I'm glad you like it. I am still continuing to experiment with various adjustments to find the best possible results. It's all about the tweaking. Thanks for visiting Fishez.
Sir (and channel team) thank you, this is going to be of great help to me and my enterprise. I really appreciate it. Beautyfull and clear, thank you again.
Great video my friend. Your way of doing this seems less messy than mine (using vegetables). I'm working on a video on infusoria culturing my way at the moment. I will, however, try out your method as well. Thanks for sharing.
I look forward to learning from your method as well. There's always something that can be picked up when we watch each other do something even if it is a small thing or what might be considered insignificant point by others. I learn so much by watching others and get great ideas in the process. Thanks.
Yes, and you could. The "other critters" part of it makes it a bit uncertain as to what you will get, but at least using this method, it's always consistent and always paramecia. I have made cultures from tank water too. See my other video on this subject.
I followed everything and i on day 5today could see some dust like particles swimming in clusters like a smoke in water is that it ??? The paramecium???
I am very glad that you liked it. I would think this is a very good starter food for Bettas. From what I understand, Bettas are very small fry as well.
Try it and let us know if that works. I would imagine that one could use just about anything that "rots" / decays and that would give the bacteria needed for the paramecia to thrive. However, the odor is what makes the difference. I have tried corn husks as well, but found the odor to be a little pungent.
Greetings from Germany, I followed the steps in the video and I have a formidable culture of paramecium. My question is, how can I feed infusoria culture for 8 weeks so they don't starve.
Thanks for your comment. I think it's a good question. I typically never have a culture longer than 5 weeks as sometimes they won't last longer than 6 weeks. So the solution is actually a lot simpler than trying to nurture along an older dying out culture. I simply start a new culture every week, knowing that I will be using them about 4 weeks from when i start it. Thus, I have a simple lineup of 6 or 8 bottles lined up and as i use them up, I go onto the next. Once you have about 6 or 8 weeks worth, I start a new culture each time I finish up one. That way, I'm always ready. I also have a continuous supply. For some of us with bigger fish rooms, I guess the best thing to do for quantity is to simply start two bottles each time for double the number of bottles. In that way, I can be very generous when it comes to feeding. I will be putting out another video on breeding Thread-fin Rainbows very soon. I stop feeding the paramecia once the fry are large enough to take baby brine shrimp. But with Thread-fins it's longer because the fry are sooooo small and grow slowly. Therefore, I need to continue with the Paramecia for a longer period. I hope this answers your question. Thanks for subscribing!
I have not tried that. I would imagine that it might work, but the flour would have to be added sparingly. I only use 5 or 6 hard wheat berries. The flour might break down too fast but to know, I would have to give it a try. If you have success, please let us know.
That is an excellent question. Simply put, Infusoria is a collective word used to denote all of the single-celled organisms that make up the small nearly microscopic kingdom of creatures swimming around in water, including tanks, rivers, lakes, pools of rain, etc. There is an abundance if varieties and types. Paramecia is the plural word for one in particular. A paramecium is an organism that looks like a small slipper which has cilia all around it and maneuvers through the water using the cilia (hair-like feet). It is a little larger than the average Infusoria and thus is better for viewing with the naked eye. It is used a lot in biology classes for viewing under a microscope where they are studied. Mine come from the strain used in biology classes. I hope that helps.
@@FishEZ Well done! thanks for a very informative explaination , highly appreciate it! You just earn a new subcriber, all the way from the philippines.. Keep up making informative upload and godbless us!
@@jaymidnight7757 thanks for the sub! I try to answer all questions. I don't know what time it is in the Philippines on Saturdays when it is 4:11 PM EST but that's when we go live and I try to answer all questions. Hope you can join us some time.
Yes, you can use a variety of other items. Initially I was using corn husks. That worked pretty good, but the smell was a lot stronger. I can't say that using other items is better, because I have not found something different than the wheat berries that will do the job with less smell.
Greetings! Great video. I was hoping you might have some advice on a planted dirt substrate for this culture? Is it viable? Or maybe... overkill? My goal is to make it live for a long time and even thrive.
I'm sure you can do something like what you suggest. After 4 weeks, the solution begins to produce a very strong odor and that's why it typically isn't done that way. You could toss 1/2 of it, put in fresh water to dilute, and perhaps a bit of yeast to get it to bounce back. It all depends on your goals. I would suggest there is a method, similar to mine but one that can be tried using a device designed by Lowell's Labs. Check out his video on making a device that you can change out the cooked wheat berries. If you want to look at that method, watch this video: th-cam.com/video/IbGvQKzZaOQ/w-d-xo.htmlsi=IyvjFHVv2uHenvL1 My method completely restarts the solution every 3 weeks or so and that works fine for me because I can time it perfectly by starting up a new culture every 10 days and thus ALWAYS have a thriving full culture ready to use at any given time.
@@FishEZ I have now a clean fish tank only gravel with these little ones plus other kinds of zooplankton. On the second week I filled the tank with a litle more water now at 25% of the 100L it can hold. Today I can see them at the new water line but very slowly the bothom seems to be dying off? I cant say for sure but there is still decoposing matter at the bothom. I will keep this on and see how far it goes. Im thinking of adding frozen daphnia there for them to feed on might work if they ran out of food already. Thank you for the video! I will be watching it right away
@@FishEZ YES!! thanks fro coming back. I have now a fully no water changes tank with only top offs from time to time cause water must evaporate. What I am missing now is actually testing the water and the substrate and actually have some insight on what I really have hapening in my tank. Either way it is working very well, shimp, killer snails and neon tetras plus many ostracods are... surviving? I cant tell if they are really thriving or not tho, there was a time all I could see was shrimp everywhere, then they slowly died down back again to a normal population for the tank size if that makes sense most likely without enough food. Since I only feed the neons. I also started another bigger tank with almost 200L, almost 10cm deep gravel substrate with maybe 2 inch deep soil and that is very much alive because I see it fart everyday XD Added guppies and months later il add shrimp
Yes, most definitely. I don't know where you live, but if you can find some locally from a friend, that's great. If not you can try ordering a starter kit by going to www.fishez.com/store
Thank you Pete! I like the idea of doing a treatise on how I use the vinegar eels. I think I will do something like that. Thanks so much for your support.
I bought his paramicium kit and LOVE IT!! So easy! Only question I have is after boiling the berries, do I put boiled berry water in the bottle too or just the boiled berries?
Hi Brandy, glad that the paramecia are working well for you. I let the water cool. After that, I put the berries into the container but also add the water that was boiled and which now has the boiled solution in it. In other words, I believe the boiled water contains elements from the boiled berries so I use it. It's only going to be a little bit compared to the volume that you put into the container, but I do. I have not tested to see if there's a difference by not using that boiled water, but that would be an interesting to find out.
Very good question but honestly I can't smell anything with the lids on. The smell only occurs once you open the lids, very similar to culturing vinegar eels. I don't smell any vinegar in the room but I do smell it when I open the lids and then the smell quickly dissipates. That's why I went with wheat berries. It seems to be the least objectionable when it comes to odor. Thank you for your question. I hope there are more.
Forgive my ignorance/misunderstanding here, but did you start with an existing culture, or some seasoned aquarium water? Or did they just manage to populate the container through air transfer?
