Microworm Culture
Since I was so impressed with the amount of spawning success from my daphnia culture, I recently decided to add micro worms to my cultures. Small tetras, barbs, danios, and corys really go for these even though they are barely large enough to see. My trio of Corydoras davidsandsi started spawning after only a couple of consecutive days of adding these to their diet and don't seem to have any intent of stopping. Likewise, my peacock gudgeons did the same, and the fry seem to be doing well on a diet of these and newborn daphnia along with a once daily feeding of crumbled foods.
There are several methods listed out there for raising these, and all
will work to some degree. I have not experimented with other
techniques to say that mine is the best, and wouldn't do so even if
I was sure of it. I'm simply putting it out there to help others who
may be interested in trying these.
As for culture containers, I happened upon a bargain, and bought 15
plastic sandwich holders for 4 bucks. These work well, but something
with a bit more depth would be preferable. There is obviously a reason
that these are seen in deli cups so often.
To start, I mix one cup of instant mashed potatoes, insta-spuds, in a
bowl with enough water to make them soupy, but not enough that water
settles on top of them. This is poured into the culture containers
to a depth of about a half inch, and allowed to settle for a couple of
minutes. On top of this, I spread about 1/16th of a teaspoon of
dried active yeast. Once this is done, I cover the containers and allow
them to sit, and brew, for 24 hours. This insures that there will be
plenty of food for the worms when they are introduced.
Innoculating the culture is easy. I simply swirl a cotton swab on the
top of the old culture medium. I normally cut the swabs in half before
swabbing, and just drop them into the center of the area that I can see
the yeast growing.
Depending on room temperature, and the amount of yeast available to
them, it will be a couple days before the culture really takes off.
My cultures are kept at about 85 degrees, and can expect to pull from
new cultures 3-5 days after innoculating them. Harvesting is simple.
I'm not as squeamish as some people may be, so I simply rub my finger
along the walls of the culture dish to collect as many as I can. A
popsicle stick also works, but I don't see the sense in spending fish
money on sticks. After harvesting, it's as simple as swishing them
into the tank being fed. Some people prefer to swish them into a cup
of water and then portion them into several tanks with an eyedropper,
but I simply pull what I want to feed at the time and put them into
the tank.
