Tigger & Tisbe Pods

[40B Knasty]

I am actually experimenting again. I am wondering if I can get the tank to cycle by running an airline throw the live rock fast to see if it can process the nitrogen cycle efficiently. The water is staying very clean. A light amount of detritus on the bottom.

 

[Alexreefer]

@40B Knasty I just saw this thread and I know its long dead but I am planning on culturing trigger pods and baby brine. I do not have a 5 gal tank so I was wondering if I can use a bucket with airline tubing and a dead rock? I have had many failed attempts before with pods but I am trying to get this going so I can super seed my tank before I get a mandarin.

Thanks, Alex

 

[ectoaesthetics]

@40B Knasty I just saw this thread and I know its long dead but I am planning on culturing trigger pods and baby brine. I do not have a 5 gal tank so I was wondering if I can use a bucket with airline tubing and a dead rock? I have had many failed attempts before with pods but I am trying to get this going so I can super seed my tank before I get a mandarin.

Thanks, Alex

Tiggers are super easy. I’ve had the best luck outside with adding a multi strain phyto. They will live with little to no effort outside with a heater in a bucket. Inside they require more phyto and an airline turned -WAY- down. They are not the best food source for mandarins as they spend a lot of time in the water column and not on the bottom. A white worm culture may help as well. In terms of pods Tsibe is better for mandarins but harder to culture

 

[Alexreefer]

So I can culture them in a bucket using airline turned down alot and a rock then feed them spirilina powder and culture them when they get a big population

 

[sde1500]

So I can culture them in a bucket using airline turned down alot and a rock then feed them spirilina powder and culture them when they get a big population

Essentially yes, add them to a bucket with an airline, feed them and you're good. Don't really even need the rock. Tisbe is a bit tougher to do this for, tigger are super easy.

 

[shred5]

Never had much luck with spirilina powder and it seems to foul pretty easy..

I prefer algae paste or instant algae from Reeds.
It can be refrigerated and some of it frozen for up to 3 years.
I used to freeze it in ice cubes and just drop one in.

 

[502mad]

I know that this thread has stalled but I found it just in time! I have struggled with culturing pods in the past and this is what I found was my downfall:

1) trying to culture multiple strains together. Best to culture just Tiggers, or just Tisbe, etc in its own container.
2) Don't overfeed..... it fouls the water.
3) tried outside cultivations, as a lot of people have had success but it never really worked for me.

So..... I currently have used the setups that are shown in this thread.... 10G tank with Tiggers from RN and working great! Also have a 2G back up tank for reducndancy.I want to also start the RN APEX pods soon in a separate 20G. I have one green Mandarin and Christmas wrasse that are the main pod eaters in my tank. I have been culturing Phyto... Nanno, ISO, and Tetraselmis with very good success. I believe the Isocrysis algae (golden brown) is probably the best for live pod feeding but also feed diluted RN PhytoFeast and diluted organic Spiralina. I also culture and feed live baby brine shrimp but have to be careful not to overdose these little guys into the tank as its a lot of nutrient.

Have been emailing Chad from RN and he's been very responsive and a great help....... quality vendor with fantastic customer service.

Thanks everyone for a very beneficial thread!

 

[Reef Nutrition]

I know that this thread has stalled but I found it just in time! I have struggled with culturing pods in the past and this is what I found was my downfall:

1) trying to culture multiple strains together. Best to culture just Tiggers, or just Tisbe, etc in its own container.
2) Don't overfeed..... it fouls the water.
3) tried outside cultivations, as a lot of people have had success but it never really worked for me.

So..... I currently have used the setups that are shown in this thread.... 10G tank with Tiggers from RN and working great! Also have a 2G back up tank for reducndancy.I want to also start the RN APEX pods soon in a separate 20G. I have one green Mandarin and Christmas wrasse that are the main pod eaters in my tank. I have been culturing Phyto... Nanno, ISO, and Tetraselmis with very good success. I believe the Isocrysis algae (golden brown) is probably the best for live pod feeding but also feed diluted RN PhytoFeast and diluted organic Spiralina. I also culture and feed live baby brine shrimp but have to be careful not to overdose these little guys into the tank as its a lot of nutrient.

Have been emailing Chad from RN and he's been very responsive and a great help....... quality vendor with fantastic customer service.

Thanks everyone for a very beneficial thread!