I advocate starting with a clean culture, not one with micro organisms that you don't about. For this reason, my initial starting culture came from a laboratory. It's the best way to get a pure culture of just Paramecia without issues. I do not believe they can populate through any air transfer.
Yes, you would have to add some sort of culture starter. After boiling the kernels the effect is to kill all organisms. So only after adding something to "start" the culture would it produce anything. If paramecia is not available to you or you are not near where I can mail it to you, then just simply try some of the methods in some of the other comments on this page. I recommend a place where water has naturally been sitting around for a while and is no doubt full of small infusoria organisms.
A very informative video sir, Love from India. Sir, I am a research scholar and the title of my research is “study the effect of microplastic on paramecium using the optical experimental system” for that we need to cultivate paramecium. But we are facing a problem that the unwanted particles or impurities in the paramecium environment affect our results, so I just want to know that is there any way we can culture paramecium with a very minimal amount of impurities (other particles). And is there any liquid feeding medium for paramecium so we can reduce the impurities in the paramecium environment. Thanking you in advance
Thank you for finding my video. Since you found this video and watched it, you could use possibly distilled water (to avoid impurities) and wash / rinse the wheat kernels prior to boiling them. I think the Yeast is also important. By doing that, I would say it would limit the amount of impurities, and by adding just a little of the starter culture, you could limit possibly too much contamination. But that's all I could suggest. I assume you have access to the paramecia culture to start with. I have heard that some order from University supply sources, but haven't been too successful with what has arrived.
The original source was from Select Aquatics in Colorado. Greg had them at the time I ordered some fish and I got some at the same time. However, he doesn't have them currently. He said originally they were acquired from a biological supply house for colleges / university biology departments.
I make the batches up every 10 days. In this way, when I start the next bottle, it's always at "peak" concentration. So I have a schedule of making new batches on the 1st, 10th and 20th of each month. This methodology seems to work best. I always have plenty of high concentration of paramecia on hand for any given moment.
@@jamesholbrook7785 Hi James, I get them from the previous culture, so I'm always seeding the next with a culture starter from the previous. Once you have a culture, you don't have to buy more. I do 2 bottles each time. I've never had one crash, but I have two in case someone wishes to buy locally a ready-to-harvest culture. If you asking where I got my original start, it was from Greg Sage of SelectAquatics who at the moment doesn't have any. (I'll have to replenish him when he is ready.) He originally got them from a Florida source where the paramecium are cultured for biology studies / fish studies at the university level. So these cultures are free of a lot of "other" organisms that one might get if they tried to culture Infusoria from tank water or from local natural sources. If you need a culture starter, they can be ordered cheaply from my website: FishEZ.ca/store
Yes, a big reason is that it softens the kernels before they break-down and that they can begin to decompose much faster so that the culture can use the elements in time. I don't over-boil either because if the kernels are too soft, it will just produce a real mucky mess. So 12 minutes boiling is perfect for me. Also, after it cools, I use the water that is from the boiled seeds. I know that gluten is in the water especially after being boiled out a bit and I think that's another important aspect of the culture media. Great question. Thanks for visiting.
This strain came from an on-line order from a supply house in Florida. They sell to universities for study purposes. That's where the recipe originated. I wasn't the one who ordered them though, I got them from Greg Sage in Colorado. He sent a starter group when I ordered some fish from him. His died out recently, so will likely have to get restarted from my cultures in the future. The good thing is that these don't come with a cross contamination of other Infusoria, they are from what I can see, all paramecia.
There are other mediums that can be used. I mentioned in the video that Corn Husks can be used and I have tried them. One only needs to put two or just one leaf into the solution. Boiling is not required in this case. We boil in the case of the wheat to break down the hard case of the kernel. There actually can be a wide variety of particular mediums. The important thing is that it will rot. Therefore be advised that whatever you decide to use can produce a very fowl smell or odor after a number of days. I have found that the wheat produces the least amount of bad odor and provides the necessary medium for the culture. If you give some other mediums a try, please to reply here as to your results. Thank you for taking the time to watch my video. --Michael
You can just use yeast really. The idea is to have bacteria for the paramecium to eat, the wheat or anything else rotting is what will create food for the bacteria, but if you have paramecium think this guy does, he could just seed from a previous culture the paramecium and add yeast for bacteria and skip feeding the bacteria really. What works of one person might not work for another but the key really is, having lots of bacteria to feed lots of paramecium so they will multiply over and over.
@@sparkyjones560 As a newbie, my cultures of what appear to be the same critters, and some smaller versions... and Much smaller versions of his paramecium... all had minimal production or died back, when not fed the rotting material... with the yeast. Let me know your secret, if you have one. (my cultures came from filter sponges of aquariums... bigger organisms cultured. - and others from rooting Ti plants in a bucket (in Hawaii)... they smelled of bacteria and produced Very tiny versions... of what appear to also be Paramecium. ...(?)
@@bubblerings That I would believe since it's not so much the "wheat" that is the key as it is using a grain that produces the right amount of gluten from the boiled grains and the amount of decay needed. I have not tried Rye but if you have, what is the smell like? Even after 10 to 20 days, the wheat berries have yet to produce for me any strong odor.
Awesome video! Thank you very much!! :) I might also have some questions: How many times do you actually feed the fry with the paramecia? Do you do that also during the night? do you also change the water for the fry and if you do how many times per week? sry for asking all at once and thank you in advance
I add the paramecia several times per day, but not during the night. Because there are so many per baster squeeze, one can feed several times per day but it would depend really on the size of your tank because the water in which the paramecia are grown is on the foul side. So if your fish are in a small tub, you'd have to change 1/2 the water frequently as needed, but if the tank is a 5 or 10 gallon, it's not a problem. Regular water changes will keep the water in good shape. Watch my video on making trickle water changes, which is the best method if you can set it up. Here's the link: th-cam.com/video/ocqrmuzLKjc/w-d-xo.html I try to get the fish onto BBS as soon as possible because it's better nutrition in my opinion and water pollution issues are eliminated.
If you are looking at the blue-eye rainbow fish fry, yes, eggs are laid in yarn mops that hang in the tanks. The eggs are then placed into a hatching tank and sit on the bottom. Before using them again, I usually boil them just to rid them of all small critters before re-use. I have several videos showing their use. Thanks for stopping by.
I don’t always have baby fish and I don’t have a whole lot at one time. Do I have to reculture it every month or can it go longer? How much longer? How often do I need to feed them if it’s been several months? Just add more yeast? Also, my house in the winter is 60° - 63° F. Are they OK in a wide temperature range?
I like to reset the culture every 3 times per month, that makes it possible to have a fully concentrated culture at any time. But you could let it go longer and you could feed it with a bit of yeast to keep it going. So it's up to your circumstances, and everyone's circumstances is different. The temps will not cause it to die out, but I'm not sure on the growth rate at such cool temps. If you test it out, please do reply and let us know your findings.
That's a good question. I have not heard of anyone using instant oatmeal for this purpose, but I have heard them use the instant potatoes / oatmeal for microworms. All I can see is you could try it and let us know the results. I do know that the use of the wheat berry kernels tends to NOT develop a very strong odor. So that's why it's my preference.
Yes, these work well for feeding very small fry in the first few days of their life. It's a must for egg scatterers and similarly type of fry. Larger fry such as Angel fish can do well with BBS from the beginning, but most fry do better with a smaller start.
