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aquaarche
03-07-2011, 03:56 AM
I have found that if your system is organic and you are not using gravel or any other medium only water float beds then you can add Grammarus to your sump tank and grow beds and they will eat up all your fish waste. eliminating the need for filters once they establish themselves. They do not harm the plants. You can find them under rocks in creeks and steams.

here are some pictures of them. they are called "Scuds", "water fleas" and "water lice" the last two names are also names of other types of Crustaceans.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3f/Gammarus_roeselii.jpg/220px-Gammarus_roeselii.jpg%20

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e3/Ampelisca_brevicornis.jpg/220px-Ampelisca_brevicornis.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2a/Lepidepecreum_longicornis.jpg/220px-Lepidepecreum_longicornis.jpg
go here to read about them
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gammarus and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scud_%28animal%29

They do use oxygen so add more air to your grow beds. Also as they grow and shed their skin or die they naturally add calcium to the system and help to maintain a 7.0 pH in your system.

I will add some to my gravel bed system to see how they work in gravel. I hope they will help eliminate the waste in the gravel as that will eliminate the need to clean the gravel.

I am also hoping to add fresh water prawns to our water float beds and see how they do.

RS_
03-07-2011, 08:04 AM
Hi Aquaarche,

I have Garmmrus Scuds in my System, they are all throughout my system in the GB gravel and ST too, and they keep everything very clean, i have not had to back flush my biofilter barrels in about 8 mo or so... they look like your first Pic. I have also had Water Fleas (Daphnia) in my system back in the beginning when the water went Pea Soup Green, and they cleared up the algae in about 2 weeks after they showed up..... I find them every once and a while now......

RS

keith_r
03-07-2011, 08:52 AM
i've been trying to find some for my system.. scuds that is

jcx
03-07-2011, 07:24 PM
I found a web site selling all kinds of handy inverts, never ordered here so I can't say anything about the service.

http://www.aquaculturestore.com/fwinverts.html

badflash
03-07-2011, 08:32 PM
If you go down to just about any local creek, find still places along the bank where leaves collect. Scook up a bunch of the leaves and muck. You have loads of scuds for free.

jcx
03-07-2011, 10:07 PM
^^ I think I get some when I collect water plants in the Sacramento river.

aquaarche
03-08-2011, 01:51 AM
I went down today to find some in our local creek here and low and behold I was able to get about 20 pieces of fresh water prawn fry. I think I got some water fleas too but it was hard to tell.

Getting fresh water prawn fry is expensive even here but the creek was full of them.

I will go to another place to find some slower moving water with more debris laying around.

It was a good day today sunny and the water was cool

keith_r
03-08-2011, 06:53 AM
everything is still pretty frozen up here! i did find daphnia locally, will probably pick some up friday, along with a few apple snails

JCO
03-08-2011, 09:34 AM
A word of warning..!

Anytime you get anything from the wild (creeks, rivers, ponds etc.) you take the chance of introducing something into your tank/system you don't want, leeches for example.

Years ago I collected some ghost shrimp from a local creek here in Florida and thought I had a new species because they had tiny black specks on them. Then the specks started disappearing from some of the shrimp and moving around on some of the others.

They turned out to be baby leeches....hundreds of them. I had to down the tank and sanitize it before I would take the chance of putting anything else into it..l

Leeches are not the only critters you can get....one of the worst for small fish and fry is the dragonfly nymph. The are voracious eaters and can devastate a tank of fish or fry in a short time and they are near impossible to find in a tank. The don't move around a lot. The just stay in one spot and wait for the fish/fry to swim by and they grab them with Praying Mantis like front legs and eat them alive. :mrgreen:

Just a heads up for the outdoor collectors..!

jcx
03-08-2011, 10:27 AM
I'm going down to a creek today and see what I can find. I'm going to set up what I find in a 2.5 gal water jug and see what grows.

Phssthpok
03-09-2011, 02:40 PM
Does anyone have a decent photo of these 'water fleas' without magnification?

We've got some critters in our grow tubes and I'm trying to determine if they are beneficial or not. These things are TINY....like smaller than a mustard seed tiny, but they swim around rapidly. I've got pretty darn good eyes, and even *I* can't get a good look at them they are so tiny. I suspect they were imported with the 'ditch fish' (minnows) I brought up from the canal behind the house to feed the brim. ;) :roll:

I understand that the critters being discussed are beneficial, which would be a good thing as we've got scads of them in the tubes. that being said...are there any tiny critters one would want to look out for that would be detrimental to system health? (so far my google-fu has failed to provide any enlightenment.)

JCO
03-09-2011, 03:27 PM
Sorry I can't help you with an answer to your question but I would appreciate it if you would go to your profile and put in the city and state where you are located. There might be some members close by that could help. :mrgreen:

badflash
03-09-2011, 07:08 PM
They sound like copepods to me. Water Fleas constantly swim in a jumping motion. Copepods can swim but like to hang out. Scuds are amphipods and are distantly related to both.

Other than leaches and parasitic worms, there are few pests you can see that are harmful. Bacterial and viral problems are more of an issue.

urbanfarmer
03-10-2011, 08:50 PM
Does anyone have a decent photo of these 'water fleas' without magnification?

We've got some critters in our grow tubes and I'm trying to determine if they are beneficial or not. These things are TINY....like smaller than a mustard seed tiny, but they swim around rapidly. I've got pretty darn good eyes, and even *I* can't get a good look at them they are so tiny. I suspect they were imported with the 'ditch fish' (minnows) I brought up from the canal behind the house to feed the brim. ;) :roll:

I understand that the critters being discussed are beneficial, which would be a good thing as we've got scads of them in the tubes. that being said...are there any tiny critters one would want to look out for that would be detrimental to system health? (so far my google-fu has failed to provide any enlightenment.)
Yes, any pests ranging from spider mites to aphids and beyond...

rfeiller
03-10-2011, 11:02 PM
there are several aquatic predators two common ones on cold water fish are fish lice and anchor worms these are visable and easily removed. if i were concerned about parasites, i would be more concerned with the ones that are microscopic, like: flagelette protozoa, nematodes, tape worms, annelids, flukes these are the ones you are going to be ingesting. :D
interesting about the gramaras cleaning and filtering the fish solid waste. they do break down organic matter, what happens to their waste?
some fish will eat gramaras, warm water doesn't bother them. daphnia only survive in colder waters, so are seasonal in CA. their eggs hatch out in the spring.

keith_r
03-15-2011, 08:34 AM
i got my dapnia on sunday and scuds went in yesterday!

aquaarche
03-16-2011, 03:00 AM
If you can't see them then get a microscope and take a look. Grammarus flick around like a shrimp but have no tail.

urbanfarmer
03-16-2011, 11:16 AM
I took some picture with my microscope a while back. I will have to see if I still have them somewhere to share!

aquaarche
04-04-2011, 03:54 AM
I am so disappointed I cannot find scuds here. it could be most of the streams I have been too are being used to wash clothing and the soap had killed most of them plus the water temp get high as 82 and that could be a factor seeing they like cooler water temps.