. i have 3 2-liter bottles that i rotate. after i empty a bottle, i dip it in my trash can full of saltwater & fill it up. i also rotate my bottles about 45 degrees daily when i gather plankton to feed my tank, otherwise 1 wall of the bottle becomes really dark green since light fixutre is beside bottles. i don't reduce the salinity of the water. i don't sterilize, though i would to change that. i don't wait fur culture growth to peak. i'm sure i could grow denser cultures if i spent more time, but what i'm doing works.

the tunicates that came on my tbs rock began receding after going in to my tank. once i started dosing plankton, their growth took off. i haven't noticed changes in other filter feeders. i do not have a phosphate problem.

the cost of the setup was less than 2 bottles of dt's. i have nothing against dt's. i happily used their product prior to growing my own

[Anthony Calfo]

quality... not quantity my friends.

That is the thrust of my point.

I'm lucky enough to occasionally play with the big toys/labs and have access to more folks with bigger toys/labs :p The differences can be amazing.

If you did/could do a bioassay on what you/we are home-growing, many folks would be surprised and disappointed.

[ezhoops]

If you did/could do a bioassay on what you/we are home-growing, many folks would be surprised and disappointed.

that's kind of like saying that if you compared our reef husbandry techniques to those of the ocean you would be surprised and disappointed.

I'm sure your right Anthony and we agree but.......Since no one can duplicate nature EVEN DT's, we have to live by this next quote.

No doubt that DT's has the science and technology to provide a very high quality product but.......if you spent about 10 minutes a day you too can grow a great phytoplankton like I've been doing for the past couple of years.

I guess its just a matter of what is a priority to you. none-the-less this thread has been very informational.

[Anthony Calfo]

I think its more a matter of trusting (and comparing) the analysis that some manufacturers have paid to have done on their products if you are not interested in paying to have one done on your own cultured phyto (hundreds of dollars to have done).

Its not impossible to know the quality of of your/our home-grown phyto, of course. So... the ocean analogy doesn't stick for me.

And while I do';t see a very big difference in most established brands of sea salt, for example,... I do see a (very) big difference in the quality of typically home grown phyto versus lab cultured from the likes of folks like DT (or anyone that invests in the equipment/labs/chillers/research to make a better phyto).

Its just one of those examples where a mfg product really does stand out.

We could not have the same conversation about frozen mysids, FD krill or nori algae, for example. These foods are so similar enough (nutritional assays) between brands that an argument about which is better is not worth the time invested.

So do I think home-grown phyto is "bad?" Heck no. Withstanding some junk fertilizers that push metals/contaminants though to your system.

Do I think home-grown phyto is very helpful for some filter feeders we keep? Heck yeah! Please... do grow it if you cannot afford better/bottled.

Do I think home-grown is inferior to the better lab cultured products? Yep.

Do I think the bottled "better" phyto products are worth buying instead of culturing in light of how relatively little is needed in most systems and for how much I value the health of my animals? Yep again.

For me... if I'm going to feed it/such things to my system at all... and believe it works/is useful, then I do not want to use anything inferior when a better option is readily available.

Most folks overestimate just how much phyto is actually needed in a system. And as such... overestimate the expense of using commercial products in turn.

[ezhoops]

Anthony, you make a great point and another topic worthy or further discussion.

1. HOW MUCH PHYTO IS REALLY NEEDED IN A SYSTEM?

2. WHAT DO YOU BASE THIS ON?

3. HOW WOULD YOU MEASURE YOUR PHYTO DENSITY IN A SYSTEM?



thanks, hope these are answerable questions

[Anthony Calfo]

at issue is what can be measured quantitatively (but expensively/tedious at least)... and what can be estimated with practical means by average hobbyists.

Most folks fall into the latter category.

So when you start adding say .5 oz of home-grown phyto to your system per 100 gall, and notice little or no increase in... say, skimmate production, but then ramp up to adding 2 oz of phyto per 100 gallons of water and notice a distinct increase in skimmate production - its gotta make you wonder ;)

In kind... if the addition of phyto seemingly doubled the growth of your cluster fanworm population (ascidians, poriferans... whatever)... but the tripling of yor phyto dose did not further multiply the population, you have to wonder again.

Another poor man's test to get you in the ballpark: test your DOC levels at the start and track them over time. Were they the same or similar in the weeks prior to light phyto feeding but steadily climbed as the use/abuse of phyto by volume also increased?

This might be telling about the phyto that was excess but did not get skimmed out obviously, but dissolved instead.

You will also notice a steady fall/flattening of RedOX values from a persistent overfeeding of most anything. This indirectly reflects food/nutrients that are not banked (used by living organisms) or exported (ala skimmer for example), but instead have dissolved and become a burden to water quality.

Indeed... these are not scientifically exact by any measure... but then again, they are part of the reality that we can decipher in trends of water quality.

In my opinion, phyto use is very helpful; in small regular (I do daily) quantities. But it is commonly overused in aquaria that are dominated by zooplankton feeding corals.

[Bugger]

Culture tecniques used by DT's can be imatated. In not all that convinced that Dt's is better then my cultures. I nice little project would to see actual comparison done. The guy at DT's said there is a decress in EDT when phytoplanton in the dark cycle he then siad that his cultures are on a 24 hour light cycle and there EDT levels never drop. What happense when those cultures go into there bottled package. (darkcycle) they are refridgerated so I assume that EDT holds up but Im not really sure what happense. Phytoplanton is at its most nutritious when havested at a certain time and cared for in a certain way. I think The man's comments are mostly to promote his product. There separation tecniques must be done with screens of some kind.

[Anthony Calfo]

And more from senior Tagrin...

He seems disappointed that some folks will make offhand judgements without taking the time to define/research their assertions.

I can't say I blame him.

Bugger... please be more open-minded about the information being shared here by D. Tagrin and others. Even ask yourself how likely you think it is that any(!) other phyto manufacturer would be to answering questions posed to them and granting permission to reprint them! Your stated opinion dismissing Tagrin's information as being self-serving is... ignorant at best. To be clear, are you saying that you believe his info to be largely false? And if you agree that his information seems sound and reasonable, then why should it not stand on its own merit to the benefit of his investment/business? Please... think before you speak.

Mr. Tagrin did not start this thread nor find it. I wanted answers to questions posed here, and he was one of the few (perhaps only) industry person I knew that would readily answer our questions. If you can't be gracious, I'll ask you to say nothing at all then... in my forum at large.

Mr. Tagrin's followup:


1. When my product is packaged it is not in a dark cycle, it is dormant. The difference is that when phytoplankton is cultured in a light/dark cycle it develops a cycle of cell growth in the light cycle and cell division in the dark cycle. That is not the same as harvesting it, processing it, refrigerating it and packaging it. The phytoplankton maintains its nutritional value because it is dormant.
2. I did not add Chlorella in order to prevent hobbyist from using my product to culture their own, I added Chlorella to provide a larger particle size and additional nutrients. Multiple species cultures will be more nutritious because of the additional nutrients including micro-nutrients that are not omega3 fatty acids.
3. I was asked about some issues concerning the culture of phytoplankton and have answered truthfully, hobbyists who do not like the answers should do their own research. The fact is that I culture phytoplankton for a living and I was kind enough to pass along some important facts concerning what is necessary to produce high levels of fatty acids in Nannochloropsis. I did so in order to help hobbyists who want to raise fish larvae to be more successful. Nannochloropsis must be cultured within a specific salinity and temperature range. You need a good source of nutrients and trace metals in the proper proportions and the potency of vitamins do matter. I brought up the effects of culturing in a light/dark cycle because it effects the nutritional quality of the phytoplankton. There are other aspects that I could get into concerning the advantage of continuous culture over batch culture but it is a point for commercial operations such as my facility or a bivalve farm, not hobbyists. Culturing high quality phytoplankton is not difficult but it is not simple, culturing greenwater is. I do not want to get into a debate concerning the use of my product verses growing your own, that is not what I got into this discussion about. I do not expect the people who are growing their own to stop, I just want you to know what it takes to produce a higher quality food. I developed my product for use directly into reef tanks and have a process to clean and concentrate the phytoplankton.

[Bugger]

Yes maybe I crossed the line. So Im sorry! take a look at Marine Fish and Reef 2002 Annual. Planktonic Foods, Live nanno is plotted on almost the same line as DT's.

[Moreta]

Anthony, would you please thank Mr. Tagrin for all the great information, it is greatly appreciated. I've bookmarked this one for future reference.

[Puffer Queen]

A big thanks to Dennis for sharing !

Kelly

[Anthony Calfo]

I will be sure to do so my friends... we will all benefit from constructive dialogues (versus pot shots, speculation, etc.).

kindly,

Anth-

[Triterium]

Very good thread. I have been culturing my own phyto for several years now. Ive tried many species but prefer Nannochloropsis. I mainly use for copepods, rotifers, brine shrimp etc.

I do believe DTs is better than using homegrown but ive always wondered how much. Mr Tagrin said the... "Nannochloropsis must be cultured within a specific salinity and temperature range". I have grown Nannochloropsis in freshwater with very good success. I am curious if he has any data on the difference in EPA values between a culture grown in fresh compared to sea water.

Im also curious as to how much of a drop in EPA levels are seen in cultures with higher temps (ie 75 degrees).

[seafarm]

Hi Triterium,

Nannochloropsis is by far the easiest of the marine algae species to grow. It also represents about 90% of the algae used in marine fish hatcheries around the world. We have about 6 acres of Nannochloropsis in commercial production and have been experimenting with it for over 10 years to produce the highest fatty acid profiles. We've found the highest EPA values at between 22-26C, all other variables being equal. At that range we consistently maintain a lipid total of over 27%, and over 30% of that total being EPA. At 32C the lipid profile starts to fall pretty quickly.

This really is a great thread - Thank you Anthony for your insights.

[Anthony Calfo]

excellent input Randy! Thank you for your contributions.

[bunsenburner]

Very interesting thread. I've been culturing my own from some minimal media I made in the lab. It seems easy to me but I also have grown various bugs for a living over the years. I clearly should read more after reading this.

I have been spinning down cultures in the lab centrifuge before I feed it to my tank. It seems I've a lot more pods than before I started feed phyto and this make my Mandarin fat and happy.

I believe that many home growers could just decant off liquid when they've noticed some phytoplankton settling to siginicantly reduce the amount of other stuff in their tank. Do 2 washes (refill with fresh saltwater) if you are really worried. When I am lazy and don't spin it down my macroalgea goes nuts. This makes me less worried about where all the fertizlizer goes, but I do not reccommend this.

Anybody have an oppinion what the best fertizilers is or a link to a thread. Currently I use some KNO3, NaPO4, trace metals (Cu, Zn, Mo, Fe), and some B vitamins. Add them to saltwater, microwave, and grow.

A good place to get cultures of numerous phyto species as well as culture kits is right up the road from me in the beautfiul state of Maine.

http://ccmp.bigelow.org/

Don't really have an oppinion what is better, home or purchased, I just do it becuase it is fun for me.

[seafarm]

Hi Bunsenburner,

There is no question but what people can raise their own algae at home, but I have to wonder why they would want to? If you spent 5 minutes each day with your cultures then over a 3 month period you will have spent 7.5 hours. You can buy a bottle of algae concentrate with 4 algae species for $14 which will last 3-4 months. That breaks down to $0.16 or less per day. If you divide 7.5 hours of culturing time into $14 you are paying yourself $1.87 per hour. I'll bet your time is worth more than that - even your play time.

If you want to grow more than one species of algae you have to increase the amount of time you spend with your cultures. Let's say that’s now 10 minutes each day. You are now getting paid $0.93 per hours. And that's conservative because not all algae are as easy to grow as Nanno.

The two most important factors for microalgae are quality and nutritional profile. There has been a lot of talk on this thread about EPA, but that’s only one of the critical fatty acids. There are something like 20 fatty acids but the most important three are EPA, DHA, and ARA. (see here: http://www.reed-mariculture.com/microalgae/proximate2.asp )

EPA and ARA are found at the highest levels in green algae, but DHA is ONLY found in brown algae like Isochrysis and Pavlova. DHA is one of the building blocks of neural tissue and without it your animals can not be at their peak vibrancy.

By the way, Isochrysis and Pavlova can be kept alive in a refrigerator for far longer than 2 weeks. I’ve heard there is a study that somebody performed that claims only 2 weeks, but I’ve never been able to get my hands on it. If they killed the Iso/Pav after only 2 weeks they did something very wrong.

Feeding your filter feeding organisms is much like feeding your dog or cat. You can take the time to make your own dog food, but it’s much easier to go to the store in buy a bag of Purina. You can grow your own algae, but it’s much easier to just buy it – especially since it is SO cheap.