That is an excellent question! It's like the difference between the word "cichlids" and "discus". Cichlids include all kinds of different fish, but the Discus is one in particular. Hence, the word infusoria is the conglomerate of all kinds of different small microscopic creatures. However, Paramecium are a specific one, its a bit larger than the rest (making it good for fry) and they have a specific look under the microscope (sort of like a slipper in shape with a lot of small little hairs so that they can move about.) By culturing just the paramecium together and not including other infusoria, I believe that they will culture the best without competing against other micro-organisms. Thanks for visiting my channel. I hope you are subscribed.
I was watching this video a couple nights ago and realized i just purchased some of your famous brew. The ice tea bottle made the connection(small world) #21 on the bottle in pink marker! The bottle is just packed with paramecia and the process is easy and quick.
That's wonderful Dave. I hope they prove to be extremely helpful. The "21" on the bottle means that it was started on the 21st of the month. I now do it the 1st, 10th & 20th (or thereabouts) and it's the perfect cycle. I always have a bottle just teeming and when the date hits, it will be time for two new bottles to be loaded up. After the 30 days, they will have peaked and it's just easiest to toss and use the next bottle. So each bottle basically gets a 10 day window for use. But it's plenty for my fish room of 30 tanks.
It is not possible to grow something without having it to start with. That's what is meant by the word "starter". If you mean how can you grow infusoria (small single-celled animals) then there's a lot of videos out there on how to do that. II advocate starting with a clean culture, not one with multiple micro organisms that you don't about. For this reason, my initial starting culture came from a laboratory. It's the best way to get a pure culture of just Paramecia without issues. I do not believe they can populate through air transfer, but perhaps via water run-off. Nevertheless, it's not likely that you would have a good clean culture in the end if you do it like that. Thank you for watching the video.
Give it a try. If it works for you, then that would be great in your case. But there's nothing cleaner and easier then just boiling some kernels. I do not know if the "ground" grain will cause any cloudiness, but you'd just have to try it out. Let us know by a reply post how it turns out for you. Thank you for your idea.
@@FishEZ Thanks for your thoughts. I did go ahead with your 'recipe' but strained only the large particles in the stone ground wheat. I left the flour powder out. I will know in a couple of days if I have success. I may have found some infusoria in water in which I was trying to grow seeds of a dwarf water lily, that are dead now, but the old water in that container was slimy. I added a squirt of it. Here's hoping it helps.
Anything used for bread would work including flour. You need something for the yeast bacteria to eat and multiple for the paramecium to eat and multiple off of.
I have found that after adding the little bit of starter culture, within several days you should see a very large multiplication of the small organisms. However, if you are asking how long before you can start using it to feed your fry, I would recommend waiting at least two weeks. But after 8 weeks the culture may be too much and might crash so start a new culture every week in a new bottle and you'll have plenty of paramecia to feed to your fry on a constant basis in just a short time.
To cultivate the paramecia, only a small amount of culture is needed to start. I place them into the preparation from the very beginning after all of the ingredients are introduced. One does not have to wait. Only a small sample or number are needed to begin the culture. In time the whole plastic container will be thriving with a large number of specimens. I use up the cultures within 6 weeks of their start. I can use them earlier if I have the need. After 6 weeks or so, I find it best to start a new culture. I have about 8 bottles going in my fish room at any given time. That way I always have plenty on hand.
@@FishEZ Did I miss something? I thought was just to mix yeast in water and then put cool down boiled water with wheat berries in a bottle to start the culture
@@andressaakie4031 Sorry for the delayed answer, I didn't notice your response until now. There must be an original paramecia in the culture in order to multiply. They do not come from the yeast. That is what is meant by the term "starter" culture. There is a small animal that must be used as the 'start'. If you are in US or Canada, I can send a starter culture, but once you have it you should be able to keep it going and use a few drops from the previous batch as the "starter" culture for the next.
@@rajdettpeterson6891 Sorry for the delayed answer, I didn't notice your response until now. There must be an original paramecia in the culture in order to multiply. They do not come from the yeast. That is what is meant by the term "starter" culture. There is a small animal that must be used as the 'start'. If you are in US or Canada, I can send a starter culture, but once you have it you should be able to keep it going and use a few drops from the previous batch as the "starter" culture for the next.
Alternative Recipe: 3 weeks later, all still looks good... plenty of Paramecium like yours! (it is stable) -What's different? (store was out of Wheat Berries...) So, I needed to add 30 to 50 percent More, using RYE Berries!... as they are very skinny. :) -as my previous attempt with Rye had failed and crashed (too few berries, my bad), I also sliced about 1/3 of them in half for good surface area exposure to the water... may not be necessary. I only had gallon spring water jugs with small caps... so, I didn't cap them. (more oxygen) I doubled your recipe to 3.5 liters... -My Starter culture was filter medium squeezed into a jug with airstone... from my puffer tank. I wiggle the jug every 2 days to break up the surface scum... and circulate the millions of critters. -Thanks again for this Amazing culture tutorial!! -Cheers! -Scotty on Maui. p.s. - The mostly crashed culture had Paramecium still alive on the top, so those were skimmed off to make my first big Success! (The first diluted attempt had a smaller yield, then ran out of gluten, as you said.) -so, if your tank water makes any Paramecium, you will eventually succeed, as well.
Excellent information, thanks for sharing. I have been experimenting as well with using tank water as the starter just to see if it would thrive in the media mixture. It has indeed! but didn't see the larger sized paramecia in the resulting Infusoria. Just smaller organisms and lots of them! This is good to know because it allows me to suggest this method to people who do not have more pure paramecia culture starters. Anyone can actually get a good culture going and concentrate it enough to use it for fry food. I merely used water from the corner of the tank--I didn't squeeze any of the yuk stuff from a filter. Again, no foul smell. I would think the Rye berries would work just as the wheat berries, but as in all cases, individuals should experiment a little to learn the best way to make it work. It takes a little trial and error. I have come to the conclusion that the best cultures are with 5 to 7 kernels and no more. Any more than that, the seeds can rot and produce too much "yuk" that only get's in the way and isn't for feeding to the fry.
@@FishEZ My first attempt with the filter goo... it was squeezed into a chopped top gallon jug with air stone for a week already (saved because meds were going to kill my filter organisms in the big tank) The longer bigger Paramecium dominated in Huge numbers by the second round (skimmed from my diluted mistake jug) -You have the Best Paramecium video I could find!
No, the paramecia are just to small for adult guppy fish. They do not notice the small micro-organisms. However, any fry in the tank that come from the adults will find the paramecia very appetizing. Once the fry are large enough to eat baby brine shrimp, I recommend switching over to BBS completely. Stop feeding the paramecia at that point. Thanks for your question.
Thank you for your question. I have been actually monitoring the time frames in which the culture sits around for a while now and I've come to the conclusion that after initial creation, I find it best to let it sit for 2 weeks before the culture is outstandingly concentrated. At that point it should be used but I've found that after 4 weeks the culture has slowly begun to die out. In some instances, the culture rebounds and will grow in higher conditions again, but I would recommend merely starting a new one each week no longer than every two weeks to ensure a very good supply of paramecia. This has been my observations. If you are referring to the "water container bottles" that I use in the videos to actually pour and feed to the tanks, the truth is that I've wondered that question myself. So I've tried leaving them in the water *drinker* for a long period but have noticed no die off. I believe the organisms actually feed off of the bacteria in the water, not the decaying wheat berries.
