New Product Announcement: Wild Toe

cranberry

cranberry

Active Member
Originally Posted by Speg
http:///forum/post/3254436
Are those 'phytoplankton based' like this product? I would assume that a plant would have trouble surviving without light (i.e. stuck in a bottle). Maybe what happens is... the phytoplankton dies due to being in a bottle with no light.. and the zooplankton eats the dying phytoplankton and survives until the recommended 'sell by date'.
I cannot see the product bottle.... I cannot open the link easily on the handheld.
I agree phyto needs to be in the fridge to stop it from using up it energy stores.... but a fridge is dark. Light is not advantageous post harvest. So, live cultures are regularly stored in containers "void" of oxygen and in the dark. Neither condition is prelude to a dead culture, I'm afraid. The only requirement to get phyto to live post harvest, is to shake them periodically to get the cells off each other they they don't suffocate. Whatever oxygen is in the bottle is all they need. Room temp does kill them, they just are not as nutritious at the end of the day.
 
meowzer

meowzer

Moderator
HMMM...I tried it tonight....the top kept on clogging....so I had to take it off and just pour some into the tank
 
eriks

eriks

New Member
We initially began cutting the tips so that all the end user had to do was "point and shoot" with regards to
spot feeding. Without cutting the tip there will be clogging. We got product to several stores with cut tips
and right away the store was accused of selling all ready opened product. So we stopped cutting the tips,
which made it easier to ship without leaking...the only issue is that the end user will have to cut the tips,
similar to using caullk or silicone.
Phyto stored in a bottle is not optimal and when stored at cold temps will slow down biological activity. However,
Biological activity still occurs even when stored in liquid nitrogen (-80F?). I agree with Cranberry.
However, I think that light could be advantageous post harvest depending on how the
algae was harvested. Shaking is good to prevent anoxic conditions but nutrition still declines over time when
the algae are not maintained under ideal conditions....an argument for a using a properly preserved product.
For instance when an algal cell is growing rapidly it is producing all the critical essential fatty acids (EFA)
most of which are associated with cell wall formation-fast growing cells. When it slows down due to
lack of nutrients...or a deficeit in growing conditions, it will produce more neutral fatty acids(stored fats) which are, in
general not as critical to animal health (predators) but great for biofuel use. When algae are stored in the
dark there is actual biomass loss due to respiration (cellular processes). On another side note, algae can be
grown in the dark heterotrophically by feeding certain "sugars".
If an algal culture could be stored in a clear container near light there would be some photosynthesis and
production of oxygen. However this is still not ideal because too much oxygen production causes
photooxidative damage to the algal cells(oxygen needs to be gassed off...as does carbon dioxide). For the
best nutritional results everyone should grow thier own cultures. I know that if I grow my own tomatoes
they would be better for me, potentially, but I still go to the store to buy them. And growing phyto is not for
everyone.
Sorry, I went off on a tangent, probably left out a lot of information. It is real cool stuff.
 
speg

speg

Active Member
It is really cool and made a lot of sense. I see your point that we could all grow our own 'gardens' and have better produce, but I personally don't have time for another hobby and I certainly don't have room in this apartment for anything else.. and even more "convincing" is a wife who already nags about my 'fish tank area'. I'll have to settle with buying phyto rather than growing tomatos ;)
 
speg

speg

Active Member
The Wild Toe is on its way :) Thank you Erik. I'm excited to try a new product! I'll be sure to give a report of what the tank thinks of it when it arrives.
 
speg

speg

Active Member
I got the Wild Toe yesterday and felt like giving it a try. The bottle says that it recommends to just put the whole thing upside-down in the water and squirt it on your coral, but I decided to put it into a seperate container and use the turkey baster.
One thing I noticed was the different things that you see when you squirt some out. I figured that all I'd see is 'green liquid', but there is a bunch of little things in there.
I decided to feed my Acan Lord. Immediately they gathered up the Wild Toe and started to retract in order to 'put it in their mouth'. My clown fish enjoyed the excess that didn't make it into the Acan, and my giant brittle star was flailing around lookin for little scraps.
One thing I noticed, which I thought was weird, was my xenia... After I used this stuff they seemed to start pulsing super fast; I've never seen them pulse this fast since I've owned them. I figured I probably just didn't notice it before, but then my wife came by me and said how fast they were (without me saying anything to her about it). I always thought the reason that Xenia pulsed was still pretty unknown. Could it have anything to do with the Wild Toe?
 
flower

flower

Well-Known Member
Originally Posted by Speg
http:///forum/post/3255919
I got the Wild Toe yesterday and felt like giving it a try. The bottle says that it recommends to just put the whole thing upside-down in the water and squirt it on your coral, but I decided to put it into a seperate container and use the turkey baster.
One thing I noticed was the different things that you see when you squirt some out. I figured that all I'd see is 'green liquid', but there is a bunch of little things in there.
I decided to feed my Acan Lord. Immediately they gathered up the Wild Toe and started to retract in order to 'put it in their mouth'. My clown fish enjoyed the excess that didn't make it into the Acan, and my giant brittle star was flailing around lookin for little scraps.
One thing I noticed, which I thought was weird, was my xenia... After I used this stuff they seemed to start pulsing super fast; I've never seen them pulse this fast since I've owned them. I figured I probably just didn't notice it before, but then my wife came by me and said how fast they were (without me saying anything to her about it). I always thought the reason that Xenia pulsed was still pretty unknown. Could it have anything to do with the Wild Toe?