My 2 cents

[shanekennedy]

i see no problem w/ buying algae. lots of people don't want to hassle w/ growing the stuff. however, the calculations in you post seem off to me. once a culture is going, it can be maintained in under 10mins/week (no exaggeration). the $14/bottle algae doesn't include shipping. 2nd day delivery to my zip would double the price, and that price is assuming 1 bottle will last 3-4 months for my 75g tank.

i'm not trying to knock down your product. i'm sure it's great for the people who want it. i just think you made a poor argument to convince growers to switch to buyers.

it is nice to see some competitive pricing in this market.

[Anthony Calfo]

yes... very good point about the value of your time! The old adage "leave it to the professionals. " Agreed :)

[shanekennedy]

it sounds like you think the non-professionals are incompetent. would you suggest purchasing ready-made saltwater? a lot of members have high reguards for your comments & you're discouraging them for learning & becoming self-profecient.

i'm not trying to start an argument here, just offering another opinion.

i've been let down by too many "professionals", not just in the reefers world. i don't believe in paying for anything i can do myself.

[jgreen1025]

I'd also like to add my thanks to both Randy Reed and Dennis Tagarin (and, of course, Anthony) for all the helpful comments here. As much as I'd really like to start my own phyto cultures, I just don't have the time, especially to do it right. Add to that the problem that my wife WILL NOT be happy if I try, and I've decided that for the time being, at least, I'm going to try these products. The biggest problem with that, however, is that they're not always stocked by my local stores (which is one reason I'd considered a home culture, the other naturally being cost), so hopefully, I can find one or the other when needed. (Supposedly, my local store in Canoga Park has both, so we'll see...)

One question, however - the product I most often find for sale is Bio-Life, which needs to be kept in the freezer. Is this stuff LIVE phyto? It certainly seemed better than the Phyto-Plex I've been using recently. Thanks for your help.

John G.

[Anthony Calfo]

shanekennedy... I think you would have a different opinion if you visited enough (impressive) facilities and (most importantly) read the comparative analysis (the nutritive value of some home phyto is just awful).

I used to think as you did ("how different could it be?), but I've see the light (green) now :D

As for the seawater analogy... bunk. Natural seawater is not ideal or recommended IMO. Unprocessed, it is unsuitable for closed aquarium systems (natural plankters crashing even if not including pathogenic organisms... mineral inconsistencies over time/seasons... pollution risk for drawing it off of populated coasts, etc).

And so... synthetic sea salts are highly processed, quality controlled and almost idiot proof. The user only adds water and it mixes up the same for everyone. This is not the same for home grown phyto culture ingredients... there is no standardization:

... no standard for feed/fertilizer (folks have to find/make their own)... the quality of light varies by user and over time (as lamps age, etc... really... how many folks are testing their culture lamps with a PAR meter, etc)... plus the influence of temperature (that most folks are unaware of), etc..

Comparisons are fine/helpful... but lets compare apples to apples here.

As far as your perception that I think "non-professionals" are incompetent here... I really don't see how you reckon that. For starters... I don't think I'm incompetent... and I'm in the same boat (hobbyist) as you are.

Read above (posts)... this is only about DIY versus commercial being tedious, expensive (to produce high quality) and inconvenient. Lab cultured/commercial phyto is usually very different (better) than home phyto. Period.

Home grown is still useful (quite so).

[seafarm]

Hi John,

I think you are referring to Bio-Planton from Liquid Life. That is a frozen product and has a very long shelf life. It is not live, but it is an excellent feed.

Hi Shanekennedy,

I'm having a hard time understanding how you think my comments could be seen as critical. I pointed out that anybody can grow algae, its just time consuming. If you have a lot of time on your hands - by all means learn about growing microalgae, it is fun to grow.

There is no question that shipping direct to you is expensive. Most of the other algae suppliers won't even ship direct - they only sell through stores. We prefer that you purchase from your local store so you don't have the shipping cost, but also give the option of direct shipments. And my calculations might be off a bit for the amount of time to maintain your cultures, but I suspect if you try to maintain 4 different algae species it will take a bit more time than 10 minutes per week.

Or maybe I need to hire you to come grow algae for me :)

[Fredfish]

This thread just keeps getting better.

Anthony, I count 7 algaes and numbers in sets of 6. Not sure how to match up the numbers with the algae species.

Now, my .02 worth...

When I started reading this thread I was in the "its easy to do so do it at home camp". However, as I have begun to educate myself for may attempts to raise seahorses I have begun to appreciate how complicated nutrition is.

I think that it depends entirely on what you are trying to do whether or not you culture your own. If you are an average reefer who wants to encourage a little more zooplankton for suplemental food for corals and grow a few other interesting inverts, home cultured can work just fine. A lot of things seem to be able to survive in reasonable numbers on just nano.

If you are like those who want to breed and raise things, life gets more complicated. Not all algaes have the same contents. Not all zooplankton have the same nutrient values. Different zooplankton feed on different size food particles...

For instance, nanochloropsis is a poor choice if you want to grow a lot of copepods. It is on the small size for a food item and it has an extremely thick and tough outer membrane. Not very digestible for copepods. Your culture will grow, but it will not bloom the way you need it to.

It gets even more complicated because some copepods can synthesize their own HUFFAs from other fatty acids and some can't. Even worse, brine shrimp are a nutrient vacume. They are only as good as what you put into them.

For me, a good commercial multi species product will be a savior (if I can find it locally :rolleyes: )

By the way, good commercial grade F2 formulations specifically for growing phytoplankton are readily available for cheap. I am puzzled why home cultures are such poor quality.

You've got bullet proof salt, f2, lighting products, and algae (nano) available. The only difficult to control variable is temperature and only in the summer.

Fred

[jgreen1025]

Originally posted by Fredfish
For instance, nanochloropsis is a poor choice if you want to grow a lot of copepods. It is on the small size for a food item and it has an extremely thick and tough outer membrane. Not very digestible for copepods. Your culture will grow, but it will not bloom the way you need it to.

It gets even more complicated because some copepods can synthesize their own HUFFAs from other fatty acids and some can't. Even worse, brine shrimp are a nutrient vacume. They are only as good as what you put into them.


So, if I want to not only feed my feather dusters and sponges, but also encourage zooplankton populations to increase, what's my best course of action? What about if I want to just raise the occasional batch of brine shrimp - what can I feed them that will make them nutritious for my fish? Will they eat the Phyto-Plex?

John G.

[Triterium]

Thanks for the info Mr. Reed :) I definately agree that most people would be better off buying a quality phytoplankon istead of producing a low-cell-density, nutrient-rich additive for thier tank. I actually use several gallons a day culturing zooplankon so growing my own is a good alternative :)

Do you have any advice on keeping axenic cultures at home?

Also, what type of lighting do you use in your facility? I use 5 gallon carboys and was thinking about switching to VHO (6500K).

[seafarm]

I agreed with John - Nanno is a great feed for rotifers and some other filter feeders will consume it, but it too small and too tough for many others. Iso/Pav are great for reef tanks, not only because they have the missing nutritional component, but also because they are larger (4-7 microns, nanno is 1) and they have thin membrane barriers instead of tough cell walls so they are easily consumable by almost all reef tank filter feeders.

There are several products on the market that contain Isochrysis and / or Pavlova. If you do a google search on those words you will easily find them.

Hopefully I said that generically enough so I don't get in trouble with the Reef Central Police :)

[Anthony Calfo]

I just want to say that I'm so glad the thread has been productive and dynamic. :)

Good job to all... lets keep it going (and friendly).

[seafarm]

We have a 10 acre greenhouse facility for growing marine microalgae so we use natural sunlight. You can see a picture of our site at http://www.reed-mariculture.com/images/farm.jpg.

Axenic (100% bacteria free) cultures are almost impossible to maintain outside of a sterile lab. They also don't grow well since algae grows MUCH better in the presence of good bacteria like nitrifying bacteria.

I suspect what you really want is just a good clean culture. I would recommend getting that from CCMP (seen earlier in this thread).

That being said, I would also suggest that you do the numbers and see if a commercial product is cheaper. I know you said you are using gallons per day, but some of the super-concentrates are still cost effective. There is a product available that condenses 3600 liters (950 gallons) of dense algae culture into 1 liter of super-concentrate, so if you are using 5 gallons per day that would last you for 6.5 months.

[seafarm]

Anthony,

My sincere apology if you took any offense to the RC Police jest. As a product manufacturer I'm still learning how much I can and can't say in these forums without it seeming too commercial and making people unhappy. I was trying to make fun of myself, not you.

Randy

[Anthony Calfo]

[a reference to a PM/edits]

no worries. I'm admittedly tight/tidy if not outright strict about keeping my forum friendly and respectful (I just need someone to moderate me sometimes when I am tired and grumpy on the 100th em/pm or post of the day :D).

All posts are welcome... I just like to see kid gloves on jabs and jests at large. The rough riders can find their way to the lounge instead ;)

[Triterium]

Wow that is a huge greenhouse! I actually have a greenhouse that has a small 400 gallon system. I was thinking about growing my culutres in 40+ gallon cylindrical containers using natural sunlight. In a couple weeks i'll be doing rotifer cultures in 55 gallon tanks so i'll need a lot of microalgae.

I was actually considering getting a start from CCMP but didnt wat to spend $100+ on a culture. Ive had good success with $8 starts from FAFUSA and can keep a nice dark culture for a couple months.

Mr. Reed, what is the cell desity of the super-concentrated algae? If you condesned 950 gallons of dense phytoplankton culture, i would think you would end up with a paste. Theoretically, if the cell integrity were strong, you could condense over 13,000 gallons of nannochloropsis (assuming 1 micron diameter) into a single liter (hmm.. i hope my math is correct). But that doesn't really leave room for much water.

edit> thats also assuming 20million cells/ml

[TheDeepSandBed]

Hi everyone...this thread is better than I ever could have imagined when I first threw my ideas out there. Thanks for everyone and thier ideas. God I love RC!!! (maybe even enough to donate some money :)). Anyway, I thought I would give a brief update.

My phyto cultures are going quite well. I just read the idea of decanting the cultures and doing freshwater rinses and I think I am going to try that this weekend. As for time investment, I spend about 30secs a day (if that) tending to the cultures and about 10 minutes once every two weeks to change my cultures. I did however have a crash in my rotifer culture...couldn't quite figure out why (I dont think they liked the phytoplex i fed them until I got my cultures up to speed). But now have rebounded nicely and are growing once again. Once again many thanks to all for this great thread.

BTW any word on trying to keep a culture on gelatin, I know someone was going to look into that?

[seafarm]

Hi Triterium,

Our super-concentrates are sold to commercial fish hatcheries for growing rotifers and for greenwater technique. The cell count on the Nanno is 68 billion cells per ml. Good guess - that comes from is 3600 liter of algae @ 19 million cells per ml.

Rotifers grow MUCH better on algae concentrates than live algae, especially for high density systems (over 1,000 per ml). The main reason is because you have to add so much live algae to the system so you are constantly dumping in cold algae water into a warm rotifer culture, and that puts them into "shock" for a few hours. Also, rotifers have to eat every 4 hours so its hard to add enough live algae to keep the tank green between feedings. There is a lot of information about how to culture rotifers at www.Rotifer.com.

Randy

[Triterium]

That sounds like a wonderful product Randy! How do you manage to get it that concentrated without causing significant damage to the cells. My calculations tell me that you are going to run into some serious problems reaching that density if the cells are bigger than 2.5 microns in diameter.

[seafarm]

There are several aspects to getting it that concentrated. First you can only do with with super-strong algae like Nanno and Tet. You will notice all of our other brown algae aquaculture products are only 9% dry weight, not 18%. Second you have to have specially designed centrifuges that introduce the algae to the bowl gradually, not 0 to 6000 gravities all at once. Our machines are fairly huge - several tons each. When the Nanno is harvested from the bowl for our aquaculture products (non-live products) it looks like green clay and we cut it with knives to seperate it out.

[bunsenburner]

Anybody know the g forces phytoplankton will tolerate during harvesting? Just curious of the values for a few commonly discussed species.

I too spend very little time on my cultures. Perhaps an hour a week. Someday I may go the commercial route since the "experts" probably grow a better quality product but for now it is part of what I enjoy doing with my free time.

As many have stated, this is a very interesting thred with loads of information.

[Luis A M]

Originally posted by Anthony Calfo
well... that was fast: Mr Tagrin from DT's replied promtly to a request for information.

his comments are pasted below here.



At DT's Plankton Farm; we use advanced cell separation technology that was developed to harvest live, undamaged cells. This is a long, tedious, and expensive process. This same process is used to wash the cells by repeatedly adding and extracting clean saltwater. This product was developed specifically for use in the closed system environment of reef aquariums.

In contrast, centrifuging phytoplankton is a process used by some companies to make algae paste for commercial aquaculture. This process was not designed to harvest live cells and in fact, the cells are scraped out like clay. This method is fast and cheap, but it damages a large percentage of cells. Several companies are purchasing these algal pastes as frozen concentrated phytoplankton to use as ingredients in their marine aquariums
products.

.

