D.magna "farm"

juraj · Jun 26, 2007

I`d like to share my experience with my easy daphnia farm. It consists from one 10l tube for daphnia culture and three 4l bottles for algae culture (pic.1) and it lives only on sun energy and a little amount of liquid ( some common NPK ) fertilizer. During high reproduction season (May - October) I keep it in week cycles. I harvest weekly cca two thirds of daphnia amount and cca three quarters of algae water. Step one: I put the removed algae water in a clean tube and add the rest (cca one third) of daphnia batch. That`s a daphnia starter for another week. (pic.2) Step two: I add clean water with a few drops of fertilizer into the rest of algae culture. That`s an algae starter for another week. (pic. 3) . I keep it only inside because it`s much more clean. This works only during "sunny months". During winter reproroduction of both cultures falls down so I harvest occasionally.
The density before harvestig (pic. 4)
Nett week production of big ones (pic5) and small ones (pic6).

peterj · Jun 27, 2007

Very impressive harvest juraj. How many hours/day of sunlight do the cultures get in that position?

coendeurloo · Jun 27, 2007

Interesting method Juraj. I wonder if this is possible during the winter if a lamp is placed above the bottles.

How long does it normally take for the water to turn green? I have a modest 'farm' outside, which is basically a tank with water, in which I drop a little amount of yeast every now and then. This seems to work fine now, though the production isn't as much as yours.

Which kind of fertilizer do you use?

juraj · Jun 27, 2007

Peter: no more than 4hours of direct sunlight in these days.
Coen: it depends of the amount of starter culture , how much light it gets and how much green you want the water to be. Under my conditions its three days at minimum. I use around a week old water. Of course I don`t do it every seven day exactly. Sometimes it takes six sometimes eight and so on. I use some common kind of house plant fertizer. It also could be an aquarium plant fertilizer.

coendeurloo · Jun 27, 2007

I'm worried about the toxins that might be in a common house plant fertilizer. I bought some Spirulina powder today, this should be proper food too, anyone got some experiences with this?

Jennewt · Jun 29, 2007

Coen, are you asking about spirulina for feeding the algae, or for feeding the daphnia directly? I use spirulina powder (human food quality) to feed my daphnia culture. I feed a combination of yeast, soy powder, and spirulina. I don't think the spirulina increases production, compared to yeast/soy alone. I hope that it increases the nutritional value of the daphnia.

coendeurloo · Jun 29, 2007

Yes I bought some 100% natural powder, which is grown somewhere in ...Haiti I believe, not sure. It should increase the nutritional value if they really feed on the powder. I also use yeast. Soy powder is new to me though, is this a good addition?

Jen, I have a question: How much yeast/soy/spirulina do you feed your culture p/litre (gallon?) and how often?

I have a feeling I give them too much sometimes, the water turns pretty murky because of the yeast.

D.magna "farm"

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