A nice Swirl of Barbs (if that's what they are at 0:22. Impressive! -and a simple to follow video, sets us up for Success!! -Cheers, man!! -Scotty on Maui.
I had some (aerated) filter sponge water sitting around, while I medicated my tank with meds that shut down the Nitrogen Cycle... So, I added Yeast to that jug... and had plenty of Paramecium-like critters in a few days... Then, skimmed those off for a fresher start, as when you poured some into the next jug... with the berries... Successful, already!! -Great technique, and not too smelly! A new and Happy Subscriber!!
@@bubblerings Yes, thanks for sharing your experience. In my live stream today, (#4) I talk about using the same concoction to grow Infusoria out of tank water and again, there's small (very small) organisms that thrive on this stuff. The odor stays minimal and there's lots of small stuff, but in comparison to the paramecia, the Infusoria is very small and the paramecia is a bit larger and can be more easily seen with the naked eye. I'm glad that this works for you.
You are the first person to ever ask about the intro videos. The first two fish-videos shown in the intro are both Odessa Barbs. The smaller fry are shown in a 5G tank over marbles that was used. (I now use a different kind of bottom.) The next video is also Odessa barbs (probably a different batch) that are growing out in a 90 G tank. When you get that many barbs in a single tank, it turns out that their behavior is completely different than when they are in smaller groups. It's a very interesting and mind-dazzling sight.
@@FishEZ ssince I have no Green Water yet... It saved my repeated dying hatches of Fairy Shrimp eggs... the babies never lived more than 48 hours... Now, no losses in 3 and a half days... Hooray for Infusoria! The straight yeast just fouled the water, but did not keep them alive. -I am expecting even better results with Fairy Shrimp, once I have the algae water going. -Also added the Yeast Soup recipe I found on Forums.
It clears up very quickly. I'd say in just a couple of days. However, there's that film-like substance that forms on the surface, and I like to give the culture a quick stir in order to get it off the surface. I will then float to the bottom. I think it's best to have the surface clear so that O2 can exchange.
I am not in luck to culture paramecium even though I tried so may method. I can't see the condensed paramecium like yours. Is it OK to feed my first day blue gourami fries with the vinagar eels or micro worms? Anyone know?
Thank you for experience, but I have used the same method and just used aquarium water to culture the infusoria. I did not get any paramecia in the batch, but the bottle did fill up with very small single-celled micro-organisms that filled the bottle. There was no offensive odor as well. I would recommend you try that. I don't know about blue gourami fry because if they are very small, the food has to be very small for the best turnout. I recommend you watch my live-stream #2 (th-cam.com/video/982AVxDbcWM/w-d-xo.html)
@@FishEZ you know what? I have my Blue Gourami fries for just second day without any paramicium. I don't want them to die. I try to feed them with spirunila powder with hoping they can eat. I used a good pair of 10x magnify to check the spirunila powder. Then I see my tank with full of paramicium 😀😀😀. I am so happy to share with you 😍😍😍😍😍
@@lanphanh That's great news. I didn't want to say it, but from now on I'm going to suggest that a person use a magnifying lens in order to double-check their cultures, just to be sure. I'm glad you have a lot of infusoria in your tank. Your fry will likely benefit from all those snacks!
Thank you for the very important question. Yes, you must start with a culture that is already existing. I received my colony from Greg Sage of Select Aquatics in Colorado. I ordered some fish and purchased a colony starter at the same time. So he sent a small bag of paramecia. Now I'm not sure if he still has the colonies at the moment. I send out culture starts to those asking who are in the United States or Canada. Greg got them from a source in Florida (I don't know where) but it had college (or university) connections. I believe they culture these for examination in biology classes. But of course, we culture them for something entirely different. ;-)
Thank you very much for the share. I know it can be something very useful for many people who have smaller fry. I don't think cultivating paramecium is necessary for guppies since they can take on larger foods from day one, but I would imagine that people with guppies may have other species of fish that they are trying to breed as well. I try to provide videos on my channel that are helpful to others because in some way everything that I practice in my fish room has come from other people sharing their ideas as well. I just keep trying to refine or improve upon what I learn. Experience teaches us many things.
Boil wheat kernels (wheat berries) for 10 mins. Pour into about 1.5L water, add pinch of yeast. Add small amount of culture starter. Wait one week. Feed to fish.
@@dbielby Depends on where you live. I recommend you get the starter culture from someone who actually has just the pure culture. I don't recommend trying to get it from local water sources because you will without a doubt introduce some other item with it that may or may not be desirable. So if you live in Canada or the US I could probably help out, but if you live somewhere else, it might be more difficult. See my webpage: fishez.ca
We have very different methods for culturing paramecium! I don't boil or prepare as you do. Typically raising them in planted community cultures (snail aquariums essentially) Great video though. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for sharing that idea. It would work like that too, but I don't have spare aquariums to do that. Sometimes I will even have a tank that gets overrun by the paramecia and what I need to do is to do continuous water changes in order to clear the water of the population explosion. If allowed to grow in a tank where the fish are not eating the infusoria / paramecia, they will eventually kill the fish. I have seen it several times. Although in your case, I think you are saying a planted tank without fish (correct me if I'm wrong). My method works well for keeping / containing the paramecia into 2 liter bottles where I can control them and replace them easily enough. Thanks for your comment, it's much appreciated.
Not sure what part you mean for heating, but if you are referring to the boiling part, it would be 100 C and if you are referring to the warm water used to kick-start the Yeast, it is about 140F or 60C. (Very hot to the touch).
It is OK to just add the yeast at room temperature. I keep the yeast in the fridge, so to see if there is any difference, I take the yeast and put it in a small glass of warm water and stir it until it completely dissolves. I then add it to the solution. I put this in the additional notes of the video. However, I have not seen a big difference in doing it this way, but I do notice that the yeast is more "dissolved" and that there are no yeast particles sitting on the bottom of the solution. So I prefer to do the pre-dissolve first before adding.
Just about any torch (flash light) can be used. It doesn't have to be particularly strong either. It's usually the angle that one places the light that helps the best to see the paramecia. I hope that helps.
@@asifriad1 For the carp, the fry will be free swimming they should eat paramecia and other infusoria initally, but typically they are large enough you could just use a micro-powder food such as the one from Sera brand (made in Germany) fry rearing powder. As for the catfish, since they often stay near the bottom I use micro-worms. I have a culture going at all times. cflas.org/2015/04/14/walter-worm-care-sheet/
Thanks for visiting my video. I have never tried cereal, but I would imagine that in small quantities that it might work. Probably anything that is decaying would work, BUT the reason for using the wheat berries is because it is a tried and proven way to provide medium and at the same time not decay to the point that the culture would produce a very objectionable odor. As with culturing worms, the cereal might very easily produce too much bad odor. I used Corn Husk leaves which did a decent job but there was a smell. I use the wheat berries and can't hardly detect any odor at all even though the culture is several weeks old. Thanks for watching.