Randy,see what DT thinks of centrifugation ;)
I can´t imagine other cell separation technique.Precipitation could work for larger heavy cells but not for NAN.
Anyway,I use IA and never found damaged cells.
I also culture six algae for special works.Calanoid pods don´t seem to enjoy pastes.And living outside USA I can only bring the long term storage algae,NAN and TET.
A factor not mentioned here is that the highest nutritional composition is obtained by harvesting in the log.growth phase...

[seafarm]

I understand why Dennis has to make comments like that - otherwise he has no way to differentiate his products. But unfortunately his "facts" are not correct. Nanno is the only algae that we concentrate to the "clay" level and none of the cells are damaged at this concentration - Nanno is just too tough. Our other algae are concentrated at far lower G's to a thick liquid. They also come out whole and intact.

The algae that we concentrate for our "Live" product which is sold into the aquarium industry is concentrated using a different method that we have developed. I'm not going to reveal how we do this because it is a trade secret that we don't want to become publically known. I know everybody hates "secrets", but sometimes they are necessary - sorry!

There is a lot of talk about the aquarium industry wanting the highest quality microalgae possible to feed their filter feeders. But I can tell you that my commercial aquaculture customers demand far higher quality from their products than this market.

Commercial hatcheries go through extensive product testing before they will bring in new products because this is their livelihood, and a product that doesn't perform or possibly disrupts a hatchery threatens that entire business.

The core of our business is selling to commercial hatcheries in 67 countries around the world. Revenues from our aquarium products represents about 2% of our total sales. None of the other marine microalgae producers in the United States sell to commercial hatcheries so they have not had to go through the intense scrutiny our products have.

So it's silly for Dennis to say we are selling a "damaged" product to the commercial hatcheries. If his products were better then he would be selling to the professionals, not us.

[bunsenburner]

Just to clarify, When using the settle technique to reduce nutrient level before adding to the tank I would be cautious to resuspend in fresh water rather use nutrirnt free saltwater to avoid lysis by osmotic shock.

I am no expert in phytoplankton growth so don't put too much weight on my ideas. I really don't know but this oppinion is based on experince growing bacteria.


So far when I pelleted phytoplanton (probably all nano by now since it was a DTs start?) at around 1500 g I notice little difference in growth rate when compared to a similar innoculant from a non spun culture. Based on this crude analysis spinning doesn't seem to bad, at least for my home application.

On a large scale it seems like a device I once used called a sharpels might work. This is cool type of centrifuge where media continuously flows up a tall spinning column and the object of interest is forced to the side of the spinning column. Clear spent media exits the top of the device. Again I don't know in reality how well this would work.

[Anthony Calfo]

I'm leaving in hours (plane) to visit some wonderful hobbyists/stores/clubs in Arkansas and St. Louis...

I will be very disappointed (ahem... vendors) if jabs and inflammatory remarks turn this otherwise fab thread into a flame-fest. You WILL lose some of my respect for you.

My apologies to all, at large... but y'all haven't been privy to the flurry of ems, PMs I've got in the last week from some participating vendors (ahem, again) here whom I am sure disagree with each other, and suspect want to tear each other to shreds :p

I'm not kidding, and I won't be shy to say it... this forum is MY sandbox. If you boys don't play nice, you will ruin a good thing (this thread) and lose some respect... perhaps a 'lil business in the process. Pot shots and shilling your businesses are not welcome.

We are only interested in useful information exchanges.

Randy... thank you for changing your commercial links as requested.

Dennis... thank you for not going ballistic. At least not yet :D

kindly,

Anthony... who really hopes to see this thread standing strong when I return :)

[bunsenburner]

This thread was really going and I miss reading people thoughts. Anybody know a good place to get a cheap 50 um mesh to harvest rotis and pods? The kind folks at Reeds donated both Roti and Pod cultures to our club to help get AC out for a talk. Since I already had pods going I figured I'd give growing the pods a shot.

Just to give credit to DT's. They also donated a generous amount of phyto and oyster eggs. Picked some of both of these up as well.

Thanks to both companies. These donations were some of the hottest items.

[shanekennedy]

try http://filterbag.com

[Fredfish]

Hm... Interesting site. Gotta order 10 at a go though.

Fred

[Triterium]

I like the one from www.florida-aqua-farms.com

[bunsenburner]

Thanks for the filtration links. I ended up going with the one from florida aqua farms since it looked like it was high quality. Split the pods to keep them going until it arrives. Probably not all that exciting to anybody but me, but I'm having fun and like to share my stories....

[Fredfish]

Keep sharing bunsenburner.

I need to get some 100um mesh for my brine cultures. I was screening some brine when I happened to notice that a good number seem to be going through my LFS brine shrimp net.

I am still considering options on phyto for my (not yet set up) pod cultures. From what I have been able to find out, most pods prefer larger size foods.

I have exchanged a few emails with Dr. Adelaide Rhodes, a pod researcher, who suggested foods in the 5-10 micron size. She also runs Seapods.com so I figure she knows what she is doing.

Anyway, nano and tet are both very small in size, well below the 5-10 microns I want, so I was looking at the Reed Mariculture phytofeast product to give me a range of sizes.

The only other alternative I can see is to culture nano and one other larger phyto like chaetoceros (sp?) myself.

If I didn't have to drive 6 hrs. round trip to get the phytofeast it would be an easier decision.

I am still also concerned about shelf life. I wonder how much of its reserves the phyto will have used after two months in the fridge.

I know a number of other breeders with larger setups have pretty much given up on culturing because of inconsistencies in home setups. Most of these guys are raising rotifers which do well on nano and tet paste.

Fred.

Fred

[GreshamH]

Are you sure Adalaide runs see pods? IIRC her company is Essential Live Feeds ( http://www.essentiallivefeeds.com/ ).

[Fredfish]

Oops, oceanpods.com and essentially...

Dang, too many pod thingy websites.

Either way, she has been quite helpful.

Fred

[Anthony Calfo]

and she (Adelaide Rhodes) is an fabulous presenter! I was truly delighted and surprised the first time I saw her lecture. A head's up to any hobby clubs looking for speaker suggestions.

[bunsenburner]

Thanks Fredfish,
Not too much new. Spli the pod culture into 3 500 mL container last week. Seem to have lost one. Took the 2 remaining and scaled up the pod culture into a half full 5 gallon. Hopefully they'll take off.

The club will have to keep Adelaide Rhodes in mind for future presentations. There are a number who are interested in raising fish and a few who currently culture phtyo.

[Bugger]

Does anybody know where to buy other species other then nan and tet.

[moumda]

Bugger, try florida aqua farms.

[Atticus]

I can't wait for the "Secret" cell seperation techniques to go public. I am getting really tired of duct taping 2 liters bottles of home grown phyto to the rims of my truck tires as I drive to work...

[Roll221]

Great thread, I read the entire thing hoping to get this question answered. If in fact I feed home grown phyto to my tank, does it have any direct benefit to SPS coral?

Ed

[Anthony Calfo]

the current belief is that not many of the commonly kept so-called SPS corals directly consume phytoplankton. But... the regular feeding of phyto supports some microcrustaceans/zooplankton that DO feed "SPS" corals.

I would not feed phyto heavily in an Acro/Monti dominated tank... but I would feed some small amount regularly FWIW.

BTW... when abused (excess phyto fed) in such "SPS" tanks, you may see mucousal net feeding calcareous tubeworms or sponges flare in number. This can be somewhat to very irritating to the SPS corals to the point of being encroached (calcareous worms pushing back coral tissue... spreading mucus nets excessively, etc.)

[purplehaze]

Seafarm:
So your "Live" product is alive i.e. you can start a culture from it, the cells can reproduce. Or are you just using the word “Live” as a trade mark meaning that it came from live algae. Your website changed with the new product, now your verbiage is very interesting suggesting that you are spinning your words to the point of confusing people into thinking it is alive.
Can you explain your odor inhibitor a bit and why you are not labeling your aquaculture products as containing an odor inhibitor and your aquarium products. People here hate snake oil and I would hate to see your products labeled as such because you are hiding things put in your product. Full disclosure is important for the hobby. When you sell a feed ingredient you’re a liable for labeling the contents of your product. Your aquaculture products would be considered a feed ingredient.

[Anthony Calfo]

Good fair/questions... but I'm putting everyone on alert:

I really just want to see respectful questions and answers.

If anyone wants a dirtier fight... go elsewhere. You're guests in my forum while your here.

And for anyone confused by this or other posts of mine to this nature in this forum, there has been a lot of behind the scenes banter between opposing parties in (me) trying to keep this otherwise fabulous and useful thread open and pleasant.

I believe many readers come to my forum in part because of the constructive atmosphere.

I intend to keep it that way.

Play ball...

[Fredfish]

Purple haze, the live product is live. Can't help you with the odor inhibitor, though I expect that the concentrated stuff will have a strong algae smell.

Fred.

[purplehaze]

Anthony,

Thanks for your comment, I am only looking for clarification..There is no intention of desrespect.

Fredfish,

Why do you say it´s really alive? Cause if not, it´s pretty misleading to use the term "live".

[Anthony Calfo]

I was also under the impression that it was not live as in 'living'/culturable.

(and no worries purplehaze... I was making a pre-emptive statement for all parties :p)

[shanekennedy]

the seafarm website states the following for their phyto-feast-live product:

Is Phyto-Feastâ„¢ Really Alive?

YES! All four species of marine microalgae are alive and will stay alive for weeks or months, depending on the species and storage conditions. Phyto-Feastâ„¢ has been induced to become "quiescent", having minimal outward signs of life. This allows the algae to stay alive in a state of "suspended animation" without depleting their reserves and nutritional value.

Claims:

1. All the microalgae that goes into Phyto-Feastâ„¢ are grown at our farm in California and are harvested live and packed and shipped "farm fresh" every week.
2. Once harvested the algae are induced to become "quiescent" in "suspended animation." At the time of bottling 95% or more of the algae are alive.
3. In this quiescent state metabolic activity and respiration are reduced to minimal levels and the nutritional value of the algae and the integrity of the cell membranes are preserved. The process is similar to cryopreservation where alga can be frozen live for years and remain viable.
4. Not all of our algae species are equally hardy and after a few weeks some of the more delicate cells begin to expire. However some cells will remain viable for two months or more.
5. Because of the unique quiescence process that is applied to the algae, the cells remain intact and they retain their full nutritional value long after they have ceased metabolic activity. Properly stored, a bottle of Phyto-Feastâ„¢ will provide the same value at two-plus months that it did on the first day.







for their instant algae product they say:

Instant Algae© is a non-viable algae product, meaning that it cannot be used to start a culture. However very few aquaculture applications need microalgae that reproduces, and there are several advantages to having a non-viable product

[Anthony Calfo]

I think its the "induced" and "preserved" wording for the Phyto-Feast that has some folks (myself included) a bit confused.

Point blank... can it be cultured? Has anyone tried this?

I'm certainly not reticent at all to give it a try... just bogged down with travel and work for at least some weeks/months longer. If no one else tries it first... I'll buy some and give it a shot around Christmas (hopefully) :) Of course... we really need more thana few folks to do it to get a decent consensus. Anyone game? Be sure to buy it randomly from an LFS if so.

[purplehaze]

Quote from Reed´s site:


Is Live Algae Better? Reef organisms require a phytoplankton (microalgae) feed that provides all the nutrition necessary for full health, vitality, and vibrancy. To ensure maximum nutritional value you must first start with high quality algae, then make sure the cells remain intact so the nutrients don't leak into the water. Phytoplankton are very small and any breach of the cell membrane will release the cell’s valuable contents. Intact phytoplankton are able to deliver their nutrients to your animals rather than dispersing them into the water

Live Algae Disadvantages - Live phytoplankton need a lot of light and nutrients to stay alive. When algae are stored in the dark, in media without nutrients, they must consume their own proteins, lipids and carbohydrates to stay alive. Depending on the level of metabolic activity, the algae's nutritional value can fall rapidly as the cells starve. Live phytoplankton also respire, consuming oxygen in the dark. Live and biologically active microalgae sealed up in the dark can quickly consume all available oxygen and become anaerobic. When this happens the algae will start to die from a lack of oxygen. At the same time anaerobic bacteria begin to grow, rapidly resulting in the classical smell of decomposition - hydrogen sulfide (smells like rotten eggs).

Summary - Reef organisms are not "smart" enough to differentiate between algae and dead algae, so it's up to you to provide them with the best quality feeds. "Live" algae ensures that the nutrients inside the cells will be available to your to your animals, but does not ensure that there will be any remaining nutrients in the cells. The best quality algae will be harvested at "peak" nutritional profile, then put into hibernation (quiescence) to keep that peak profile.

Suspended Animation / Hibernation (Quiescence)

The best process for obtaining the benefits of live algae without the disadvantages is to place the live microalgal cells in a state of suspended animation (also called quiescence or hibernation). This process reduces the metabolic activity of the live cells to minimal levels, allowing long term storage without the depletion of oxygen or the loss of nutritional value. A commonly used form of suspended animation is cryopreservation in which algal cells are frozen alive and intact and can be revived later.


