Biosphere

J

jay

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I'm making a biosphere for class, does anyone know of a good aquatic species to put in? How about terrestrial species? They need to not eat a lot of Daphnia(aquatic) and fruit flies(terrestrial). They also need pretty much the same living temperatures. If one is semi-aquatic it's OK too. the aquatic one will have about 10 inches by 20 inches by 6 inches, and the terrestrial will be about 8 inches by 18 inches.
 
Hate to say it, but I've never heard of a biosphere with any kind of large animal. It'd be really hard to get everything right so that they have enough food & all. The ones I know have just water bugs & algae & that kind of thing.
 
Well, that's kind of an interesting concept. It would be easy to find an animal that met these requirements, most newts would not completely deplete a daphnia or fruit fly population. You'ld probably want to include earthworms and slugs. Though it's an interesting concept, I think it would be some what impractical because unlike fruit flys, daphnia, worms, snails, and slugs newts reproduce only once a year. So unless you wanted to project your study over a long time period then you wouldn't see any reproduction or population fluctuation. Besides in a container that big you maybe able to sustain a few newts, but you could never have a growing population.

If you really must have a vertebrate, aim for a small freshwater fish which doesn't produce much waste so you won't need a filter and can just rely on the natural filtration of plants. I can't think of any fish right now which would meet these requirements, but I'm sure there are many. If you are allowed a filter and can deal with more space I'ld recommend goldfish which reproduce fairly quickly.
 
I think anything more than simple aquatic plants (java moss) and freshwater shrimp is going to crash pretty fast. You could try Hymenochirus, or a small killie fish, shrimp, daphnia, springtails, and algae or java moss. I think land animals would be tough. The smaller and simpler you can keep things the better. Hymenochirus don't eat a lot but they might eat all of the shrimp and daphnia in a couple week.
 
We have about two months to do it. i was planning on putting in the terrestrial spot a few crickets, 10 fruit flies, 3 earthworms, and 4 mealworms. In the aquatic area, 4 guppies, a Daphnia culture, and 2 big snails, and a few shrimp. this doesn't include plants, caves, etc. I was thinking redbacks in the terrestrial part, and Chinese firebellys in the aquatic part. I'm not sure whether the Chinese firebelly is a good choice, i'd only get two (male and female), they'd have plenty of plants and stuff, my only concern is that they'd eat the other animals living in there, and they'd have to be pretty temperature tolerant. If you can think of a better, relatively small newt, could you tell me?
 
The newt should be semi or fully aquatic, 4-6 inches in length, and not attack everything else in the biosphere.
 
The problem, along with those already mentioned, is that newts are toxic creatures. Over time they could produce enough of a toxic build-up in such a small unmaintained set-up that it could kill off everything else in the biosphere.
 
To get daphnia, crickets, fruitflies, most insects, etc. to reproduce, you need fairly high temperatures to keep the colony reproducing fast enough to become sustainable. Newts would not be able to tolerate these temperatures. Not to mention, guppies and newts just don't mix. Why don't you just leave newts out of the equation and use small fish?
 
Daphnia and slugs don't need high temps, but fruit flies and crickets do. Stick with a small fish in the water part.
 
If i am right you will be sealing the biosphere right? a biosphere is a self sustaining sealed enviroment as far as I am aware.

I dont think it would be a good idea to include newts at all you could have a very interesting biosphere that would work well for years if you concentrate on invertabrates.

how long are you planning on keeping the animals in their?

flies wont live very long and cannot reproduce without a medium to lay their eggs.

I would recomend going pond dipping and see what you come up with. some daphnia etc but also include a couple of predetory insects to keep the population under control.

does it have to be terrestrial and aquatic? one or the other would be much easier and more effective.

woodlice would be a good species to include in the land area and depending on the number of plants a couple of terrestrial snails.

there are biospheres comercially available that include shrimp and various other marine animals. these are garunteed for 20 years without any intervention from the outdoor world. do a search for them see what you come up with.
 
Yeah, all right, I'll leave newts out of it. i'll just put in fish, snails, Daphnia, etc. Would the redbacks work? or are they the same as newts. Anybody know of a good predator for aquatic and terrestrial places so i can control the population better? I'd prefer to have a fast breeder, but any other kind would do.
 
Red backs are sals, same as newts, don't put them in the environment. Thes fish would be your water predetor. If you had a warm environment I could imagine you keeping crickets as terrestrial omnivores, but they'll drown if they have access to water like that.
 
spiders might work. could you supply enough food though? depends how quickly the intended prey will reproduce. you may not need a predetor? the natural cycle of the plant life feeding the animals might control the population.
 
surely in a sealed biosphere like that the populations would control themselves without predator intervention?
 
Yeah, the populations might be fine, it would just be a more realistic experiment if predators were involved. I'm not going to use newts or salamanders, but i will use spiders, and i think the aquatic guppies are predators too. Thanks for all your help.
 
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