That is in interesting question because basically it can be done using infusoria. I haven't tried it myself but will sometime. One can take a bit of "starter" from the mature aquarium and no doubt there would be small micro-organisms that would be able to multiply and reproduce in the culture medium prepared in this way. However, it might not be any paramecia, or it might have some. Others collect paramecia in stagnant pools of water outdoors. That's not best because there's a possibility to add unwanted "creatures" to the aquaria. For this reason, using an established culture starter is always best. There are several other videos out there that show how to culture infusoria using aquarium water as the starter. I think Mark's Aquatics has a good one.
Thank you for your interesting question. Discus fry eat the slime mucous off of the parents skin for the first few days of their lives. They are not typically known for eating other things but it is possible that something so tiny would certainly look good to a small fry. However, I guess is that it wouldn't really be the right kind of food. Once the Discus fry are large enough to begin swimming on their own, newly hatched brine shrimp might be more appropriate. However, if you are trying to raise Discus fry without the parents, it might not be a bad idea to have paramecia in the tank water as any small fish probing about will see these tiny infusoria and will feast on them. That is what I think would be the case.
Hi Thank you for sharing such precious informations.. I m starting one right now.. but I have no previous culture in wheat.. I have infusoria culture on lettuce.. May I take from it the starter?
Yes, if you already culture infusoria using lettuce, you can try using the wheat berries and it might be even a better media for you. It might be less smell. I would give it a try and please do share your results here in a reply.
Basically I culture Infusoria using dry banana leaves and old water from aquarium nd leave it for a couple of days to produce Infusoria. You can see whether it is an infusoria or not , if it is attracted to light
Yes, thanks for the tip. As I stated, I've used also a culture with corn husks. Basically the idea is to use something that does not produce an odor that is objectionable. Other items can be used. When a culture starter cannot be obtained, I would say using aquarium water would work as well. But I do not advise using water from outdoor source so as to avoid contamination being brought into the home aquarium. Thanks for watching!
They are called "wheat berries" but basically they are just hard wheat kernels. I do not know why they call them that. But I would be surprised that you don't have some wheat around. As I mentioned in my video, the truth is that you can use the leaves of corn-on-the cob which is what I used for some time before. But the odor as the leaves decay is stronger than the wheat berries.
One can use natural water, e.g. water from established tank, however, the infusoria will not necessarily be paramecia. But it might work. I recommend you look for a source for the starter culture. If you are near Canada, I send starter kits very reasonable. fishez.ca/store
Just depends on how many tanks of small fry you have. I have several jars of rainbow fish hatching all the time so I can go through one of these bottles in less than two weeks. But if I have a 5G tank full of fry, perhaps hundreds, I like to add more so I might go through the bottle in just a few days. There are so many paramecia, that I can just use a turkey baster to give about 1 oz of paramecia to a tank and that' s a lot.
Yes, you should be able to use some water from the river / creek / ponds / etc. It likely will have some paramecia in there, but for sure it will have some infusoria. However, you might get some additional creatures growing in the culture instead of paramecia. That's fine, if they are all good for fish food. You will have to be discerning. Once you have the culture going, it can be used to start additional cultures.
I have never tried it, but I would guess that the parameters are not the same, i.e. the amount of gluten and other things that make for a clean culture whereas the use of milk in my opinion might cause more of an odor. But since I've not tried it, I couldn't say that with certainty. If you try it, please do post your findings.
Take aquarium water and use a small drop of milk you will see infusoria grow very fast. You can use banana peels as well. Indian almond leaves also works very well. I have tried and tested all these options. Good luck.
@@jt9513 Thanks for the comment. I'll have to try it myself. I guess is the Indian almond leaves or any other decaying leaf would be better than the banana peels to keep the odor down. I use the wheat berries and it works like a charm every time. Of course, there's many types of infusoria out there, some are better than others for this purpose. The paramecia seem to be a very good choice for young fry.
I heard from aquarium coop and dean that he feeds his ram fry paramecium for first food. I am new to breeding and want to try to breed rams. Thanks for your video
I too breed Rams. The paramecia is not needed for a very long time with Rams because they will be eating Baby Brine Shrimp in a very short amount of time. I think I only use Paramecia & Walter Worms for the first couple of days just to give them a kick start, after that, they are eating BBS and no longer need the small stuff. Having the paramecia in the water from the beginning, however, can make a big difference from the outset. Thanks for visiting my channel.
@@stealthswim223 Yes I do. The cost of shipping is much higher than the cost of the starter, but for anyone who needs it to get started, it is only a one-time purchase. Just go to my store at: fishez.ca/store and select USA at checkout. Sorry to other folks but only USA & Canada is possible.
Thank you for your question. I have never tried it so I couldn't say for certain what the result would be. However, in my experience, I would say that the wheat flour might decay out too rapidly and cause too much of a contamination of the water for the culture to be easily harvested and put into your tank. i.e. it wouldn't be easy to separate it out. I can't see how that would be better. The kernels of wheat berries are very hard and even after the boiling, they retain their shape. If you try it, please post your results in a reply here.
Thank you for your question. I have not found that darkness or light affects their growth, but I have not tried to completely darken them either. I just leave them in the upper shelf of the fish room. I have them in a box most of the time. The box does not have a lid, so it's not completely dark, but it's not bright either. I do not believe these organisms depend on light or lack of light. The decay of the wheat causes a source of bacteria which these organisms feed from. Paramecia are cultured for many reasons other than just fish, so there's a lot of information available on the internet for some of the finer details. Thanks again for checking out my video.
That is a very good question. I do not. However, I aerate my water for 24 hours before using it. That means that I don't have a chlorine problem with the water because the chlorine has been removed by that period of time. However, you might try some de-chlor if you have issues with chlorine in your water. I do use Prime on ocassion and for this amount of water used in the Paramecia culture, it would be one drop of the Prime that is needed. -very little.
Great video, thank you I learned a few things from it. I found that I get much better results if I use spring water rather than tap water. Tap water contains lethal ions from the metal pipes it runs through. Rain water might be another option but I never did try it.
I have tried tap water and also RO water, but have not noticed much of a difference. Perhaps Rain water is best, but I have not tried it. I get good results with tap water, so I don't see the need to get more complicated. Thanks for sharing your comment.
Great video! I've just started mine and it's doing well so far. Do I need to feed a second dose of yeast to each culture after a few days or is the initial amount enough for the whole time? Thanks.
I have found that adding the additional yeast over time doesn't actually improve much. I have experimented with both methods, no more after the initial, and a consistent little bit being added. I don't see a big advantage (if any) for the repeated feedings. After the first time or two, that seems to be sufficient. After 6 or 8 weeks, the culture will max out anyway, so it's a constant process, but easy to work with. Thanks for watching!
Hi John. I think I understand your question, but the answer is: YES you can grow infusoria by merely using any culture media and then adding some tank water that has infusoria in it. The culture should become dense, but sometimes it does not due to the competition within the infusoria. But, you won't necessarily end up with any paramecia, just infusoria of differing kinds. Some people just squeeze their filters out and let the muck form the food for their fry. However, if you want to have a culture that is a lot cleaner, hardly any smell, and consist of only the larger sized infusoria known as paramecia and visible to the naked eye, then you would want to have a culture starter by introducing only the desired paramecia. I hope I answered your question. If not, send another reply.
maybe you should consider running the paramecium through a filter sock so you can get rid of the rotted wheat smell and keep the food for the fry.... just an idea.