This all seems like voodoo magic word games. The way it reads it sounds like Reed is using a cyropreservative to preserve the algae or some preservative. You can’t centrifuge the algae, add something to it....“to place the live micro algal cells in a state of suspended animation (also called quiescence or hibernation).” without using a preservative, natural or artificially. Even if you are using Vit. E or some very natural product you are using a preservative. You may or may not be using something like BHT but its the same thing, a preservative, if your putting anything at all in the algae to preserve it natural or unnatural. One way or another is very suspect that you don’t label it. I just feel like they are trying to use word games to confuse people in to thinking the product is alive. When the product was first introduced it was “alive” and now they use terms like “live,” quiescence, suspended animation. These all lead one to believe that they are preserved cells. Why not just come out and say they are viable or non viable; fresh or preserved (naturally or unnaturally). Its just seems like they are intentional confusing people. To say that your products don’t contain preservatives is a bit unlikely when you are adding something to mask the smell and not labeling what that is. Many people use the products to produce animals for their livelihood and not to label what is in the product is very very suspect and dishonest.

Again no disrespect, but its hard to get a handle on reality sometimes. Many of us have bought enough snake oil to last a life
:rollface:

[Anthony Calfo]

I have heard these concerns from other aquarists... and I have the same wonder myself.

The wording seems very strategic and stands out. It has the ring of a formerly live product that is now chemically fixed (preserved).

That does not make it a bad product, of course! Thats not the issue here. Simply consumer confusion and curiousity. And for me personally... a preference to use truly live phyto.

I also differ/disagree that filter feeders can't tell the difference between live and dead. On the contrary... a majority IME can, do and are very discriminating on particle/prey size, texture, composition!

I'd like to see the studies that led the Reed folks to the conclusion that "Reef organisms are not "smart" enough to differentiate between algae and dead algae..."

I cannot imagine any such data exists to support this for any kind of majority enough to validate the statement. Species list?

If Randy cares to chime in... my question simply is as above: Can this "live" product be cultured out? Or is the "hibernation" non-reversible=dead/fixed algae?

[Fredfish]

From further down the page from "is live algae better?":

"1. All the microalgae that goes into Phyto-Feastâ„¢ are grown at our farm in California and are harvested live and packed and shipped "farm fresh" every week.
2. Once harvested the algae are induced to become "quiescent". At the time of packaging 95% or more of the algae are alive.
3. In this quiescent state metabolic activity and respiration are reduced to minimal levels, preserving the nutritional value of the algae and the integrity of the cell membranes. In concept, the process is similar to cryopreservation where alga can be frozen live for years and remain viable.
4. Not all of our algae species are equally hardy and after a few weeks some of the more delicate cells will begin to expire. However, due to our quiescence process, the cells lose none of their functional qualities or nutritional value. Many of the cells will remain viable for several months.
5. Because of the unique quiescence process that is applied to the algae the cells remain intact and they retain their full nutritional value long after they have ceased metabolic activity. The quiescence process delays any biological decomposition of the product for many months. Properly stored, a bottle of Phyto-Feastâ„¢ will provide the same value at two-plus months that it did on the first day. "

From the above it seems clear that the algea is live. Point two: its 95% live at the time of packing. Point three: there is still metabolic activity.

If this is a proprietory method of maintaining live algea at high densitys, it would be quite reasonable for Reed to not publish its methods/contents.

Purplehaze. Rather than posting speculation here, why don't you just email Randy and ask him?

By the way, if you were to use the phrase "very very suspect and dishonest" to describe me or a company I created, I would find it very offensive, particularly if you didn't first contact me. "voodo magic word games" is not neutral language either.

Anthony, I would love to test out Ried's phyto live, but I can't get hold of it here in Canada. I hope you are able to try to culture it.

Fred

[Anthony Calfo]

it is the whole "at the time of packaging" that is largely the question here. Is the product also preserved/fixed "at the time of packaging" ?

Indeed, lets not speculate. We'll find some known and trustworthy aquarists to test it out.

[Steven Pro]

Originally posted by Anthony Calfo
I also differ/disagree that filter feeders can't tell the difference between live and dead. On the contrary... a majority IME can, do and are very discriminating on particle/prey size, texture, composition!

I'd like to see the studies that led the Reed folks to the conclusion that "Reef organisms are not "smart" enough to differentiate between algae and dead algae..."

I cannot imagine any such data exists to support this for any kind of majority enough to validate the statement. Species list? Anthony, do you remember either Rob Toonen and Eric giving a presentation in Pittsburgh about feeding corals? I am leaning towards Rob as it would make more sense because of timing and his studies, but I can't recall the details or find my notes. The one thing that stuck out in my mind is someone was able to feed a filter feeder tiny balls of plastic that were of the appropriate prey size. Do you have any recollection about that?

[Rod Buehler]

I dont remember too much, but I do remember that it was Rob Toonen, and the study was done with clams. It showed that they would eat anything(plastic beads) if the particle size is right. Are they getting nutrition from the plastic beads though?

[Steven Pro]

Of course not, but whether or not they distinguish between live or dead phytoplankton is questionable.

Do you recall, was it Rob that performed the actual study or did he simply reference it? I would really like to read the paper for myself before commenting too much.

[Anthony Calfo]

Good point... and yet, by the same line of logic - just because a panther grouper, for example, will eat Cheerios and beernuts does not mean that all marine fishes (or even its Order alone: Perciformes) will eat and survive on Cheerios and Beernuts.

And the overwhelming majority of marine/hobby fishes are members of that Order and, as such, are more closely related to each other than (and more likely to have similar family traits to) what we call "filter feeders" or even "corals!" The latter still being dramtically different physiologically in so many ways.

The plastic ball example IMO likely applies only the slimest minorty of filter-feeders.

More importantly... what some of us are largely talking about here is the product advertising! Not the product potential. Its just not clear enough. If someone floats a claim(s), well then... we'd like to be convinced that the claim is true.

I would, at least, like to know that any claims are true and verifiable before adding a product to my systems with tens of thousands of dollars of corals in it and countless living creatures depending on me for their very lives ;) This hobby has no organized consumer advocacy as you know. Its up to us (consumers) to evaluate the merit of each and every product with little assistence otherwise.

And to reiterate... a principal concern for me at least is if the "hibernation" process is a chemical fix. Is the product truly alive... or was it merely alive at the time of packaging? If the latter... then what killed it? What was the process of preparation? And how does that then reflect on the advertising claims that started the discussion?

That is something I'd very much like to know before feeding it to to my filter feeders.

I don't put anything into my body that doesn't list the ingredients clearly... and I personally do not use products for my livestock that don't fit the same criteria.

I'm going on the premise that Phyto-Feast is a safe and useful product, indeed!

Its just raised some questions and neither the label nor website are clear enough for me. As a consumer... I'm going to information gather longer before I actually try it in living aquaria.

If we can't find Rob's info on a thorough web search, we'll e-mail him.

[Anthony Calfo]

An FYI too... in my characteristically long-view approach to information exchanges - this conversation is largely an excerise in (hopefully) constructive discussion about evaluating products. For the purpose of archiving and for reaching many aquarists with the hope of reminding them/us all to apply sensible measures on other/future products and being better consumers.

The best thing for everyone is if we closely examine a manufacturers product and claims and that it stands up to the scrutiny!

How wonderful for everyone then. :) The hobbyist, the manufacturer and everyone in between!

I'm sure if we all did more of this, then there would not be so many (or such severe) backlashes to the endless stream of products that come out each year which turn out to be false or even harmful (low grade seasalts, numerous algacides, various so-called "reef safe" ich cures... we've seen them come and go each year and heard or even experienced some awful stories about them :(

Being educated consumers is simple and the only good path here.

The phyto discussion has been good so far... now lets get some folks to run trials with it and eliminate some variables :)

Please do not limit your experiments to only one brand either! Make it fair and useful/interesting.

[spawner]

Anthony,

This has become an interesting thread. I would be intersting in helping out but I have a potential conflict.

Rob Toonen
Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology
PO Box 1346
Kaneohe, HI 96744

** edited out phone and e-mail pending Rob's permission for public posting in an archived forum - Anthony Calfo.


I know that Rob has done a lot of work for DTs in regards to feeding. Being in Hawaii (Coconut Island) now he would have some restrictions to over come. I know that DT cites Rob's expermints in his product literature. I would think he would be a great choice to run a trial if he could get the permits and had time. Have you guys seen his website, he seems to have figured out how to get 30 hours out of a day.

http://www2.hawaii.edu/~toonen/index.html

[Anthony Calfo]

cheers, Andy :)

I do have tremendous admiration for Rob. Always have... he's an amazing and interesting fellow.

But lets keep this discussion and any trials very open ended... not about a specific Reed product or a DTs product,etc. solely.

I rather see this as some home-grown consumer advocacy ala Consumer Reports style.

And so... let's avoid any folks with affiliations to any specific manufacturer. (sure... many aquarists have taken free samples given out randomly to the public at trade shows and hobby events. Thats fine. But lets not employ helpers with interest beyond that).

I for one have had both pleasant and... er, "debating" discussions with both Mr. Reed and Mr. Tagrin. I reckon they both might love or hate me equally :) I do feel even-handed with both FWIW.

Most folks that use these products are regular hobbyists... unqualified amateur (aquarium) professionals at best.

Let's keep it simple at first and just reduce some variables to answer questions and address marketing claims:

For starters... which packaged products are live or not.

Take a few commonly available brands... give them some same/equal) fertilizer and light and see if they grow out. simple enough.

If all are live... and all grow/sustain... then in some ways thats good enough for most folks. "Yes... X, X, and X are all live"

Or versus any known or discovered dead phyto products, most consumers I believe would agree that live is better than dead.

Whether dead is as useful (readily taken or not) is irrelevent to this point here. Consumers will believe individually and variously that live is better (nutrionally, receptive to filter feeders... whatever) IMO and want to know that when gathering information and wanting to make a buying decision. Especially in light of superlative advertising claims.

In a nutshell... I personally am just looking for practical consumer info.

[purplehaze]

My intention is not to speculate. For a start, it’s just confusing that Reed first offers his product as Phyto-feast TM LIVE and changes it to Phytofeast LIVE TM . Was 100% alive now is “live” …

He claims that the algae is in a suspended animation, in order to achieve that you have to add a preservative or a fixative like methanol or DMSO. You have to inundate the cell to a point where it stops functioning normally. So what preservative is he actually using and is their a possibility of it being harmful? It could be 100% natural or artificial!! The producer does not tell us what it is…just tries to confuse us.

Additionally the producer is adding a high powered caramel flavoring sugar to his algae to mask the smell (Ethyl Maltol). Why would he do all this and not come out and say that his product is preserved or fixed, naturally or unnaturally and that he has added a sugar to make things smell more pleasant. I have bought many products that are nothing more than hype, some honest information would be a nice change. For a manufacture to state that his product will
..... retain their full nutritional value long after they have ceased metabolic activity. The quiescence process delays any biological decomposition of the product for many months. Properly stored, a bottle of Phyto-Feastâ„¢ will provide the same value at two-plus months that it did on the first day.

This would mean that things will be exactly the same, which is ridiculous, because we all know that fatty acids degrade over time, and some degrade very quickly. The only way to prevent them from degrading would be to add a preservative or to keep them at –80C other wise they will degrade. That is just basic biochemistry.

Again I mean no disrespect to Reed in anyway, but we all get tired of hype and disingenuous information that is designed to confuse.

Check out this links:

http://reefcentral.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=137494&papass=&sort=1&size=medium&thecat=

http://reefcentral.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=137495&papass=&sort=1&size=medium&thecat=

[Anthony Calfo]

[degredation over time and particle clumping/clotting]

it has been a big concern/criticism from me at large about bottled phyto in general, and unrefridgerated ones in particular----> IMO, they have to be very, very fresh to be used optimally. As they age, degenerate, clump, clot... whatever - they are less and less useful. Particle sizes increase (clumps really) and nutritional value inevitably decreases.

So I am a fan of live phyto (obviously).

[spawner]

Well said Anthony:

Many people from reefs.org know me as a very strong and sometimes overly outspoken advocate for the home aquarist that is not on these boards and is sucked into advertising that not factual or confusing. I personally take offense to ads by companies which have large ad budgets specifically that target the under informed hobbyist. I am not saying that is what is happing here, but I sure would like to see straight forward advertising.

Anyway a good consumer report type project would be wonderful.

Products would be restricted to algae or all invert filter feeding food?

I can offer to have the fatty acid word done for this project, I have a fellow grad student that runs all my shrimp samples. We could get him to run the fatty acid profiles, he’s not affiliated with any group at all and I think I might be able to have him slide them in with my samples without much additional work..

I however am working on a very successful calanoid copepod project (we are going to unleash it at MO’06) with and receive free algae from an algae company. Therefore I don’t think it would be ethical to do anything other than provide some contacts for fatty acid testing if needed.