Thanks for the follow-up! Happy to hear you are having success. With those species of microalgae, your soon-to-be Apocyclops panamensis (Apex-Pods) culture will do just fine. We are running a special on them right now, so don't miss out: https://reefnutrition.com/promo/reef-rock-stars

Cheers!
Chad

 

[Kyl]

Kind of odd seeing the bump notification the other day for this, as I had been thinking about restarting my pod endeavour. I've now tried this with 2.5 and 5 gallon Aqueon tanks, but the result is the same. They're kind of a pain to clean, aren't in an easy form factor to move around or empty, and are made of glass. I'm giving serious thought to using some polycarbonate food/liquid storage vessels like this ones Cambro makes. About 4 gallons comfortably would make for easier cultures, the tops are opaque and can have an airline hole put in them, these are even dishwaster safe if they had to be cleaned well, and only about 25 bucks each with lid.

Thinking of where to set them up, and the form-factor would fit perfectly in some of the Ikea Sektion wall cabinets.. the ideas are starting.

 

[EW_Fish]

Kind of odd seeing the bump notification the other day for this, as I had been thinking about restarting my pod endeavour. I've now tried this with 2.5 and 5 gallon Aqueon tanks, but the result is the same. They're kind of a pain to clean, aren't in an easy form factor to move around or empty, and are made of glass. I'm giving serious thought to using some polycarbonate food/liquid storage vessels like this ones Cambro makes. About 4 gallons comfortably would make for easier cultures, the tops are opaque and can have an airline hole put in them, these are even dishwaster safe if they had to be cleaned well, and only about 25 bucks each with lid.

Thinking of where to set them up, and the form-factor would fit perfectly in some of the Ikea Sektion wall cabinets.. the ideas are starting.

I'm also about to start my own cultures. I'll be using the 5g tanks though.

 

[Kyl]

They're fun to get going, just the ongoing aspect of it takes commitment. I've learned in this hobby if it's not easy on day 1, you probably won't make it to day 90, or 120, etc.

 

[EW_Fish]

They're fun to get going, just the ongoing aspect of it takes commitment. I've learned in this hobby if it's not easy on day 1, you probably won't make it to day 90, or 120, etc.

For sure. I figured two 5g tanks and just rotate them when starting a new culture. One 5g tank clean and ready then start a new batch examine it for a week or two then harvest the old batch.

 

[Kyl]

I'm in a small space and the more I can hide in plain sight, the better. Going to go with a flip-up ikea sektion kitchen cabinet like would go over a stove, it will fit three of the vessels I'm going to use in there, should work fine. Will put a small fan port and led strip just to keep things ventilated and lit. This way I can have it mounted on the wall, below an existing shelf and out of the way.

We'll see how it turns out.

 

[40B Knasty]

Yeah sorry everyone. I don't need to do Reef Nutrition Tigger Pods anymore. My mandarin is a chunker and eats frozen mysis, brine w/ spirulina, and mini blood worms.
When I started this project. It was more to keep him healthy and alive, because there is no definite answer to whether or not they will expect frozen foods or stay eating them. So I had to learn how to keep pods and learn it fast, because I took on a fish I really wanted and there wasn't much for information out there to keep one successfully. I am a very technical person when it comes to the care for my fish. So I thought rationally about how I could trick him into eating frozen foods. So by feeding Tigger pods spirulina and BBS(baby brine shrimp) to my mandarin. He got the taste of both flavors. Then a month later. He was big enough to eat frozen foods. He recognized the two flavors of brine and spirulina. I trained him to like them. Then he started chasing the Hikari Brine w/ spirulina. Then 2 weeks later. I mixed in a little bit of mysis to the brine and tricked him again. He loved them! Then the blood worms came in down the road, but it is a success story for you all to possibly try. I have videos about the basic math, keeping Tigger pods, how to use a BBS feeding station, and the day he ate his first frozen brine. They are all on 40B Knasty YouTube. I do this not for viewers. I do it more to teach and log my journey of my tanks. You are entitled to your opinions about them, but you won't ever hear a lie from my videos. I show the good times and the bad times, because let's face it. If this hobby was easy. Reef2Reef wouldn't exist. This is a great place for us to share experiences.

 

[NS Mike D]

Reviving this thread. From a number of videos, in my research, getting the culture is not that hard, it's keeping the pods from crashing due to the water fouling. I think @EW_Fish is correct, harvest the pods, for the tank, then harvest the rest into a new culture of phyto into a clean vessel.

I am adding Reef Nutrition Phyto Fest to the pod culture to supplement the nanno phyto I am culturing. Also, since I can culture more phyto than I will need, I can keep a fresh back up in case of a crash as well as phyto for manual dosing to the tank.

I dosed Imaginarium bacteria into the pod culture to help with nitricucation and will likely add an aquarium sponge on the airline like the Poseidon set up do to be colonized by the bacteria.