Thanks for your idea. Your idea has a lot of merit, but I use a 16 micron filter for cleaning up the green water because the green water goes right through it and any other bug or animal is typically too large to escape the filter. I think in the case of the paramecia, there's not a whole lot of worry if some of the foul water gets into the tank. Even a the berries have been in the tank and just remain there until I later clean them out but I don't bother until the fry are much larger and ready to come out of the tank. Paramecia can take over the tank and kill the fish if left unchecked, but I have merely drip water changed the tank with clean water and the eventually overpopulation of paramecia | Infusoria just vanishes. The overflow is a sponge filter that prevents fry from escaping but the water goes through it and the paramecia with it. With a few cups of paramecia water, the 5.5 Gallon (smallest size tank I have) has enough volume to handle the little bit of intrusion. It does not seem to affect the fry. Smell doesn't occur in the tank, either, only in the highly concentrated bottle used to culture the paramecia.
Thank you for your question. As I have noted in the video, the magic is not in what the media is. So paramecia and other infusoria can actually be cultured in a lot of decaying items--green beans being one of them. HOWEVER, the smell is usually what makes culturing infusoria the challenge. Using wheat berries seems to be the least objectionable in my opinion.
@FishEZ all the fish food culturing videos seem to get a lot of views for quite a few you tubers, but it doesn't look like it always translates to subscribers. Still excellent information 👍
I guess you could give it a try. I've used corn husks, but the main thing for using the wheat berries is that it is a tried-and-proven source that does not seem to produce an objectionable smell. But if you have a place to store the cultures whereby the smell is not an issue, then go ahead and give that a try. Would probably work.
Hi Gary, it's not hard at all. Rather inexpensive too. Anyone can order them from this website: www.fishez.ca/store/ I ship to US, Australia, and even Europe if you are not in Canada. Kit comes with a starter supply of everything you need. I got them originally from a fellow fish keeper who does not have them now. They died out because he didn't keep them going.
That is a very good question. I have not seen the need for the culture to need sunlight because it does not feed on algae or anything that requires sunlight. So after putting the culture together, I merely place in a box and leave in the upper shelf of the fish room. What it does need is some small holes in the top for air. That's it.
Have fun! I keep cultures going constantly and find that making them every 10 days is perfect. So three times a month gives me a peaking culture at any given moment.
Thank you for visiting the site. In the near future I will be producing a similar video describing all of live foods that I use and how to culture them easily. This new video will take the cultivation of the paramecia experience I have and consolidate it to a short section within the video. The new video will have links to jump to various segments of the video so that you will get the concise summary in just a matter of minutes. In the meantime, just (1) boil the wheat berries for 10 mins and let cool (2) add a small pinch of yeast, (3) add small amount of culture start, and (4) start feeding in 2 weeks. I hope that's a good summary for you.
Thanks for saying. I believe there's a lot of improvements to be made in my video-making department. But I keep trying. The goal is just to make some videos whereby people can take away something helpful.
Just wanted to say thanks for the information. It actually works!!!!! My fry are happy 😊 yum, yum 😋
I'm very glad to hear that.
Very great but so simple method of culture of infusoria. Love your way of making it simple.
I'm glad you like it. I am still continuing to experiment with various adjustments to find the best possible results. It's all about the tweaking. Thanks for visiting Fishez.
Wow! What a great video. I did not think it was this easy to maintain live food! Thank you so much!😊
Great video and product, I bought this from you at the aquatic expo in Missasuaga! my Celestial pearl danios fry are growing so fast, cheers.
I am glad you were able to get some. I am sure that the paramecia will help with the CPD's. Just keep starting a new batch every 10 to 20 days.
Sir (and channel team) thank you, this is going to be of great help to me and my enterprise. I really appreciate it. Beautyfull and clear, thank you again.
Great video my friend. Your way of doing this seems less messy than mine (using vegetables). I'm working on a video on infusoria culturing my way at the moment. I will, however, try out your method as well. Thanks for sharing.
I look forward to learning from your method as well. There's always something that can be picked up when we watch each other do something even if it is a small thing or what might be considered insignificant point by others. I learn so much by watching others and get great ideas in the process. Thanks.
Pond water has paramecium and other critters. Could use it for a starter.
Yes, and you could. The "other critters" part of it makes it a bit uncertain as to what you will get, but at least using this method, it's always consistent and always paramecia. I have made cultures from tank water too. See my other video on this subject.
I followed everything and i on day 5today could see some dust like particles swimming in clusters like a smoke in water is that it ??? The paramecium???
Fantastic Information and now I need to get my own starter culture.
I am very glad that you liked it. I would think this is a very good starter food for Bettas. From what I understand, Bettas are very small fry as well.
@@FishEZ yes they are! I had seen starter cultures at our local fish club but did not know about them. Great video
Quick question. Would rice work in place of wheat berries?
Try it and let us know if that works. I would imagine that one could use just about anything that "rots" / decays and that would give the bacteria needed for the paramecia to thrive. However, the odor is what makes the difference. I have tried corn husks as well, but found the odor to be a little pungent.
Greetings from Germany, I followed the steps in the video and I have a formidable culture of paramecium.
My question is, how can I feed infusoria culture for 8 weeks so they don't starve.
Thanks for your comment. I think it's a good question. I typically never have a culture longer than 5 weeks as sometimes they won't last longer than 6 weeks. So the solution is actually a lot simpler than trying to nurture along an older dying out culture. I simply start a new culture every week, knowing that I will be using them about 4 weeks from when i start it. Thus, I have a simple lineup of 6 or 8 bottles lined up and as i use them up, I go onto the next. Once you have about 6 or 8 weeks worth, I start a new culture each time I finish up one. That way, I'm always ready. I also have a continuous supply. For some of us with bigger fish rooms, I guess the best thing to do for quantity is to simply start two bottles each time for double the number of bottles. In that way, I can be very generous when it comes to feeding. I will be putting out another video on breeding Thread-fin Rainbows very soon. I stop feeding the paramecia once the fry are large enough to take baby brine shrimp. But with Thread-fins it's longer because the fry are sooooo small and grow slowly. Therefore, I need to continue with the Paramecia for a longer period. I hope this answers your question. Thanks for subscribing!
@@FishEZ Thank you for everything, have a good day!
Excellent, I've watched this video a few times, thank you.
My video where I mention your channel will drop on Friday.
Steve Heller
Sheller Aquatics
Wow, thanks! I appreciate the shout-out. Let's keep in touch.
Can wheat flour be used instead of the berries ??
I have not tried that. I would imagine that it might work, but the flour would have to be added sparingly. I only use 5 or 6 hard wheat berries. The flour might break down too fast but to know, I would have to give it a try. If you have success, please let us know.
Thanq for the reply … but I managed to source the wheat Berry
What's the difference between paramecia and infusuria?
That is an excellent question. Simply put, Infusoria is a collective word used to denote all of the single-celled organisms that make up the small nearly microscopic kingdom of creatures swimming around in water, including tanks, rivers, lakes, pools of rain, etc. There is an abundance if varieties and types. Paramecia is the plural word for one in particular. A paramecium is an organism that looks like a small slipper which has cilia all around it and maneuvers through the water using the cilia (hair-like feet). It is a little larger than the average Infusoria and thus is better for viewing with the naked eye. It is used a lot in biology classes for viewing under a microscope where they are studied. Mine come from the strain used in biology classes. I hope that helps.