Again, I think you have done a great job here keeping things civil, these types of discussions wheather about sea salts or other products tend to get a bit heated.

[Anthony Calfo]

outstanding Andy. Much thanks for the offer and especially your candor.

I too am very pleased to see this life in this thread without a flame fest. Indeed, flames happen too easily at large on message boards :( Ridiculous when so. You can't get that (usually) wasted time of your life back. A pity to see folks waste energy on such fights rather than run civil and constructive debates.

Let's take some days/weeks to see who is able and interested to do what with looking at these products. My advice again is to start small if only to be systematic in addressing issues and eliminating variables: Algae products first... live vs dead issue.

Then if we like we can get into nutritional issues later (great thanks for the fatty acid analysis support!)

Spin-offs to other filter-feeder foods, etc possible.

This is likely out of the scope of ability for any one single person (time/money constraints). But lets see what we can do by pulling together.

Consumer advocacy has to start somewhere :)

Indeed many good folks are of this mindset. My friend Steven Pro is rather outspoken about such issues as well (though he already has two pending projects to finish presently). Many others are the same. We must not only stand up for ourselves... but the majority of the participants in this hobby are not represented on this or any message board! Yet their success or failure does impact our participation in the hobby via prices, product quality and availability... legislation, etc.

We simply must police ourselves and be educated consumers! I can't think of anybody more interested and better able to take care of us... than us :)

I'll try to get back to this thread as often as possible before Christmas (between cities and airports!) :D

kind regards to all,

Anth-

[Fredfish]

Curiouser and curiouser...

So, purplehaze, before posting here you had in your hands a not so inexpensive report analysing for suspected preservatives?

Leads one to ask, who would commision such a report and why?

hmmm...

Not so live product, not entirely forthright poster. Wnat gives?

Fred

[Anthony Calfo]

Fred... with all due respect, can you separate your personal skepticism of Reed product critics from what seem to be real questions from real consumers such as myself?

If so... you are welcome to stay.

If unsure... do consider that your bias does not seem any different than others here. You could be called a "Reed product fan" as much as you/we/anyone could call purplehaze a "reed product critic." I'd like to believe that most of us here are neither. Just curious consumers.

If not... I'd ask you if you are then saying that none of us have valid points here in stating our confusion (same as purplehazes' in many ways) about the aforementioned issues.

Put another way, are you stating that we should take the Reed manufactur's website and product literature as unchallanged fact, but that purplehaze or any other person should not take DT's criticizing advertising/report as dubious?!?! Aren't they both equally unsubstantiated (by us)?

Seriously, Fred... I fear some hypocrisy is in your approach.

Please illuminate us otherwise. If you can do it civilly.

And again... I'll say (and don't get tired of saying it), that I will promptly uninvite from this thread anyone not playing fair... by what I deem to be fair ;)

If anyone doesn't like the rules here... bub-bye! Expect a PM :D

They can start their own thread elsewhere if needed :)

[Steven Pro]

Anthony, I thought of two other very experienced phytoplankton growers that are also fellow Pittsburghers: Eric and Sallie. Also, since neither is actively involved in marines, their inherent level of bias is nill. Additionally, if you obtain the phytoplankton, you could give them blind samples simply labeled A, B, C, etc. Each sample would have a standardized portion of the products and at the end of a set time period, the grown samples would be evaluated.

Just some thoughts.

[Anthony Calfo]

hey, great idea Steve :)

We should discuss this more over sushi :D

Seriously too... I will pick up a selection of brands from across the nation in the coming weeks. I'll be cross country and back twice... through a handful of cities. Will buy them at whatever LFS shops I find. Kell from LMAS offered to grow them out as well and she has no affiliations. Heck... she doesn't even like coral/filter feeders :D Blashpemy I know :p Imagine my surprise when she said fish culture needs phyto (feeding rots/pods) ;) Fish... Hmmm... interesting. I never thought of putting them in an aquarium. I guess I'll have to take some coral out :D Heehee...

[Anthony Calfo]

A bit of FYI for readers of this thread... thefolks that Steve is suggesting we try using include:

Dr. Sallie Boggs - Grand Master Breeder and highest ranked (FW) aquarist in the USA variously through the years... has bred more marine fish too (pipefish, gobies, blennis, clowns, cardinals...) than most anyone you and I will ever meet.

Eric Bodrock - also Grand Master status as I recall and one of the most accmplished aquarists you will ever meet. Has been the first to breed (in the world) and import a very long list of fishes! He's the present owner of All Oddball Aquatics in Pittsburgh PA (all freshwater but TRULY must bee seen if you ever visit the city!!!!!!!!! His facility is amazing and a near perfect model of what a "fishroom" should look like)

Kelly Jedlicki - expert marine aquarist, decade long BOD member for LMAS, directed two of three successful MACNAs for her hometown aquarium society. She has bred marine fishes from tiny seahorses to (spawned but not yet reared) Puffers and Burrfishes and sharks! Currently keeps a marine-only 3,000-ish gallon fishroom(s)

I know all three of these folks very well... I respect them all greatly! And not one of them is an avid coral keeper (Kelly being the only one of the three with any inverts at home... she calls them "puffer food" :D). These folks will have no bias nor any/much recollection of coral trade advertising or drama. With blind samples... thats good enough for me.

Steve... will you check with Eric this week if you can? Ask if he has the time?

I'll check with Sallie. Kell has confirmed.

Will someone(s) make a list of the products that are being marketed as live? Let's all agree on a list of what needs/wants to be looked at. Obviosuly DTs and Reed's will be discussed.

I'll talk to Dr. Marini to see if he's interested in serving as an overseer with... Steve Pro? and I for simple decisions on the matter.

Make no mistake y'all... this is only a casual trial.

Why?

Because we are all poor :p We don't have over 10K to contribute for a proper scietific study. In true consumer advoc fashion, we must fund it ourselves.

This is just a practical excercise of a practical application. And that has to be good enough for now.

[spawner]

Anthony,

I think you should also have the dry weight of each product tested. I can also have this done for you through another person. We have a clam hatchery that is doing some reserach on algae. They use our lab for dry weigths. I can ask the tech they have doing dry weights everyday to run some for me. You could just send her 5mL of the product labeled A,B,C etc. Next to something being alive I would think this is the most important question to answer, how much are you really getting.

[Anthony Calfo]

Very good point my friend. And we will do this first so that when giving the blind samples to the growers, we can begin with quantitatively equal samples.

Although, playing devil's advocate here... the (equal) dry weight of samples used is less of an issue when addressing the question of if a given product is simply live or not (presuming said products are wholly live or wholly dead... but not allowing for the possibility that a "mostly dead" product if so would have a greater chance of growing out with a greater dry weight sample size).

Ultimately yes, though, we must standardize the weights of samples.

Andy, thanks you again :) May I ask/trouble you to e-mail or PM me with information on how we can accomplish this together?

[Steven Pro]

I just remembered something. I recall an awkward moment at a Midwest Marine Aquarium Conference a few years back. Joe Lichtenberg (sp?) was talking about raising his clownfish. He mentioned briefly that he thought DT's was a dead product. Dennis happened to be in the audience and corrected him saying it was in fact live. To which Joe responded that he assumed it was dead because he could not get a culture to start with it.

[Puffer Queen]

I think the problem in trying to culture DT's may be that there is more than one strain of algae in the solution.

Just my opinion.
Kelly

[DrBDC]

I have tried a half dozen times with DT's and I could never get a culture started. Not sure the reasons but it was no problem getting one going with some nanno from someone that was shipped half way across the country and it looked dead by the time it got to me. Mostly white and cloudy with barely a tint of green. But apparently there were some live cells left.

[GreshamH]

Originally posted by Puffer Queen
I think the problem in trying to culture DT's may be that there is more than one strain of algae in the solution.

Just my opinion.
Kelly

Which would be an even greater problem with Phyto-Feast Live, being there's 5+ strains in there ;)

[Anthony Calfo]

no worries... this is just a simple excercise. As in... so simple that it can easily be answered with a good microscope (live or not)!

Indeed... that is the very point to some great extent here: most hobbyists do not have access to a good microscope nor the skills to ID what they/we are looking at. hence the practical excerises we go through in various consumer experiment threads with light bulbs, pest control products, etc.

Gresham... am I to understand correctly from the PM you just sent me that you have an affiliation with Reed Products? Its not problem at all so long as you identify it in posts when making comments that can be taken as endorsements (caution of shilling here) by readers that do not know of the bias.

You see... "even greater 'problem'" with the Reed product can be taken as a comment that its an "even better product" for allegedly having more strains/species.

Sigh... a slippery slope. If only a non-industry person had made the comment :D

[Anthony Calfo]

followup: Gresham has confirmed his professional affiliation with Reed Products (I thank you for the prompt reply, Gresham).

That's no problem in simple information exchanges/posts. But some discretion needs to be applied, as all mfgs/sponsors need to do when talking about their products specifically.

No biggie here... just a heads up to all.

[GreshamH]

Yup, I've never tried to hide the fact either :D

The grade of the slope depends on the reader, no matter what the intentions of the author were/are ;)

From viewing phyto under a scope, what protocols are going to be used to quantify live? Simply saying it's not moving isn't an accurate measure if the cell is alive.

[Anthony Calfo]

Gresham... can you simply tell us if the algae in Reed product in question here is alive in the bottle at the time a consumer purchases it say... 3 weeks after it leaves the bottling facility? (please see definition below). Presuming that your distributer has handled the product exactly as you'd recommend, of course.

Put another way, could the bottled product ever be used solely by a Reed expert to start a new growing culture for production of more Reed phyto?

I think this is largely where many of us are confused or unclear on the definition of "live" or "alive"

[Anthony Calfo]

ooh... my apologies. I missed your post.

As for the "protocols are going to be used to quantify live"

That has me... confused as well.

It's alive... or its not. Right?

If the phyto is not dead then... its alive.

Or maybe I missed learning about some state of existence that is not either? :D

We have very simple requirements here for qualifications in the categories of live or dead :)

Torpor is alive. Hibernation... yep, alive. Stoned on cheap wine... alive (barely). Glue sniffing induced deomonstrations of performance art... also alive (regrettably). Drooling and mumbling incoherently after a the Saturday banquet at MACNA conference... oh yeah - alive (but wishing not).

[GreshamH]

so you look under a scope, and your looking for life how, movement, reproduction, what? That's what I'm getting at in my "quantify life" comment.

Drooling and mumbling incoherently after a the Saturday banquet at MACNA conference... oh yeah - alive (but wishing not).

I ponder the meaning of life at that moment, it's the morning after I wish I wasn't alive :D

[spawner]

The fact that an algae culture might have more than one species in it doesn't keep you from starting a culture with it. If it was alive and healthy enough to start a culture with, then it would grow, it might be taken over by the fastest growing, weed type, but it would grow no doubt about it. There are plenty of ways to isolate several species from a culture. This is commonly done when isolating a new strain or species from the wild.

Calfo....Torpor is alive. Hibernation... yep, alive. Stoned on cheap wine... alive (barely). Glue sniffing induced demonstrations of performance art... also alive (regrettably). Drooling and mumbling incoherently after a the Saturday banquet at MACNA conference... oh yeah - alive (but wishing not).

Ha, yes these are alive, but you left out the part of being covered in caramel food flavoring so you don't smell.

Seriously, being alive doesn't give any clue as to the health of the algae. For example one algae species might be very alive and very healthy but not much better than Mickey D's while another species might be on its last leg but still have more nutrition.

I think its best to keep things simple and then get more complicated if needed.

[shred5]

Originally posted by StevenPro
I just remembered something. I recall an awkward moment at a Midwest Marine Aquarium Conference a few years back. Joe Lichtenberg (sp?) was talking about raising his clownfish. He mentioned briefly that he thought DT's was a dead product. Dennis happened to be in the audience and corrected him saying it was in fact live. To which Joe responded that he assumed it was dead because he could not get a culture to start with it.

Hey Steven...
I was there and remember that... By the way wasnt that Anthony's first time giving a talk on the reef hobby.....

Funny thing is I know I have heard of people culturing dt's... Back then they only had one strain in DT's.. Now they have more strains of algae to make it harded to culture... Rod Buehler should know since he used to work for DT's...

Dave

[Anthony Calfo]

...Not my first talk to the hobby by any stretch (had been doing regional pitches since early 90's) ... but it was my second largest crowd at that time... and I was quite nervous! :D

MASM had microphone troubles (feedback) and I could not use my hands animately, which for people of Italian decent is like wearing a muzzle. For me at least. Heehee... it was difficult talking without using my hands to 'ennunciate' :)

As for the multiple strains of algae being added to any phyto product to make it more difficult to culture out... that's ridiculous. :p

They are not grown togther... but merely blended to make a more diverse (particle/prey size) product.

Much like the biodiversity in your own reef tank, which reveals certain organisms that excel and displace others... so too will any mixed phyto culture. You cannot (and would not want to) culture all 5 or X-multiple strains in one vessel. That's not a strategic marketing handicap... it's a simple biological reality/inevitability.

