What do copepods eat in a refugium placed after a filter roller?

[Muffin87]

If you used an automatic filter roller preventing leftovers and fish poop to get to the refugium, would you still have a thriving pod population in the refugium?
I believe the obvious answer would be no, as they’d have little to eat. But frankly, I don’t know if pods are able to eat tiny bits of food that are too small to be filtered out by the filter roller.
Possibly they may eat any microalge growing in the refugium too?

Can someone that has both a filter roller and a refugium chime in?
Is your pod population thriving even tho the filter roller is removing any visible trace of fish food and poop?

Thank you

 

[Mr. Mojo Rising]

Do you feed phyto? Phyto is less than 5 microns.

 

[WestMI-Reefer]

If you used an automatic filter roller preventing leftovers and fish poop to get to the refugium, would you still have a thriving pod population in the refugium?
I believe the obvious answer would be no, as they’d have little to eat. But frankly, I don’t know if pods are able to eat tiny bits of food that are too small to be filtered out by the filter roller.
Possibly they may eat any microalge growing in the refugium too?

Can someone that has both a filter roller and a refugium chime in?
Is your pod population thriving even tho the filter roller is removing any visible trace of fish food and poop?

Thank you

I’m running a roller and a fuge with a steady copepod population. The roller will not remove everything, there’s more ways for food to make it through. Seems fine to me, no different than the idea of socks+fuge

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

If you used an automatic filter roller preventing leftovers and fish poop to get to the refugium, would you still have a thriving pod population in the refugium?
I believe the obvious answer would be no, as they’d have little to eat. But frankly, I don’t know if pods are able to eat tiny bits of food that are too small to be filtered out by the filter roller.
Possibly they may eat any microalge growing in the refugium too?

Can someone that has both a filter roller and a refugium chime in?
Is your pod population thriving even tho the filter roller is removing any visible trace of fish food and poop?

Thank you

The obvious answer is unfortunately, incorrect.

Pods mostly consume phytoplankton which no roller or socks will catch.

They also eat particulate foods so small, they are going right through your roller mat.