@@FishEZ Well done! thanks for a very informative explaination , highly appreciate it! You just earn a new subcriber, all the way from the philippines.. Keep up making informative upload and godbless us!
@@jaymidnight7757 thanks for the sub! I try to answer all questions. I don't know what time it is in the Philippines on Saturdays when it is 4:11 PM EST but that's when we go live and I try to answer all questions. Hope you can join us some time.
can we use other alternatives other than wheat berries?
Yes, you can use a variety of other items. Initially I was using corn husks. That worked pretty good, but the smell was a lot stronger. I can't say that using other items is better, because I have not found something different than the wheat berries that will do the job with less smell.
Greetings! Great video. I was hoping you might have some advice on a planted dirt substrate for this culture? Is it viable? Or maybe... overkill?
My goal is to make it live for a long time and even thrive.
I'm sure you can do something like what you suggest. After 4 weeks, the solution begins to produce a very strong odor and that's why it typically isn't done that way. You could toss 1/2 of it, put in fresh water to dilute, and perhaps a bit of yeast to get it to bounce back. It all depends on your goals. I would suggest there is a method, similar to mine but one that can be tried using a device designed by Lowell's Labs. Check out his video on making a device that you can change out the cooked wheat berries. If you want to look at that method, watch this video: th-cam.com/video/IbGvQKzZaOQ/w-d-xo.htmlsi=IyvjFHVv2uHenvL1 My method completely restarts the solution every 3 weeks or so and that works fine for me because I can time it perfectly by starting up a new culture every 10 days and thus ALWAYS have a thriving full culture ready to use at any given time.
@@FishEZ I have now a clean fish tank only gravel with these little ones plus other kinds of zooplankton. On the second week I filled the tank with a litle more water now at 25% of the 100L it can hold. Today I can see them at the new water line but very slowly the bothom seems to be dying off? I cant say for sure but there is still decoposing matter at the bothom. I will keep this on and see how far it goes. Im thinking of adding frozen daphnia there for them to feed on might work if they ran out of food already.
Thank you for the video! I will be watching it right away
It's been a few months, has your sustainable tank experiment worked out?
@@FishEZ YES!! thanks fro coming back. I have now a fully no water changes tank with only top offs from time to time cause water must evaporate. What I am missing now is actually testing the water and the substrate and actually have some insight on what I really have hapening in my tank. Either way it is working very well, shimp, killer snails and neon tetras plus many ostracods are... surviving? I cant tell if they are really thriving or not tho, there was a time all I could see was shrimp everywhere, then they slowly died down back again to a normal population for the tank size if that makes sense most likely without enough food. Since I only feed the neons.
I also started another bigger tank with almost 200L, almost 10cm deep gravel substrate with maybe 2 inch deep soil and that is very much alive because I see it fart everyday XD Added guppies and months later il add shrimp
@@sofiakaos5278 Very interesting.
dose it needs a starter culture to cultivate?
Yes, most definitely. I don't know where you live, but if you can find some locally from a friend, that's great. If not you can try ordering a starter kit by going to www.fishez.com/store
Probably the best tutorial here on TH-cam explaining how to culture paramecia, could you do the same for vinegar eels?
Thank you Pete! I like the idea of doing a treatise on how I use the vinegar eels. I think I will do something like that. Thanks so much for your support.
I bought his paramicium kit and LOVE IT!! So easy! Only question I have is after boiling the berries, do I put boiled berry water in the bottle too or just the boiled berries?
Hi Brandy, glad that the paramecia are working well for you. I let the water cool. After that, I put the berries into the container but also add the water that was boiled and which now has the boiled solution in it. In other words, I believe the boiled water contains elements from the boiled berries so I use it. It's only going to be a little bit compared to the volume that you put into the container, but I do. I have not tested to see if there's a difference by not using that boiled water, but that would be an interesting to find out.
When the jars are closed, is there a smell? Or does it just become apparent once you open the bottle? Thanks for documenting the process you use.
Very good question but honestly I can't smell anything with the lids on. The smell only occurs once you open the lids, very similar to culturing vinegar eels. I don't smell any vinegar in the room but I do smell it when I open the lids and then the smell quickly dissipates. That's why I went with wheat berries. It seems to be the least objectionable when it comes to odor. Thank you for your question. I hope there are more.
Forgive my ignorance/misunderstanding here, but did you start with an existing culture, or some seasoned aquarium water? Or did they just manage to populate the container through air transfer?
I advocate starting with a clean culture, not one with micro organisms that you don't about. For this reason, my initial starting culture came from a laboratory. It's the best way to get a pure culture of just Paramecia without issues. I do not believe they can populate through any air transfer.
hi, i would like a clarification. Do you need a starter culture to make this?
Yes, you would have to add some sort of culture starter. After boiling the kernels the effect is to kill all organisms. So only after adding something to "start" the culture would it produce anything. If paramecia is not available to you or you are not near where I can mail it to you, then just simply try some of the methods in some of the other comments on this page. I recommend a place where water has naturally been sitting around for a while and is no doubt full of small infusoria organisms.
A very informative video sir, Love from India. Sir, I am a research scholar and the title of my research is “study the effect of microplastic on paramecium using the optical experimental system” for that we need to cultivate paramecium.
But we are facing a problem that the unwanted particles or impurities in the paramecium environment affect our results, so I just want to know that is there any way we can culture paramecium with a very minimal amount of impurities (other particles).
And is there any liquid feeding medium for paramecium so we can reduce the impurities in the paramecium environment.
Thanking you in advance
Thank you for finding my video. Since you found this video and watched it, you could use possibly distilled water (to avoid impurities) and wash / rinse the wheat kernels prior to boiling them. I think the Yeast is also important. By doing that, I would say it would limit the amount of impurities, and by adding just a little of the starter culture, you could limit possibly too much contamination. But that's all I could suggest. I assume you have access to the paramecia culture to start with. I have heard that some order from University supply sources, but haven't been too successful with what has arrived.
Have you tried using spring water rather than tap water? Spring water gives me much better results.
Where do you get your initial culture from
The original source was from Select Aquatics in Colorado. Greg had them at the time I ordered some fish and I got some at the same time. However, he doesn't have them currently. He said originally they were acquired from a biological supply house for colleges / university biology departments.
Thank you so much. You made it quite simple to understand. Big thumbs up to you!
I make the batches up every 10 days. In this way, when I start the next bottle, it's always at "peak" concentration. So I have a schedule of making new batches on the 1st, 10th and 20th of each month. This methodology seems to work best. I always have plenty of high concentration of paramecia on hand for any given moment.
@@FishEZ that is a great schedule to follow.
Where can I get a starter batch of paramecium?
@@jamesholbrook7785 Yes, it works out very well.
@@FishEZ where do you get your paramecium?
@@jamesholbrook7785 Hi James, I get them from the previous culture, so I'm always seeding the next with a culture starter from the previous. Once you have a culture, you don't have to buy more. I do 2 bottles each time. I've never had one crash, but I have two in case someone wishes to buy locally a ready-to-harvest culture. If you asking where I got my original start, it was from Greg Sage of SelectAquatics who at the moment doesn't have any. (I'll have to replenish him when he is ready.) He originally got them from a Florida source where the paramecium are cultured for biology studies / fish studies at the university level. So these cultures are free of a lot of "other" organisms that one might get if they tried to culture Infusoria from tank water or from local natural sources. If you need a culture starter, they can be ordered cheaply from my website: FishEZ.ca/store
Why boiling the wheat? Is there any reason ?
