selcon and rots

[Dman]

After spending the better part of an hour reading through 85 threads via the search function, I'm no where closer to find this out.

I'm starting to play with selcon.

What I would like to know is how much I should use and how often?

A little background is in order.

22 gallon rubbermaid container 75% full
I drain off 5-6 gallons per day
I dose +/- 18-20ml of IA per day
and 8-12 grams of Cloram-X per day
sg= 1.019
room tempertaure today being 78F

My densities are fairly high and I'm quite happy with the production I'm getting. There is however issues with my GSM's that i think I may be able to fix if I can adjust the nutritional makeup of the rotifers, hence the Selcon.

TIA
Dman

[David M]

I have always ben leary of any of the oil-based enrichment products, I have probably killed more cultures with them than I helped. I don't use Selcon (or similar products) in the culture tank at all, I collect the rots or bbs I'm gonna feed out, rinse them well, add new water and fortify for 20-30 minutes with it. Then rinse again and feed out. JMO- D

[ediaz]

I do the same as David but for 2- 8 hours depending on the specie.

I use Ratio Hufa from Salt Creek. It is WAY better.

Edgar

[rsman]

it really depends on what your aiming for, generally I take my screen pour out what I think im gona use from my culture, then using a shallow plate with like 1/8" of water in it i stick my screen into the water and drip in a few drops (maybe 5 if i *feel* like there is a lot of rots in there, which I know doesnt help ) of selcon swirling the screen around to get everyone juicy and feed away. if I feel the target fish need more selcon ill add a few more drops, I use about 10 drops on my cleaner shrimp if like my oscellaris and bangaii, they do fine even w/o it ill just use 2 drops for kicks. I do basically the same thing for brine shrimp also.

[Dman]

rsman,
What I'm aiming for is to get my GSM's to live past four weeks without losing 95 percent of them. Remember that thread I posted a little while back about having 800 baby GSM's in a 12 gallon tank? Wellll, I might have 40 left. And that's after moving them to a 45. I'll unlock the secret yet.
So don't add it directly to the water? Swirl them instead?
Do they uptake the selcon that fast? Kewl.

ediaz,
Slat Creek, eh? Gots a link?

Dman

[rsman]

they dont eat selcon, it just sticks to there bodies, its like crude oil on birds. you can get *ALMOST* the same quality in about 5 minutes as you do in 30 IF you manually agitate the water selcon, rotifer mix. and the amount of water is low.

[ediaz]

Here

http://bmraqua.com/EA_product_distri....asp?pg=3#view

[Dman]

Edgar,

Thanks

Dman

[David M]

I'm no scientist but my understanding is the same as rsman as far as the idea being to be getting them gooey. Your'e not feeding it to them, yer "stickin' it to 'em"

Hey Edgar, I sure hope there is supposed to be a decimal somewhere in that "sale" price of $1000 for the Ratio Hufa.

[ediaz]

Ratio Hufa sells for 36 dollars a bottle.

Artemia does feed on the Selco
I had some analisis done to different batches enriched with different products.

Here are the instructions for using Selco from Artemia Systems, basically the leader in enrichment products.

Do not enrich nauplii in their hatching water! Prepare a new cone or culture vessel for the enrichment using fresh seawater. Adjust salinity to 25-30 parts per thousand (ppt), at a temperature of 28 degrees Celsius. Maintain vigorous aeration.

Harvest the newly hatched nauplii. Rinse with fresh water and transfer to clean culture vessel. Stock at the rate of 5,000-10,000 newly hatched brine shrimp per liter in the new culture vessel. Do not feed nauplii at this time — they are absorbing the attached yolk sac.
After approximately 18-24 hours from time of transfer to clean culture vessel, the nauplii will have molted into the Instar I feeding stage.

Shake SELCO bottle well.

Add 5 mls (10 drops) of SELCO per liter directly to the culture vessel. Add no more than 10 drops of concentrated SELCO per liter. Insure that the aeration is vigorously mixing the water column.

After approximately 12 hours, the intestinal tract of the nauplii should be fully enriched with SELCO. Be sure to rinse the enriched nauplii with fresh water and feed immediately.

[David M]

Cool, I have been going back and forth on this for years, so many opinions out there. So if they actually do feed on it, would you have microalgae in there too or just the Selco?

[ediaz]

That sounds like a good idea, never tried it. We ussually did one or the other,

1. because sometimes we did not had much algae
2. Dottybacks don't raise good on algae alone

Edgar

[David M]

Dottybacks don't raise good on algae alone

Oh sure, start scaring me already I use Reed IA a mix of 2/3 Nanno 3600 and 1/3 Omega Boost. This was more or less recommended by Randy but I am open to other ideas. I don't even have any Selco, the closest thing I have is Kent Zoecon. My wife has something she gives the dogs, very interesting. It's an Omega 3 fish oil made by Twinlab (I recognize that name as a manfacturer of aquarium products). A fraction of the cost of "aquaculture" products, been wonering if it all comes out of the same big vat?

[ediaz]

well depends on how many you want to raise

What I mean is that that does better, enrichment. We used algae too in the tank to keep the rots nutritious when the enrichment was assumed gone.

You should try that with clownfish, the dog supplement you never know it may work. I am palying with something to enrich the artemia that would make you laugh.

Edgar

[Dman]

I'm not culturing bbs, perhaps it's time I tried it again. In the mean time I ran across this article in the breeders registry. I noticed that the author had much greater survivability rates at 3 weeks after enriching his rots with Isochrysis. I wonder if this might solve my problem with my GSM's.
Anyhoo, after comparing Nanno and Iso in this chart I couldn't see that much of a difference.
Is anyone else using Iso?
Dman

[ediaz]

Theres a difference in the contents of DHA and EPA acid.

We used both, alternating or mixed, know of a lot of people having success with Nano only.



Note the big tank size too, 260 gallons that helps a lot.

Edgar

[Dman]

Edgar, Oh ya, I saw the tank size. Nice if you have that kind of room, not to mention the money to spend a a bunch of 260 gallon tanks.
One of theings I did start doing was increasing the size of my hatch tanks from 12 - 25 gallons, it's helped but nit enough.
Dman

[ediaz]

All I say is that do not atribute all the success to the algae. With that kind of volume there is no worry about water quality.

I use these, the biggest one goes for $50. And they make custom sizes. http://www.tufftubs.com

Edgar

[Dman]

Edgar,
Thanks, I know enough to not believe that the Iso was soley responsible for his success, one thing I've learned over the last three years, it's alot, ALOT of small things all together that make the difference.
My water quality issues have been marginable, but trying to find the room to do what I'm doing now is hard; large tubs would be a nightmare right now, if not next to impossible.
Thanks for the link to the tubs, if only I could find them up here as cheap I'd MAKe room for them.

How exactly do you siphon the bottom if they're black? Or do you swirl them so the detrius settles in the middle and just take from there.

Dman

[ediaz]

eamail them they might find a dealer close to you they sell those only at farm supply stores.

It is better when the tank is black, the reflection of the light don't let you see the bottom, but when you assume the siphoning position, looking down the water the shadow created by the head and torso gives a perfect view of the area to be cleaned, so clear that you can see the larvae at the bottom . I had to do 40 300 gal. tanks in 3 hours.