Sounds great, I won’t be able to make a purchase for a while, so I guess I will be paying for mine. Sometime in the near future I hope.
I thought Xenia closed up when it feeds. Like the heads acting like little fists grabbing the food. I believe the pulsing was it trying to seek out food. Maybe the smell of the new food made it try and grab as much as possible as fast as it could… no doubt the Xenia thinks it was finding a tasty treat and in its own way saying YUM!
 
speg

speg

Active Member
Originally Posted by Flower
http:///forum/post/3255933

Sounds great, I won’t be able to make a purchase for a while, so I guess I will be paying for mine. Sometime in the near future I hope.
I thought Xenia closed up when it feeds. Like the heads acting like little fists grabbing the food. I believe the pulsing was it trying to seek out food. Maybe the smell of the new food made it try and grab as much as possible as fast as it could… no doubt the Xenia thinks it was finding a tasty treat and in its own way saying YUM!
I don't know! I've heard that Xenia have no digestive system.. so dunno.. maybe it was just extra happy during the time I was feeding the tank :p
The smaller bottle costs like 14 bucks? It's a truly fair price to pay really. I just got a package of 3 different frozen foods that cost me 15 bucks; granted, the frozen food will more than likely last longer, but there is only one ingredient in each one of the foods. Wild Toe has a laundry list of different planktons that are in the bottle. It's about the same price as other phytoplankton supplements, except you're getting a lot more besides phyto.
 
mrdc

mrdc

Active Member
It will be a pain to spot feed with this stuff since I cannot take my canopy off by myself. Is there any recommendation of how much to use if you just want to apply it to the whole tank say a a teaspoon per x gallons. Thanks.
 
quiettempest

quiettempest

New Member
This product sounds great! I just noticed it listed in aquarium supplies section and came here to learn a little more about it and hear others' opinions. I will definitely pick up a bottle when I'm able. I have a tank cycling at the moment and plan on making a few purchases here in the near future.
 
staplewho

staplewho

Member
i was just at lfs an looking at a product named reef nutrition but owner new nothing bout the product gald i didn't buy it now !!!! next time i place an order at swf i will order wild toe always nice to read threads here before u buy something love theses threads thanks swf
 
stanlalee

stanlalee

Active Member
Originally Posted by staplewho
http:///forum/post/3257022
i was just at lfs an looking at a product named reef nutrition but owner new nothing bout the product gald i didn't buy it now !!!! next time i place an order at swf i will order wild toe always nice to read threads here before u buy something love theses threads thanks swf
reef nutrition makes many FINE proven products (oyster eggs, rotifiers, pods and phyto). these products arent even in the same nitch. reef nutrition products are individual species products aimed to feed specific types of live stock while this wild toe is a broad scope feed meant to feed many things at once. you would need to rotate the whole line of reef nutrition products to get the same broad spectrum effect but on the other hand you can pick and choose exactly what you want to feed (or dont want to) in the ratio you want to (for example if you want to cut back on phyto and not oyster eggs).
 
mathteacher

mathteacher

New Member
I am curious if my sea apple would like it. I know that they like really small pieces of food, maybe even smaller than many corals. So would my apple be able to get benefit from this?
Sounds like a great product.
 
speg

speg

Active Member
Added this stuff again tonight. How long can this stuff be kept before you should toss it?
 
eriks

eriks

New Member
Sorry...things get beyond crazy at times and it is hard to maintain a presence on-line. We, as a company, are constantly trying to develop new ideas, new products, new markets and sometimes I get sucked under for a period of time. Regardless, we have been getting great feedback from the "Toe" with regards to results. We have heard from several end users that they feed thier anthias with our product and throw in some dry feeds. Over the course of 1-2 weeks the anthias begin feeding on the dry feeds and get converted over. We never thought of that one. We continually see response from acans, favites, dendros and all sort of inverts. I love to watch shrimp dance (rock back and forth).
Ok- a question to you all....Should we change the label? Is it too bizarre? Should we go mainstream and put a pretty picture of a coral on the front? We hoped people would laugh but some stores won't carry it because there is a Toe on the front. I am curious.
Regarding previous questions...I would think that clams would respond well, the phyto is not alive but there is plenty in the bottle. Any organism that eats copepods, detritus, particulate matter from 50um up to 1-2mm should find something in the "TOE". Sponges should eat some of the stuff in TOE, sea apples too.
Shelf Life..4-5 months IF kept in the refrigerator AFTER opening/using. Again apologies for disappearing -thanks for the patience and support!
 
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