I believe that most aquarists buying Reed, DTs or any other muti-species phyto product prefer the convenience of getting more potential prey/species in one bottle rather than having to buy multiple products/packages.

[FMarini]

Anthony-
Thanks for this wonderful information exhcange this is an excellent thread. I jumped in on page 1 about 5 months ago.
I am of the opinion that home hobbyists can grow decent phyto cultures of excellent nutrition, however it takes more than 5 mins/day and as Mr Reed has noted time=money. So in many cases the superior product can be readily purchased.

Thats said, i'll gladly provide some oversight in interperting the data for your consumer reoprt. I can tell you that i have a chance to view both products in question under a microscope (one of the labs fancy $75K leicas) and it quite revealing.

In this regards- allow me to suggest you ask additional questions of your hypothesis, which i beieve is are these products "alive" (whatever your definition of alive is). To me focusing on - can you culture these products is not the appropiate way to address their "alive-edness". If viability is a concern (to me this is the more approaiate term for these products, since you are asking are they alive or not alive. Viability would assess are they metabolically active and do they still contain sufficent nutrition (which IMO are really the questions your pondering), not can you culture them out and make a starter culture from them. If you want primo monoculture, go to the site Mr Reed supplied about 3 pages back.
As for culturing these products, I'm not sure what to expect and what your expectations would be? I guess I'm askin what is your end result? are you trying to get all of the individual species to culture out or just prove that a product contains sufficent innoculum to start some form of culture in your hands?
If it were me conducting the experiment I would make this a very simple experiment. Agree on a standard endpoint, first.

Last comment, i saw this a while back, the use of a carmelizing agent to mask the smell. I remember a while back, when the first wave of "live" phyto products hit the market, many threads popped up about should my algae XX smell like this? I suspect this a reponse to those comments, this way a product can undergo decompostion and putrification and not generate an obvious indicator of its spoiling. However it would suggest that presumably one would expect the product containing the maskin agent to be decomposing, hence not viable.

frank

[spawner]

Frank,

From what I gather, Anthony is trying to look at products along the lines as a hobbyist would, in this case the average Joe walking off the street. When I flip through mag.. once every few months or so, I try to do this as well, in an effort to determine if something is misleading and needs to be corrected. Many times I find things that I am uncomfortable with in ads from varies sources. A few of those times I have confronted the source of the ad and asked for explanations or corrections. Some times this is effective; some times not.

The point is that when an ad seems to be very complicated; uses fancy words, it begs the question whether it’s 100% straight and honest to the average person or if its spun around to be kind of correct but misleading. I am not saying in anyway that this has occurred but I am only saying that it feels that way sometimes when ads use very complicated words and processes to explain a simple product.

So what I think Anthony is proposing is to do a simple test to determine in a very simple way if something is alive. If you ask most anyone, esp. those who are not biologist what "alive" or "live" is they would first think of themselves or some other organism that is alive and compare that with the given product. That said alive should only mean that it can be grown. Complicating this process is that you have multiple species in a product that have different characters. So maybe some species are treated differently than others or have different shelf lives. Regardless of any of these factors the producer should be honest with the average Joe and come clean about how long something should last and what is in it. Now we can't expect someone to give 100% of the details of a product but what we should demand is that someone give us an idea if something is preserved or has additives in it. Kind of like "all natural" or "organic" something along those lines. Or contains additives synthetic or food grade; preservatives or flavoring.

[Anthony Calfo]

lucid, Frank :) Super thanks! And yes... you have hit the nail spot on the head, especially, on several points.

There is some irony here too for me as it relates to the points made/clarified since we are talking about analyzing (deconstructing myths/misbeliefs) products particularly for DIY culture folks [the origin of the thread] yet I have been pitching (hard early in the thread) the mantra that buying (certain) commercial products is the better route (nutritional value and overall quality including particle size and prey species) for most aquarists!

Heehee... I really don't think culturing phyto at home is the best bang for most folks buck (time invested or money spent to make what kind of end product?!?)

But either way... what many of us asking here really is -

a) are the given products we use "viable"

and more importantly

b) are they nutrititious and usable (taken by filter-feeders, etc)

Indeed... we should start simple/small and have a clear endpoint goal.

"Viability" is the first question to me. If I want to DIY grow phyto (again... the very name and origin of this thread!), then viability of a commercial product used as an innoculum (and/or boost/re-envigor) to live home cultures is obviosuly an issue. And, for reef keepers that want to use store-bought phyto... I personally believe that a majority will also need/want/favor fresh, viably active phyto rather than something that has been altered. Nutritional value aside (see below), there are some very legitimate reasons for wanting this... starting with the belief (true or not) that fresh (viable) live phyto is more likely to be taken by our targeted filter feders for its natural and appropriate particle/prey size (has not been clumped, clotted, fixed ot in any way denatured).

And really... where does the average aquarist go to get a "starter culture" of phyto? Even the savvy RC readers largely do not have access to pure lab cultures, but rather get innoc's from local store bought phyto, or local aquarists. Period.

As for nutritional value... great point (again most important here) but is simply beyond the means of home aquarists to quantify.

And since we all here are mostly simple aquarists (OK... Frank - you are not simple aquarist. Your a super-aquarist. Well... you may be simple, but just not a simple aquarist. Er... what I mean is... ah, nevermind :D)... Hmmm, sorry. I digress.

Since we are chatting up this "DIY phyto" thread from a DIY home based/consumer perspective... I think we can say that we are at least initially interested in the practical realities.

1) is the product "alive", which we will define as metabolically viable sufficient to start a DIY home culture

2) can home aquarists with reasonably sufficient hardware grow out reasonably good cultures of at least one species
* indeed more than one species is not likely or recommended for optimal phyto culture. Ridiculous really to even discuss more than one species per culture.

That is a good starting point as I see it. Comments?

Much appreciation again to Frank for his comments and offer to oversee.

mille grazie,

Anthony

[Anthony Calfo]

Thanks Andrew :) We were posting at the same time and you beat me to the punch! :D

[FMarini]

Anthony-
allow me to ever so lightly disagree w/ you on one above point (althou) maybe a few by the time I'm done.
Most hobbyists can grow phyto, its just more cost efficent for them not to and buy it- i will agree w/ you on that.
point 1- I believe many people have a easy way to assess nutritional profiles of their phyto culutres;. its called feeding. If you grow phyto and you feed it to an feeder organism (like rotifers, brine nauplii) and the rotifers can support clownfish fry development, then subjectively the phyto is nutritional sufficient to grow clownfish fry. Is it nutritional complete enough to fulfill the requirements of an EPA lab test? probably not, but it should be sufficent to provide growth support for developing clownfish fry (and most likely any filter feeding organisms), now is this phyto the same "quality" as what you buy from the vendors in question. Probably not.
I'm still not sold on the concept of culturing phytoplanknton from a store bought phyto concentrate as a defination of how good or viable the product is. I understand your and Andys statements, and I also understand that the average hobbyist (and yes Anthony I am simple) might want a starter culture, but every hobbyist has access to good starter cultures, florida aqua farms.
Besides this your asking a diffcult question of these phyto concentrate products, your hypothesis takes on the supposition that A) if the phyto product is not viable, then one cannot get a viable phyto to grow out of it, and B)if the phyto product is alive, then one can get a viable phyto to culture out of it. I purport that if statement A and B are true, then what happens if nothing grows out of statement B.
Anyway, I would support a few thing already mentioned here, one would be a quick microscopic examination. Easy to do ( i would add something like trypan blue or some viability dye to ensure intact cell membrane or and exclude an cellular debris fragments, and b) aquaculture- althou i won't hang my hat on this
Andy- in my opinion alive does not only mean that it can be grown. If i were to add 0.5% formalin or 250Cgy of Cesium radiation to anyones bone marrow stem cells, it would stop them from replicating. However for the next few months the cells would be metabolically chugging away making every factor, they normally produce, they would in all intents and purpose act like a normal untouched cells, yet, they wouldn't ever make a daughter cell. Are these cells still alive? are they stuill viable? could you take these cells and grow more from them- no.
Lets say that one of the agents used to ensure long term storage of phytos were to do something similar to the effects i describe for 250Cgy of radiation (in my above example). Would the phyto be any less viable? would you be able to culture any of these cells? if this were true would the innoculum required to establish a viable culture go from 1 cells to maybe 10 million? does that change your thinking about the products vigor?

i ask these questions because growing your own starter culture from a phyto product produced to survive storage for extended periods maybe be asking apples from an orange. From my own experience i can tell you that i used to be able to grow nanno direct from a small innoculum from one of the products in question only when it arrived fresh at the LFS, if the product sat for any more than 2-3 weeks, i couldn't grow anything from it.

[shanekennedy]

i ordered phyto-feast live direct from reed mariculture. received the bottle on oct 26th. if i recall the label correctly, it says best if used before feb 06. i started a culture haloween weekend, forget the exact day, but it was about a week and a half ago. i used a dishwasher-sterilized gallon jar filled w/ ~1 cup of ro/di water & the rest saltwater. added ~20 drops of photo-feast & some air & light. the jar seemed to tint a little green after a few days & then went mostly clear. it has since turned to a light-medium green color.

[FMarini]

shane-
interesting obeservation, however allow me to ask you to take hard look at whats in your culture vessel. it could be anything from cyanobacteria to who knows what, and maybe even phytoplankton.

[shanekennedy]

i'm no bio-lab tech, just some guy who turned some water green. i wouldn't know how to determine what's in the vessel.

[spawner]

Frank,

If somone wants to grow algae they should buy good starter cultures and not some off the shelf product. I'll never understand why people fill they need to buy a bottle of what ever to start a culture. Why not just buy a good clean starter culture, they are not easy to find but you can get them.

My questions pertain more to product advertising more to reality of growing something. I personally think it’s crazy to try to start a culture with an off the shelf phyto product. I just go crazy and Gresham can attest to that, when I see ads that are not 100% honest with what is written down. Now taking this into account, your example is an excellent one. I think of live; living; and alive in those terms, many organisms are alive but not really viable or reproductive due to one reason or another. But at the hobbyist level for product packaging and advertising purposes only, I would suggest that if you alter something to the point of preventing it from behaving as it normally would, then you need to say so. So your if you sold your marrow as "alive" so someone and they were not a bone marrow specialist but likes to use it, would it not be best to say that your have preserved the cells and state in plain English what you have done to them so an 6th grade student could understand it. That is my only point really, is that one should be as straight forward as possible.

I think that Reed has done a great job of explaining this very point in the past. To me, years ago is paste was quite clear, not really live and not really dead. Kind of non-viable as it is labeled and sold. So I know that is was going to start to decompose quickly when I was using it but it was still in a state that some organisms could ingest it. This information was very nice, clear and easy to understand. I’ve been using since 1998 or so. But to see a very similar product come on the market as live “alive” I just question if that is 100% on the level with the average guy, that is my only point really. For algae if the cell will not reproduce then I would questions its “alive” state, and suggest that maybe it should be call non-viable. I mean you can freeze nanno paste and it is still in the same state as it was before the freezer, not really live, not 100% dead. I just like plain English labeling. I am not saying its not a good product, could be great could be not so great. That is not the point.

As far as hobbyist being able to grow phytoplankton and have it turn out as good as a commercial product. I have to strongly disagree with that. While on the surface it might seem that way, the vast majority of people growing phytoplankton (I mean fish farms etc) don’t have a real clue how to really make it grow and make it 100% effective. That said lots of people can turn water green/brown even dark green/brown but a good understanding of the biochemical processes that take place is critical to get the best product. Now can a product that is 1 month old or so be as good as some home brew well yes and no; depends who is home brewing. Sure clownfish might or might not display the difference, but other more sensitive organisms will. Also you have to look at the Fatty acid profiles.

I don’t know if Matt Palmtag’s study is published yet. But anyway from speaking to him about it and skimming over his Thesis, on thing is clear. You would never want to use University of Texas algae to enrich rotifers or Artemia with when you can buy some of Reed’s paste or other products. I haven’t read the study in great detail yet, but I think you will see several things; one is the nutrition of the algae when presented to the organism and the other is the density of algae. I am willing to bet when it comes to enriching that density is a key factor. Would I use paste now to enrich now, no, but that is because I have access to algae that most people only dream of. Would I grow algae to enrich Artemia and rotifers with if I was under normal hobbyist conditions, no, if you only had 5 minutes a day, using soda bottles and some homebrew. Sure I would grow algae for green/brown water, but not to enrich unless I had the time to grow good algae. Those are two very different things.

Another thing that is clear is that I am getting and maintaining, for over a year, A. tonsa densities of around 10-15/mL because the quality of algae, so the type of algae and who and how they grow it are the key points. So I get densities of calanoid copepods that no one has ever seen because I have access to great algae, would you see the difference with clownfish I don’t know.

