WalterJay Posted December 12, 2017 Report Share Posted December 12, 2017 What do shrimp love to eat more than anything? The algae you grow (perhaps inadvertently?) in our tanks. I make my own fish food, so after seeing a video on Facebook I decided to try cultivating algae to make a shrimp food out of. For tonight I setup just a small tub of water with a 100W LED over it with some mild fertilizer. Tomorrow I will move to a larger container. My goal is leave the light on 24/7 and see how much algae I can grow. Long term this would be outside but for the experiment I want to be able to control all the variables. I'll keep everyone posted on this riveting journey! Shrimporama 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheeseball Posted December 12, 2017 Report Share Posted December 12, 2017 Neet idea! You could also try and mix in bio-film that grows on the side of the tank too, or any other popular diy foods. There is a guy on YouTube, Marks Shrimp Tanks, I believe, who trys all sorts of stuff for food. You could check him out. I think I'll follow this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 I added a bit some "algae spores" i bought on Ebay to start some greenwater. It looks like spirulina to me But we'll see. Also rehoused to a large tub outside already, pics to come in a few days when hopefully i have results! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Just had a thought. I want the algae that grows on the surface, so it can be later scraped off (I'd rather not try to evaporate off greenwater). So tomorrow I will add some other objects into the tank to act as surface area. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyzazz Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Might I suggest using lava rock as a surface for the algae to colonize? Rob & Amanda at Flip Aquatics are doing something similar in a large, shallow tub. They found that they needed to turn off the light for a couple of hours a day to get the algae to grow. Oxygenation/circulation will also play a role so make sure you have something in there to move the water around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 I have a small power head in there. My apprehension with lava rocks is that I want to be able to scrape the algae off and I won't be able to do that with lava rocks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyzazz Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Why scrape it off? You could just put the rock into the tank for the shrimp to feed on. Or are you planning on drying and powdering this up? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nicpapa Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Shrimps dont eat algae... just biofilm... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Why scrape it off? You could just put the rock into the tank for the shrimp to feed on. Or are you planning on drying and powdering this up? Dry and powder. I make my own food already and thought some nice algae pucks would be nice.Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 Shrimps dont eat algae... just biofilm... Ya, biofilm, but from my own experience I know most shrimp will happily munch on some spinach leaves or a piece of kale. I don’t think they’ll turn their nose up at this but of course I could be totally wrong! Science!Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nicpapa Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 2 minutes ago, WalterJay said: Ya, biofilm, but from my own experience I know most shrimp will happily munch on some spinach leaves or a piece of kale. I don’t think they’ll turn their nose up at this but of course I could be totally wrong! Science! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk It depend... if there is no biofilm in the tank they will eat spinach or kale.. or anything else. In my tanks , i dose bacter ae... shrimp dont eat expensives food... only the snail... In the past i dose spinach, now they dont eat it.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyzazz Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 17 minutes ago, nicpapa said: Shrimps dont eat algae... just biofilm... I'm going to disagree here. Mine eat up spirulina powder and algae wafers if given half a chance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 13, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 It depend... if there is no biofilm in the tank they will eat spinach or kale.. or anything else. In my tanks , i dose bacter ae... shrimp dont eat expensives food... only the snail... In the past i dose spinach, now they dont eat it..Sounds like you have a great system going. I will let mine go on biofilm for weeks sometimes. I just like the sense of control I have in choosing their food, and I have definitely noticed they like certain foods more than others. To me that indicates they will willingly eat food other than biofilm if they like it.Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nicpapa Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 2 minutes ago, wyzazz said: I'm going to disagree here. Mine eat up spirulina powder and algae wafers if given half a chance. I say that they dont eat algae grown on water... They dont eat , bba, gda, greenspot, and others algaes... Most algae wafers have protein inside... that why they prefer... i feed them hikari algae wafers . And again i can say that shrimp prefer biofilm as first food... i keep ~18 shrimp tanks. I feed well when shrimp get big in numbers,, 200++ . As i said mine dont prefer the food, thats why i keep snails in the tanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyzazz Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 4 minutes ago, nicpapa said: I say that they dont eat algae grown on water... They dont eat , bba, gda, greenspot, and others algaes... Most algae wafers have protein inside... that why they prefer... i feed them hikari algae wafers . And again i can say that shrimp prefer biofilm as first food... i keep ~18 shrimp tanks. I feed well when shrimp get big in numbers,, 200++ . As i said mine dont prefer the food, thats why i keep snails in the tanks. I agree on all points here. Thank you for the clarification! I've also noticed that certain types of shrimp take to certain foods more readily. My OERBT's and Neo's eat veggies and almost anything I put in the tank. My PRL/CRS are almost the same way, just not as voracious. My Taiwan Bees though, they eat almost exclusively biofilm & bee pollen. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nicpapa Posted December 13, 2017 Report Share Posted December 13, 2017 2 minutes ago, wyzazz said: I agree on all points here. Thank you for the clarification! I've also noticed that certain types of shrimp take to certain foods more readily. My OERBT's and Neo's eat veggies and almost anything I put in the tank. My PRL/CRS are almost the same way, just not as voracious. My Taiwan Bees though, they eat almost exclusively biofilm & bee pollen. I try bee pollen , but i didnt show shrimps interest for this... as bacter and baby food.. I think it depent from shrimps populations in the tanks... and again how much biofilm is there... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chappy6107 Posted December 14, 2017 Report Share Posted December 14, 2017 On 12/13/2017 at 12:07 PM, nicpapa said: Shrimps dont eat algae... just biofilm... shrimp do eat algae, just not enough to be considered algae cleaning machines. They most likely prefer biofilm, but do eat algae I have seen them eat hair algae and other types of algae. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 27, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 27, 2017 So the tank is going well. I'll take some photos tomorrow. Tank sides are covered. I'm going to drain, dry, scrape, then do it again but add more flat objects. I never got around to adding any more surface area to this run. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wyzazz Posted December 27, 2017 Report Share Posted December 27, 2017 Awesome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WalterJay Posted December 27, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 27, 2017 I imagine it should form much more quickly this time since it is "seeded." Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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