Refugium pods bugs

[gritchie2]

HI and thanks for any advice you have. I have a 125 reef tank set up that has been set up for about five years, I started a refugium in the sump about two years ago. After I set up the refugium I added a few different types of bottled PODS or as we like to call them BUGS, the pod population took off great, I would lie on the floor and check them out. Over time there was a lot of sediments on the floor, I added two green brittle stars, they cleaned up the sediment but my bug population has gone to almost none. I have asked a few people at the local LFS and have been told that the stars won’t eat the bugs, anybody have experience with this??

 

[jrse7en]

I just added a bottle on friday and they are hard to find still. I do see some swimming in the display though.

 

[gritchie2]

at first mine reproduced rapidly, I have a few wrass fish in DT and they eat what ever finds its way in there. look for them just after you turn on the light, they scamper like crazy when lights come on

 

[gritchie2]

any critters in your sump??

 

[ifirefight]

Have you recently added a UV sterilizer? Only reason I ask is because I added one a while ago on my 130 and have seen the pod population dissapear....Im not saying that was the cause of it...but I have no idea why they dissappeared. I have nothing that eats them anymore,since I lost my mandarin.

 

[gritchie2]

no UV only thing that changed that I know of was the brittle stars. they must be eating them

 

[cranberry]

What kind of pods were they? Some are meant more for direct feeding while others are more for seeding fuges. Tigriopus califoricus we recommend for direct feeding and Tisbes and Pseudocyclops we recommend for seeding a fuge. Were you feeding them at all? Feeding with phyto like some Tet or Iso will help boost your pod populations. Nanno cannot be eaten by pods, so say clear of that one.

 

[gritchie2]

not sure what type they were but they were for seeding. I was not feeding them. What is your think about the green stars eating them??? when I re-seed the tank I will get some DT's I used to feed that to my tank but stopped because it seemed to me that feeding the DT's would cause me to need to clean the tank walls more than one time a week.

 

[gritchie2]

Do you think I should remove the green brittle stars???

 

[cranberry]

What did your DTs smell like?

 

[gritchie2]

Not a good smell but it didn't smell dead. i allways purchased it from high volume store and never expired by date.

 

[gritchie2]

Originally Posted by gritchie2
http:///forum/post/3156447
Do you think I should remove the green brittle stars???
??????

 

[fishyman1]

this site is chock full of saltwater fish for dirt cheap..they are practically giving stuff away for free. www.petesfishplace.com i had to share this one. i had the guy come out to my location and maintain a 200 gal tank i had running for a while now..he got the job done in no time he even gave me a free clown fish for booking a second apointment with him to clean/maintain the tank for me.

 

[cranberry]

Links to other sites are not allowed.

 

[cranberry]

Originally Posted by gritchie2
http:///forum/post/3156465
??????
Which you you like more. The brittle or the pods.
It's not suppose to have any smell. Single species products does not. DT's smells like death coming off the assembly line. The expiration means nothing... there's already too many dead cells in there... that's what you are smelling.