Re: [RML] daphnia and intro

Michael Baker (mbaker at ag.Arizona.EDU)
Fri, 14 Feb 1997 11:07:49 -0700

We used to rear large quantities of Daphnia to feed to our backswimmer
(Insecta: Notonectidae) colony. We used both large plastic garbage cans
and 10 gallon aquariums, although the garbage cans seemed to work better.
The cans and tanks were set up in a green house. The cutures were fed a
blended mixture of trout chow and alfalfa. We also tried culturing some
type of single celled alga (I don't off hand remember the species) but this
was more trouble than it was worth. The cultures were fairly cyclic, so it
is important to have multiple tanks to increase your chances of having
enough. I'm not sure how widespread this is, but from time to time the
Daphnia would get infected with some type of fungus which necessitated
starting the cultures over.

Since this is my first post, in the fashion of a recent thread, I would
like to take this opportunity to introduce myself. My name is Mike Baker
and I currently live in Tucson Arizona. I am a post doctoral research
associate at the University of Arizona working on the molecular phylogeny
of ground beetles (Carabidae). Before this, I spent pretty much my whole
life in Illinois (Belleville and Champaign areas). I am married and have
two children. I also share my apartment with several tree frogs (White's,
Red-eyed, and Canyon), but currently do not have any fish. Before we moved
out here, I kept several tanks with Angels, Corys, Darters, Gudgeons, Bows,
etc. The rainbows were my favorite and I was planning to raise them
exclusively before the move. I was a member of the RSG and am planning to
join again. I would like to get back into the hobby, but just haven't had
the time recently to set up my two empty tanks.

Regards,
Mike

Michael D. Baker, Ph.D.
Department of Entomology
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
ph: (520) 621-7033
fax: (520) 621-1150
email: mbaker at ag.arizona.edu