[FMarini]

Andy- very salient points.
I understand your concern over the potental verbage & misleading advertisment claims. However this thread and Anthonys concerns have fallen on the premise of "grow your own stuff", but your angle towards the manufacturers accruacy is well taken.
I havent seen Matts article, I'll check it out
thanks
frank

[Anthony Calfo]

fabulously constructive dialogue! More valuable to date (and will very likely be) than the simple excercise proposed thus far.

Let's continue ride this discussion folks. :)

Especially interesting to me from the recent banter is the practical reminder that "you are what you eat" in so much that average aquarists can indeed essentially quantify the nutritive value of the phyto they are feeding to their rotifers by the success (or not) of the larval fish being reared. A good point at least for those breeding fishes. And here's an interesting thread touching on some of related points (feeding phyto, rotifers and larval fishes... plus toxicity concerns):

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=6037560#post6037560

A minor mention/comment though to Frank, et al - we may have different perspective here on aquarists' tendencies and options for procuring starter cultures. As a man of science (you live, love and work it) you are resourceful at finding places like Florida Aqua farms. But do consider that the majority of aquarists have no such perspective... heck, most cannot even find (or are willing to use) the dang search tool on any given site to help themselves to common questions/queries! heehee... running your own forum I'm guessing you'll agree with that ;)

Florida Aqua Farms does not currently advertise much on any major hobby sites... in no mags (a bit in FAMA)... but overall they are not heard of. Yet they've been around for decades. Fish breeders know of them well and find out about such sources in the networked circles in which they run/chat.

But I still think the masses of hobbyists (casual reef keepers including most here on RC) are mostly dependant on what they see and hear among the limited circles of largely new(er) aquarists - our hobby having a very high turnover of aquarists as you know... short average lifespan.

This is a small matter in this thread. But it perhaps should remind us of the difference in perspectives between skilled aquarists (yep... like you Frank ;)) and typical aquarists (casual reef keepers not breeding fishes, etc.)

[shred5]

In my opinion it is not the average aquarist who is culturing phyto though.. Most of them will buy something like dt's or some other type of bottled phyto...

You have to pretty dedicated, have some time and knowledge of the process for culturing phyto... Also to culture phyto you need some sort of fertilizer (f/2) which is found at the same places that sell phyto cultures.. Plus it takes a little research...

Anthony you are right about the search but most will just start a new thread and ask how and where?

Dave

[Luis A M]

Wow,this thread is some:D. Across it´s very lengthy development,I´ve seen it rise to philosophical and metaphysical issues about the meaning of life and the complexities of organic chemistry,without omitting some considerations on commercial ethics.All this to endorse the simple question if home cultured phyto is better/worse than a commercial product.:p
To address this question in plain terms,when we buy a lettuce plant at the grocery,we care about if it is fresh and nutritious,not if it is live or not.And we could also discuss if home grown lettuce is better than supermarket´s greenery.
Off the shelf algae have proven to be a practical solution for many aquarium needs,be it cryopreserved,frozen or refrigerated.
But culturing phyto is easy and fun and I wouldn´t sustain that home grown are in any way inferior to commercial algae.I find it better in some applications,like the green water technique for larval rearing and pelagic copepods culturing.
As in any culturing,you need to start with good,sterile cultures from some reliable institute.That was expensive or difficult for the average would be culturist.Old agar plates weren´t too reliable either,I cultured Tetraselmis and Chlorella from their Nanochloropsis plates!.
A new company,Algagen,now offers good starter cultures of lots of algal species,including zooxanthellae,at reasonable prices.I ordered a TET culture and it was strong and healthy.They are even now offering calanoid pods,a very much needed live food for difficult species.
Not meaning to pull this long thread even longer:D

[Anthony Calfo]

quite true... we have exercised and excorsized in this thread :D

Mostly quite constructively too.

I have learned from the thoughtful posts made here.

[Fredfish]

Luis. You never saw my lettuce. I stick to the grocery store. ;)

I find that faf is quite well known here at RC. Maybe its the forums I hang out in...

Thinking on it, it is quite amazing to me how easy it is to get hold of phytoplankton now. Store's don't ususally carry stuff that dosn't move, so there must be a lot of people feeding their tanks phyto. Thats quite a change from 5 years ago!

Fred

[Anthony Calfo]

Amusing... I just saw lettuce for sale at my grocery store - packaged and labelled as live!

Hydroponic source, of course, and packaged as a whole head with a small root mass in a depression with moisture/water.

Live and fresh is best, right? ;)

[shred5]

Forget lettuce it has very little nutritionand is mostly water, we cant even feed it to tangs, buy spinach... :lol:

Dave

[Luis A M]

So we keep drifting away with this thread:p
For consumption, live and fresh is the same,but life is an obvious certification of freshness:D That´s why Chinese sea food stores sell their stuff live.
Some algae (TET,PAV,T-ISO,RHO) are motile,so you can tell if they´re alive by watching them in the scope.NAN is not,but if you can culture them,you know it´s live.(like the lettuce plant Tony found).

There is something wrong about the idea that it is easier to raise rotifers on algal pastes than with live algae.It is not.Rots on live algae are cultured uneventfully for years without crashes.
What is true is that it´s easier to buy commercial algae than to culture them,but that´s a different thing.And you can reach ultra high rot densities with pastes,but IMO this is something a hobbyist doesn´t need.
I mass produce rots with pastes but keep my stock cultures on live algae.

[sleizure]

Quick question.. I've been culturing for a bit over a year now - changing the 2litres on a not so frequent basis - using Marine Algae Grow... things are doing well - or so I think - I've never had a culture go bad - or so I think...

Whats the span of time that I can keep reculturing from that initial culture? Forever? How do I know it has gone sideways on me? My tank seems to be doing ok? The greenwater gets greener as the week goes on while culturing...

[Luis A M]

You need to keep stock cultures as a back-up if you want to keep your cultures running indefinitely.Your working cultures,bottles or larger,after some time get contaminated with ciliates,bacteria and even with other algae like Chlorella.

[spawner]

Unless you have a good microscope you generally don't know how your cultures are really doing (as far as contimiation) until its too late. You can always renew your cultures by getting clean starters every few months. Generally nanno will out grow most contamints. I was shocked how long Luis kept his Tet for, something like 5 years or more and still looked good. BTW, Erik said to let you know it's swimming now. Most people can't keep things that long, but Luis has special skills. ;)

[Luis A M]

Originally posted by spawner
but Luis has special skills. ;)

No skills :p ,just need to take good care of my cultures.Living here,if I loose a culture,I am in deep sea to get it back across intl.borders:eek2: So I keep sterile stock cultures.

But Andy is right,you really don´t need to keep stock cultures living in USA.When a culture crahes,it´s a simple matter to order a new starter:cool:

[Triterium]

Any ideas where to get good starts of T-iso and Rhodomonas? I got some starts from a commercial brand and they came with a green algae contaminant. Andy, i think you know the company im talking about. At $20 a culture, i feel like it should have been unicellular.

id rather not spend over $100 for an axenic culture.

I know FAFUSA has T-iso actually so maybe just a source that sells unicellualar cultures of rhodo

[Anthony Calfo]

minor update... I have chatted with several science/fisheries and industry friends that have done casual labwork on some of the phyto we've discussed here to date.

With chagrin I must admit that none of them (so far) feels comfortable to state their findings for fear of getting dragged into a lawsuit for either side of at least two prominent manufacturers. Sigh...

I can tell you that they are in agreement: at issue here is not (metabolically) alive product or not. Or even nutritive value, or not. The products reviewed ran the gamut of our definitions. This is all much as Dr Marini has stated here at RC and at hobby events, pers. comm., etc.

Therefore, there is no need for Dr. Boggs, Ms. Jedlicki, etc to culture out samples. (I know... this is not a news flash to most of y'all) :D

At issue then perhaps solely is the marketing for some product(s), toxicity issues aside. Nefarious intent or simply unclear... not clear enough to enough people... whatever. And that is a consumer advocacy issue that is well worth tackling! But not here in this thread. I may well take it up personally in fact, and I know of several other folks with the time and money inclined to do the same. No doubt the support is there for the establishment of some kind of consumer watchdog in our industry, for which there never really has been one. Rest assured y'all will hear of it when it hits the fan :D

Back on track: this thread has been well enough on topic for culturing issues. Kudos to all. Pardon the interruption :)

[scottfarcuz]

I'm looking to start culturing my own phyto. I have been doing copepods on DT's, and to be frank it's getting pretty expensive. After reading this thread I've learned that my home grown may not have as good of nutritional value as DT's, so I'm considering just feeding 50/50 home grown/DT's.

Anyone have suggestions for current articles on the best method for home culture?

What strain(s) would be best for my copepods? I learned here that Nann is not ideal for them, but what is?

Anyone have a good method to bottle the copepods? I have more than I need, and would like to spread them around my reef club...

[Worldwithin]

I think the general consensus has been that culturing your own phyto for feeding pods and rots is economical as well as useful. When it comes to feeding them directly to your tank, the nutritional aspect comes into question.

:fish1::hammer:

[Luis A M]

Originally posted by scottfarcuz

After reading this thread I've learned that my home grown may not have as good of nutritional value as DT's

I hate to say this and restart the bitter debate of the nutritional convenience of using commercial algae instead of home grown,and be against the main stream of opinions played in this thread.

But I have to be honest and say that I don´t buy the concept.There´s no way a good alga strain,grown healthy and fed with the right nutrients,and harvested at the right time could be nutritionally inferior.There is just no way.



Regarding your pods,you didn´t say what are they.

[shanekennedy]

Originally posted by Luis A M
But I have to be honest and say that I don´t buy the concept.There´s no way a good alga strain,grown healthy and fed with the right nutrients,and harvested at the right time could be nutritionally inferior.There is just no way.


i'm sure the commercial guys would love everyone to believe otherwise.

i'm in full agreement w/ you. i've followed this thread from the beginning & have seen all the claims of homegrown being inferior, but have seen no evidence to back up the claims.

[Fredfish]

Well Luis, since you are going to swim upstream, I'll join you: with caveats. ;)

I think that you can sucessfully culture good quality if you take a little time and start with quality ingredients. For instance, don't use miracle grow as the fertilizer, use a proper f2 formula. Miracle gro (or any other plant fertilizer) provides an unballanced nutrient base for algae. Garbage in, garbage out.

Also, if you have temperature control issues during certain times of the year, as I do, there are times when you may be better off using a comercial product. I learned this summer that once the water hits 30C your algae no longer has much of a HUFA content.

There are probably some other things you should be careful of that I can't remember or don't know, which is why it is probably a good idea to beg/buy/borrow a copy of Hoff's Plankton Culture Manual with your first order of culture supplies (thats my Christmas present to myself this year).

Culturing phyto is not for everyone. Give it a whirl and if whatever you are feeding your pods to thrives, you are OK.

If it turns out to be a pain, the comercial guys do know how to produce a consistantly high quality product. You really can't lose either way.


Fred

[Worldwithin]

I think what it comes down to nutrition wise is that commercial products provide a variety of algae strains in a single product, rather than the typical single strain product that most DIYers produce. If you produce multiple, healthy strains, then I would imagine that your product would be comparable to a commercial product. A single, non-varietal algae will only provide so much in the ways of nutritional value.

:fish1::hammer:

[Anthony Calfo]

well said, Fred and Worldwithin

mahalo :)

[graveyardworm]

I just finished reading this thread through, long read and very interesting. I did make my first attempt last winter at culturing phyto, I started with DT's after having read that it was possible, and after several attempts with cultures that never took off as the result using f2, I turned to FAF culture disks. I had better luck with the disks but still after a few weeks the cultures slowly crashed, probably a newbie mistake. Eventually I will try again as I would like to try my hand at rearing clownfish.

Anthony you mentioned way back in this thread about the amounts that aquarists are feeding their tanks as being an improper amount, I believe you said too much. Do you have any guidlines aside from whats printed on say a bottle of DT's, or would it be specifically a tank by tank basis and the kinds of animals that exist within? I'll try to find the quote.

Here it is found it on page 3 "Most folks overestimate just how much phyto is actually needed in a system. And as such... overestimate the expense of using commercial products in turn."

[Anthony Calfo]

any particulate food must be measured on a case by case basic of course.

It really goes without saying. The mfg has no way of knowing what kind of nutrient export is going in in the consumers display (water changes, how much, or not?... skimmers working well or not, or not existing at all)... the ability of the consumer to finesse water flow to keep particulates in suspension for a maximum/optimal period of time, or not (sinking and polluting)... mechanical filtration trapping said food particles, then said food particles being rinsed/exported soon, or not (burdening water quality) etc.

I reckon the mfg guidelines for dosing phyto, feeding frozen or dry food, etc much like the warnings on a a cup of fast-food take-out coffee: it's obvious that the cup and contents are hot ;) And you are the best person to judge when it is cool enough to drink and how much to drink at a sip, etc :D

That all said... following the mfg rec's, we often see a new (uninformed/ignorant) aquarist with a young tank with a lower than average number or mass of filterfeeders than the "typical" display of the same filter-feeding reef inverts who likely will be overfeeding the phyto (and other foods). Badly sometimes.

