14
Raising Daphnia
by Bill Childers
First published in Fincinnati, the official newsletter of the Greater Cincinnati
Aquarium Society
Aquarticles
Key elements in the proper care of aquarium fishes would include water quality,
space, temperature, fish compatibility and food. Just "feeding the fish" is easy buy a can of flakes or pellets at a shop and be done with it. However, a thoughtful Aquarius will go beyond this most basic feeding philosophy and at least buy
two types of dry food - one for morning and one for evening. Perhaps he will
even buy a package of frozen shrimp for an occasional treat. Most aquarium fish
will survive with such a feeding program. After all most commercially prepared
foods are carefully made with fish nutrition in mind - emphasis on "most". I once
bought a can of green flakes formulated for herbivores only to see on the ingredients list that animal fat had been used as a binder! If you want to take that extra step toward maintaining your fishes' health - try a live food. Live foods can
provide that extra boost that moves you from "keeping them alive" toward
"enticing them to breed".
One of my favourite live foods is Daphnia.
Daphnia are freshwater "bugs" that are
sometimes called water fleas because of
their shape, size and jerky motion. Daphnia
are easy to culture if you understand their
requirements. They nourish themselves by
filtering small edible stuff out of their water
habitat. What kind of stuff? Just about any
kind of plant or animal life form that is small
enough and moves about or is suspended in
their water. Thus, requirement number one
is, do NOT put a filter in the Daphnia tank.
I do use one airline, bubbling slowly.
When the tank is dark the Daphnia seem to
go to the bottom and become inactive which
is bad for Daphnia production, so rule number two is to give them some light 24 hours a
day. Daphnia need a reasonable temperature to be happy and multiply. Since my
Daphnia tank is close to the floor, I keep a
heater in it set at 72 degrees F.
IMAGE FROM: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Daphnia.png