Here is my set up (also documented in my rebuild thread)


16oz of nanno from Mercer, Ferlizer, airline tubing, 2 rigid lines. 2 pipettes, 2 syringes and tips.

I had food safe sanitizer I use for home brewing. I used this but did rinse it with rodi. Not sure what it would do to phyto.

32 oz vinegar bottle, I had the caps laying around along with the pump.

The pods were scheduled to arrive next week so this morning, I split the culture

and of course the pods arrived today a week early


8oz Atlantic Biotechnology tigriopus californicus. Very happy with the density and activity with these pods. Lots of adults. I had originally went to get Reef Nutrition Tigger Pod but my LFS has been sold out for months. I asked them to order but I have not heard back from them.

in a rush I put this together . I had about 2oz of the mercer I was using for my tank I instead used for this and added a PhytoFest.

ambient air is 65° - 68°. I'll work on heating but for now and summer on it's way, it will be ok. Not sure if I need lighting. I had to move my plants that explode in this light.


I have a 300 micron mesh sock on it's way I will repurpose into a sieve to collect adults for the tank. I'm looking for a 90 micron or other solution to harvest the rest to return for culturing.

 

[NS Mike D]

quick update

The pods are doing well. To address ammonia I had Immaginarium Biological Booster on hand for my betta tank and so I dosed that into the pod tank (it's for both fresh and salt water). I also added a filter sponge I had lying around to give some surface for the bacteria and the pods. I plan on 100% water changes for the pods (to help prevent crashing, so the sponge will bring provide a base of bacteria while the drops of the booster get established.

I have been dosing 10mls daily of phyto out of the smaller culture and a few drops of the Reef Nutrition Phyto Feast.

While I am culturing nanno phyton, the PhytoFeast contains a healthy blend of phyto, so I plan on supplement dosing it to the pods and the DT.

The plan for weekly phyto harvest is to divide for :

1. dosing pods
2. dosing DT
3. Back up culture, and
4. Base culture

 

[NS Mike D]

I harvested the phyto today. Sanitized the equipment. Made 16of saltwater. I set aside 16oz of the main culture and set aside the rest (about 12oz). Sanitized the bottle and returned the main culture, fed 5ml of fertilizer and topped off with saltwater. Fed some to the pods and put the rest, an 8oz bottle and about another 4 oz., in the fridge.

What I need to figure out is how much back up culture will I need and how to maintain it. 16oz harvest is far more than I need to dose and the second culture is being used to dose.

The harvest has deep green color one week from starting it.

The new culture on the left, second smaller culture I was using for dosing and the pods

It will be a few more weeks before I begin harvesting the pods. After reading ReefNutritions write up on culturing pods, I think I will use a brine shrimp net to harvest for the DT and then use a 90 micron (need to get one) filter to harvest the rest and do the water change.

TIGGER-PODS®

Reef Nutrition's popular Tigger Pods® copepods (live Tigriopus californicus) are cultured using our own nutritious marine algae in our biosecure facility. These attractive, large red copepods swim upwards with a stimulating, jerky swimming motion attractive to both fish and people. Finicky fish...

reefnutrition.com

 

[ectoaesthetics]

Just harvested two bottles to take the the LFS for them to give away to some customers. I have a serious over harvest. It’s just that time of the year for pods!! And all my cultures boomer at the same time. My fuge is so full of them that my yasha is pretty over it

 

[NS Mike D]

The phyto part is taking off (more than I need right now). The pod culture is moving along. I did pull out a few pipettes of pods to help the fuge along but overall, it's still a bit early to see if this will eventually support the mandarin without crashing. I estimate I can start harvesting next week as that would complete the first full reproductive cycle. So far so good. The 80 micron bags will arrive today so i can make my sieves from 3" pvc and do a water change, but I am confident that the sunlight it's making the phyto in the pod container self sufficient and the bacteria I dosed with the floating sponge (bacteria surface area) are keeping ammonia is check. My API test kit is very old as I no longer test for ammonia in the DT.

I might order tisbe pods and start a second (separate) culture to dose both tisbe and tiggers into the DT.

 

[NS Mike D]

The 80 micron 12"x12" (milk nut) food strainer bags arrived, so I made a sieve using 3" pvc. I made 32oz of salt water, strained the existing tank water catching the pods, then returned them to the container pouring the new saltwater thru the bottom of the sieve, and then topped off the tank with the old water to complete a 33% water change. I returned the filter sponge, added a few drops of bacteria and dosed more phyto.

Doesn't look like I lost any noticeable pods, whatever mulm that was on the bottom passed through the 80 micron sieve. I presume the pods will feed on that.

Clearly not enough pods to harvest yet.