Last Chance Rack (macro algae and copepod)

[KenRexford]

The Fuge is Full. So, you are about to yank out a handful, but then the mass killing! All those happy copepods in that handful are about to meet a completely unfair demise. I always feel guilty and wasteful, so I sit there trying to shake them off or to pick them out. It seems like there could be a better way.

My idea is some sort of shelf of maybe screen that rests on the return pump chamber, not under the Fuge light to fry everything, where the pods have a few hours to ditch the doomed wad of algae for the safety of the return. Of course, that means a likely demise later in the mouth of some happy fish, but at least it has a fighting chance or at least dies for the greater good of that Tank.

BeforeI reinvent the wheel, has anyone seen anything like this or made anything DIY for that purpose?

 

[F i s h y]

I'm thinking that unless you are running water through it from above (like a shower) the pods are likely to stick to the wet algae rather than drop off on their own. I like the idea though.

 

[KenRexford]

I'm thinking that unless you are running water through it from above (like a shower) the pods are likely to stick to the wet algae rather than drop off on their own. I like the idea though.

I wondered that also, but I see that some copepods seem to squirm and drop when I pick up the algae. I suspect that they know that down=good and would eventually give up on the safety of the slowly drying world.