We can't fault the mfg. They can only provide an educated estimate based on some average... and pray that we (consumers) use some common sense to finesse it for our individual systems.

And so... we should IMO treat dosing phyto like dosing Iodine, other food products, nutritive matter: add small and sparingly at first (I suggest half mfg dose) and then slowly push the envelope in time.

With Iodine eg., if you increase slowly over time to excess, you will eventially see an undesirable increase in brown diatom growth when you've crossed the threshold for iodine demand in your system. Indeed, in excess, something (diatoms in this case) will fluorish and exploit the boon. So we simply back down to the last known "safe" dose and ride it for a while until we think the need for iodine in the system has increased (biomass increase), when we can increase the dose slightly and see if the system sustains it (no pest or nuisance organisms flare).

In the case of excess phyto, we typically see a surge in sponges, fanworms, vermetid snails, and other filter- or mucus feeding organisms.

Look to such indicating organisms for guidance on if you are applying a useful or excessive amount of phyto.

[graveyardworm]

Could feeding phyto be considered a sort of one way street, you start slow and as the amount of living organisms that consume it increase you can then increase the amount you feed, but if you were to suddenly stop the result would be starvation and death for these populations which in turn could cause ammonia spikes and a seemingly unexplainable tank crash?
Interesting example with the iodine I've never heard it explained that way.

[spawner]

Graveyardworm,

I think you'll find that plates are not the best way for most people to start a culture. They are best used for isolating a strain of algae. For the average person, taking algae off a plate and making a test tube starter is too much work and there is too much room for error. Plus, plates that are homogenous, 100% covered in algae don't help out at all. The idea behind plating algae is to see and move individual stains or cells as much as possible. This is very similar to the way you plate out bacteria cultures to ID them, if its too dense then you can't see anything other than a central mass. Many times plates can be more contaminated than a good starter liquid. I think you would have better success obtain a very clean starter, a few hundred mL vs. a plate.

Just about anyone can grow a few species very easily and with some reading and practice, as Luis has done, can keep a strain of algae for a long time. It's good pratice to renew your starter every few months or so to keep things clean.

[graveyardworm]

Hi spawner,
I am still very new to phytoculture and so far my research (mostly from melev and flame angels sites), indicated that the easiest way to start a phytoculture was with the plates purchased from FAF. I havent opened all the links provided in this thread yet and so hadnt heard of a liquid starter culture until your post. Would it be possible to post/repost a link to where I can purchase liquid starter cultures. Also I would like to start culturing rotifiers is the best way from cysts or is there also another way available which may be better. Thanks

Sorry just checked FAF and noticed they also carry liquid starter cultures for both phyto and rotifs so I'll rephrase my question. Which phyto would be best to culture for both rots and tank feeding, and are liquid rotif starter culture better than cysts?

[Worldwithin]

Florida Aqua Farms (https://3kserver7.com/~frank/secure/agora.cgi?cart_id=7070891.17667*783nH1&product=LIVE_CULTURES) has both plates as well as liquid cultures. The advantage that plates have over liquid is that they are easiter to ship (not paying for water weight) and last longer then their liquid counterparts. Otherwise, assuming that they are not contaminated, they are pretty much the same.

[spawner]

It might be a bit easier to ship a plate, but trust me, its much easier and cleaner to start a culture from cleaner starter cultures in a liquid form. The correct way to use a plate is to use it for isolation purposes, not storing algae. You can store strains for several months or even years in test tubes in the right conditions. Plates are only good for several weeks maybe a few months for some strains.

From the plate you should start test tube cultures, let them bloom up, then transfer that to small cultures working your way up to larger volumes. It’s much easier to start with a few 100mLs or so starter culture that can be used to for several 2L cultures. The more steps the person cuts out the less likelihood of problems. As long as you keep your main cultures clean you can back cross them for several months. It's a good idea to get new cultures every few months to keep things clean. Unless you have an autoclave and a good sterile technique contamination is a given. I have looked at cultures that appear healthy and growing ok only to find them heavily contaminated.

The problem with plates is that your plates are made from starter "pure" cultures and then you are reversing the process. Some one took a starter culture, made a plate, then your taking a plate and making a starter culture. That are a lot of extra steps, windows for contamination.

If you or the person that made the plates is not extremely careful or in each process to reach the larger volume if your not sterile, your culture is going to get a small amount of contamination in each step and you'll lose the battle to keep them clean. Taking a plate straight to large volume (a few liters) is asking for problems. It might work for Nanno but not many other species are that weedy and it doesn't work all the time for everyone. Many people have had bad luck growing algae for this reason.

Plates are best used when you can see the individual culture strains, again very similar to what a microbiologist would do to isolate bacteria.

[shanekennedy]

Originally posted by spawner

I have looked at cultures that appear healthy and growing ok only to find them heavily contaminated.


what are you examining the cultures with?
what contaminates are you finding?
& why are these contaminates bad?

thanks,
shane

[Anthony Calfo]

graveyardworm... you are correct my friend. If you add an increasing amount of nutrients/food (phyto in this case) over time to support increasing colonies of X organisms, then indeed you have a mass with a minimum threshold/needs for survival. If you abruptly reduce said nutrients... the dependants will obviously suffer some attrition.

We see this will folks that foolishly culture massive quanties of Caulerpa but do not really know how they are doing it and then they are surprised when the demands of the matter exceed the systems resources (available nutrients) and it all crashes suddenly, and often catastrophically to other livestock in the tank. :(

That will not happen with starving fanworms ;) But... if you grew large amounts of sponge in part on phyto feeding, you could have a tragic crash if you failed to meet the increasing demands of said filter-feeder. Poriferans are indeed some of the most noxious organisms in the sea... its no wonder whay they are aggressively scrubbed off of live rock before export. It's more than a fouling (decay) issue. They are largely toxic.

I frankly enjoy the worms, snails and sponges very much. So I simply feed a small but consistent measure of phyto to my systems to maintain a moderate population. Keeping it in check as it were and not depriving them by waning or stopping the flow.

[Worldwithin]

Originally posted by Anthony Calfo
We see this with folks that foolishly culture massive quanties of Caulerpa but do not really know how they are doing it and then they are surprised when the demands of the matter exceed the systems resources (available nutrients) and it all crashes suddenly, and often catastrophically to other livestock in the tank. :(

Are you referring to those that let it grow unchecked in a fuge or something and don't harvest it regularly?

:fish1::hammer:

[Anthony Calfo]

it doesn't matter where its growing, but yes... if Caulerpa is not systematically "thinned" then there will be problems in time. Mind you, it is the old-growth Caulerpa that needs to be specifically "thinned" out (removing whole strands) and not pruned or cut... to stave off catastrophic events of vegetative fission or sexual reproduction and minimize the exudation of breaks in these single celled algae.

That all said, lets not get off track here, my friends. This is a phyto thread. Any OT subjects warrant a keyword search of the archives, and a new/seperate thread made if necessary.

kindly,

Anthony

[Worldwithin]

Thanks for the clarification..

:fish1::hammer:

[moumda]

Great thread Anthony! Do you see any problems over time with the metals used in f2 fertiziler in a sps tank? I do weekly (sometimes bi-weekly) water changes in a system of about 160 gallons total. Skim heavy with an Euroreef cs5-2 and an Aqua-c EV-180. The only reason I ask is it was talked about at the last IMac. Thanks in advance.

[spawner]

Shane,

Under a good scope at 100 - 400X you can see ciliates and flagellates, 1000X oil gets down to the cell level for looking at the health of the algae , heterotrophic plates to test for bacteria and TCBS plates to look for Vibrio.

[Anthony Calfo]

Moumda/all... I really do not see trace metals from f2 being an sigificant issue if any concern at all. I'm not saying that they won't accumulate to levels potentially (likely in some cases) higher than avg NSW, but rather that compared to the possibility of importing and accumulating the same or similar elements from source waters (tap water or inevitably degrading RO water as membrane ages, breaches, etc), foods, or other contaminants (via low grade reagents of various supplements used, etc)... the issue overall is moot.

With good average husbandry that includes regular water exchanges and (hopefully) some chemical filtration (I do love resin pads like Poly-Bio Marine Poly-filters and the like), my opinion is that trace metals via f2 will be a trace concern at best. No worries. :)

[Anthony Calfo]

not much here... but scavenging some info/links on:

what makes some algae smelly:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=703027
(11/14/2005 02:57 AM post... thanks to Randy for the info)

and

refridgerating phyto:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=625783

[Anthony Calfo]

Darn... had a thought to dig through archives I could have answered the live vs non-viable query earlier:

http://web.archive.org/web/20041009161827/instantalgae.com/livealgae.asp

and interesting tips/info on feeding rotifers:

http://web.archive.org/web/20041010142523/rotifer.reed-mariculture.com/recipe.asp

[Triterium]

I just got some cultures from Algagen. They appear very pure and healthy. It is the only place ive found that has cheap, pure cultures of some of the harder-to-find species. They also have a cool copepod (acartia i think) for raising fry.

There is also the Provasoli-Guillart National Center for Culture of Marine Phytoplanton (http://ccmp.bigelow.org/). They have axenic cultures but are a lot more money.

Ive bought cultures from florida aqua farms many times but they only have a few species. Their cultures are cheap and ive always had good success with them.

[Seahorsewisprer]

I have a few cultures from Algagen. I love their stuff! I had their Red rhodomonas growing for quite a while last winter. From what I read, it is high in fatty acids..

But, for those who don't want to grow their own, they also have a product called "Phycopure" that is 8 (I think) different live phytos?

[Rod Buehler]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6216902#post6216902 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Anthony Calfo
not much here... but scavenging some info/links on:

what makes some algae smelly:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=703027
(11/14/2005 02:57 AM post... thanks to Randy for the info)

and

refridgerating phyto:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=625783

here is another from Mr Tagrin

http://www.dtplankton.com/phytoplankton/mgw2/main.html

[Atticus]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6243668#post6243668 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Anthony Calfo
Darn... had a thought to dig through archives I could have answered the live vs non-viable query earlier:

http://web.archive.org/web/20041009161827/instantalgae.com/livealgae.asp



I don't really believe this one....

Without attacking the whole article. Dead cells have been shown to clump and I am sure his frozen product is no different. Live cells will also clump if not properly aerated and allowed to settle to the bottom of a culture vessel. Instant Algae is a wonderful product. I just wish the false claims and embelishment would stop, as they only damage the reputation of the product.

[spawner]

Rod,

I would suggest that you post this in Reeds commerical section (sponsor's forum Reef nutrition), Anthony is no longer on the board and I would think now that he is not a mod, they will shut this thread down when you guys start going at it again. There is useful information in the thread for the average hobbyist, and I would hate to see it shut down because of mud slinging that will for sure begin again.

[shred5]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6837926#post6837926 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by spawner
Rod,

I would suggest that you post this in Reeds commerical section (sponsor's forum Reef nutrition), Anthony is no longer on the board and I would think now that he is not a mod, they will shut this thread down when you guys start going at it again. There is useful information in the thread for the average hobbyist, and I would hate to see it shut down because of mud slinging that will for sure begin again.

Hi Andy

What happened? Why is Anthony not doing this forum anymore?
Sorry I have not been keeping up much on stuff lately...


Dave

[graveyardworm]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6837955#post6837955 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by shred5
Hi Andy

What happened? Why is Anthony not doing this forum anymore?
Sorry I have not been keeping up much on stuff lately...


Dave

Anthony is still around, just posting when and where he feels like it, I think he as well as some of the other experts wanted a break from all the controversy after some threads got out of control during their Xmas vacations. I've noticed alot of members have been "moved on" since that time.

I think threads like this should keep going as there is alot of useful information here and certainly more to be gained, but at the same time I think spawner is correct and questions regarding the validity of product statements should first go to the sponsers forum if one exists.

[shred5]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6839450#post6839450 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by graveyardworm
Anthony is still around, just posting when and where he feels like it, I think he as well as some of the other experts wanted a break from all the controversy after some threads got out of control during their Xmas vacations. I've noticed alot of members have been "moved on" since that time.

I think threads like this should keep going as there is alot of useful information here and certainly more to be gained, but at the same time I think spawner is correct and questions regarding the validity of product statements should first go to the sponsers forum if one exists.

I noticed Ron and Eric look to have left too.... what happened.. Pm me I dont want to hijak this thread to much.. I have not been around much lately....

[DrBDC]

This would be the place to debate these items. If you have a direct question, you can ask in their forum but to debate in their forum might not be the correct place. Debate is good. Attacks will get a thread closed. i.e. if someone comes on here and says "Brand X is a bottle of sewer water". That would still be allowed if you would add "because on XYZ cell analysis I came up with e. coli, etc." Just no unfounded attacking. Really the same with any threads.

[spawner]

I am not saying that this is not a good place to discuss something, but these things tend to get very heated and Anthony is not here on a daily basis to put out flames and such. I just don't want to see the mods kill a useful thread.