Varying the Zooplankton?

radiata · Sep 15, 2017

My LFS sells grass shrimp as feeders ($.25@). They are pretty hardy, and I expect that they will spawn in a marine setup. I don't want to raise them - they probably go through a half dozen different larval stages, each one with their own specific food requirement. BUT, if I were to put a few dozen of them in my refugium and/or sump, would they spawn and their larvae thus add to the live zooplankton in the system? One would have to use some sort of screen to prevent the adult shrimp from getting sucked into a pump, but a pump shouldn't hurt any larvae. I can't think of any downsides, and (unfortunately) can't think of any tests/observations to determine if the additional larvae make any difference at all...

Your thoughts please...

TIA.

mcarroll · Sep 15, 2017

It can't hurt and it sounds like a great project to experiment with!

Healthy adults will probably stay away from the pump on their own, but just the same maybe set up an overflow sump so there's no pump intake inside the sump?

radiata · Nov 3, 2017

I think I've come up with a simpler way to release Grass Shrimp eggs and also their zooplankton into my DT. This would avoid the use of a pump. I think I can do this with a slotted-bottom guppy trap, hung on a tank's edge and populated with a number of gravid females. As the eggs are released, they would pass into the reef tank either as live edible eggs or as some stage of edible larval shrimp. When the shrimp are no longer gravid, I'd either dump them in the tank as live food, or return them to the small tank holding their brethren, and then repeat the process.

If one wanted to, one could place a plankton net below the guppy trap in an attempt to determine what kind of zooplankton and what quantity of zooplankton was released. But, I'll leave that to people with more time than I...

mcarroll · Nov 4, 2017

I think you can just get peppermint shrimp (also not expensive) and they will live happily and do the same thing in your display tank. Or even the refugium or sump if you have them – the return pump will deliver the babies to the display probably without much (if any) damage.