Amphipods, Copepods, Starfish

[CoralNerd]

Interesting article on Algae Barn's website

Amphipods and/or Copepods: Can They Peacefully Coexist?

https://www.algaebarn.com/blog/copepods/amphipods-copepods-peacefully-coexist/


Oh, does anyone have some micro brittle starfish I've been wanting to get those in my tank.

 

[Emac909]

I have a shhh load of mini brittle stars. But I’m out in Perris ca 92751

 

[Robbedigital]

Call me a nut, but I have a 8 gallon invert/coral only tank, and I bought and dumped in 500 amphipods. They all hide within like 12 hours and now you only see between 5-10 of them at a time unless feeding when they come out en masse. I'm very happy with that decision. And if it ever gets out of hand i'll just buy a couple peppermint shrimp or borrow a six-line wrasse to clean em right up.

 

[Robbedigital]

Just finished the article and enjoyed. I'll be on the lookout whether the amphipods elimnate the copepod population which sounds probable. So far the copepods are still snowed all over the glass since I don't have any fish, and the amphipods stay in the substrate. Who knows maybe that will help me keep the balance. I'm hoping i don't have to ever buy a predator specifically for the purpose of thinning out amphipod numbers. I'm hoping they do an ant farm type thing which is pretty close so far. I'm about 1 month in to amphipod husbandry I love it.

 

[CoralNerd]

I've gotten my sump too clean over the years and I don't have any amphipods or brittle starfish. I ran an algae reactor for awhile, then at one point I was spinning chaeto. Now it's just an old school refugium so I was doing research and amphipods do good job at detritus but so does the brittle starfish and I don't think they eat pods. The article mentions how pods are more nutritious than amphipods as pods eat more algae so I might as well go that route. 500 amphipods in a 8 gallon that's cool 😎

 

[resortez]

Thanks for sharing, that was a great read.

 

[Reeferkcp]

Thank you very informative

 

[Robbedigital]

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