Yes, a big reason is that it softens the kernels before they break-down and that they can begin to decompose much faster so that the culture can use the elements in time. I don't over-boil either because if the kernels are too soft, it will just produce a real mucky mess. So 12 minutes boiling is perfect for me. Also, after it cools, I use the water that is from the boiled seeds. I know that gluten is in the water especially after being boiled out a bit and I think that's another important aspect of the culture media. Great question. Thanks for visiting.
@@FishEZ Thank you for your kind explanation😀🙇♂️
Where did you get the initial paramecium from to culture though
This strain came from an on-line order from a supply house in Florida. They sell to universities for study purposes. That's where the recipe originated. I wasn't the one who ordered them though, I got them from Greg Sage in Colorado. He sent a starter group when I ordered some fish from him. His died out recently, so will likely have to get restarted from my cultures in the future. The good thing is that these don't come with a cross contamination of other Infusoria, they are from what I can see, all paramecia.
Is there an alternative medium aside from wheat? Thanks
There are other mediums that can be used. I mentioned in the video that Corn Husks can be used and I have tried them. One only needs to put two or just one leaf into the solution. Boiling is not required in this case. We boil in the case of the wheat to break down the hard case of the kernel. There actually can be a wide variety of particular mediums. The important thing is that it will rot. Therefore be advised that whatever you decide to use can produce a very fowl smell or odor after a number of days. I have found that the wheat produces the least amount of bad odor and provides the necessary medium for the culture. If you give some other mediums a try, please to reply here as to your results. Thank you for taking the time to watch my video. --Michael
You can just use yeast really. The idea is to have bacteria for the paramecium to eat, the wheat or anything else rotting is what will create food for the bacteria, but if you have paramecium think this guy does, he could just seed from a previous culture the paramecium and add yeast for bacteria and skip feeding the bacteria really.
What works of one person might not work for another but the key really is, having lots of bacteria to feed lots of paramecium so they will multiply over and over.
@@FishEZ Rye berries, same amount worked quite well. :)
@@sparkyjones560 As a newbie, my cultures of what appear to be the same critters, and some smaller versions... and Much smaller versions of his paramecium... all had minimal production or died back, when not fed the rotting material... with the yeast.
Let me know your secret, if you have one.
(my cultures came from filter sponges of aquariums... bigger organisms cultured.
- and others from rooting Ti plants in a bucket (in Hawaii)... they smelled of bacteria and produced Very tiny versions... of what appear to also be Paramecium. ...(?)
@@bubblerings That I would believe since it's not so much the "wheat" that is the key as it is using a grain that produces the right amount of gluten from the boiled grains and the amount of decay needed. I have not tried Rye but if you have, what is the smell like? Even after 10 to 20 days, the wheat berries have yet to produce for me any strong odor.
Awesome video! Thank you very much!! :) I might also have some questions: How many times do you actually feed the fry with the paramecia? Do you do that also during the night? do you also change the water for the fry and if you do how many times per week? sry for asking all at once and thank you in advance
I add the paramecia several times per day, but not during the night. Because there are so many per baster squeeze, one can feed several times per day but it would depend really on the size of your tank because the water in which the paramecia are grown is on the foul side. So if your fish are in a small tub, you'd have to change 1/2 the water frequently as needed, but if the tank is a 5 or 10 gallon, it's not a problem. Regular water changes will keep the water in good shape. Watch my video on making trickle water changes, which is the best method if you can set it up. Here's the link: th-cam.com/video/ocqrmuzLKjc/w-d-xo.html
I try to get the fish onto BBS as soon as possible because it's better nutrition in my opinion and water pollution issues are eliminated.
Is that wool/yarn in the fry tanks?
If you are looking at the blue-eye rainbow fish fry, yes, eggs are laid in yarn mops that hang in the tanks. The eggs are then placed into a hatching tank and sit on the bottom. Before using them again, I usually boil them just to rid them of all small critters before re-use. I have several videos showing their use. Thanks for stopping by.
I don’t always have baby fish and I don’t have a whole lot at one time. Do I have to reculture it every month or can it go longer? How much longer? How often do I need to feed them if it’s been several months? Just add more yeast? Also, my house in the winter is 60° - 63° F. Are they OK in a wide temperature range?
I like to reset the culture every 3 times per month, that makes it possible to have a fully concentrated culture at any time. But you could let it go longer and you could feed it with a bit of yeast to keep it going. So it's up to your circumstances, and everyone's circumstances is different. The temps will not cause it to die out, but I'm not sure on the growth rate at such cool temps. If you test it out, please do reply and let us know your findings.
@@FishEZ Thank you!
Can you use instant oatmeal instead of wheat kernels?
That's a good question. I have not heard of anyone using instant oatmeal for this purpose, but I have heard them use the instant potatoes / oatmeal for microworms. All I can see is you could try it and let us know the results. I do know that the use of the wheat berry kernels tends to NOT develop a very strong odor. So that's why it's my preference.
Good idea. Looks clean. 👌👍
Yes, these work well for feeding very small fry in the first few days of their life. It's a must for egg scatterers and similarly type of fry. Larger fry such as Angel fish can do well with BBS from the beginning, but most fry do better with a smaller start.
what's the difference between infusoria and paramecium?
That is an excellent question! It's like the difference between the word "cichlids" and "discus". Cichlids include all kinds of different fish, but the Discus is one in particular. Hence, the word infusoria is the conglomerate of all kinds of different small microscopic creatures. However, Paramecium are a specific one, its a bit larger than the rest (making it good for fry) and they have a specific look under the microscope (sort of like a slipper in shape with a lot of small little hairs so that they can move about.) By culturing just the paramecium together and not including other infusoria, I believe that they will culture the best without competing against other micro-organisms. Thanks for visiting my channel. I hope you are subscribed.
I was watching this video a couple nights ago and realized i just purchased some of your famous brew. The ice tea bottle made the connection(small world)
#21 on the bottle in pink marker! The bottle is just packed with paramecia and the process is easy and quick.
That's wonderful Dave. I hope they prove to be extremely helpful. The "21" on the bottle means that it was started on the 21st of the month. I now do it the 1st, 10th & 20th (or thereabouts) and it's the perfect cycle. I always have a bottle just teeming and when the date hits, it will be time for two new bottles to be loaded up. After the 30 days, they will have peaked and it's just easiest to toss and use the next bottle. So each bottle basically gets a 10 day window for use. But it's plenty for my fish room of 30 tanks.
how how to culture the Paramecium without starter.....
It is not possible to grow something without having it to start with. That's what is meant by the word "starter". If you mean how can you grow infusoria (small single-celled animals) then there's a lot of videos out there on how to do that. II advocate starting with a clean culture, not one with multiple micro organisms that you don't about. For this reason, my initial starting culture came from a laboratory. It's the best way to get a pure culture of just Paramecia without issues. I do not believe they can populate through air transfer, but perhaps via water run-off. Nevertheless, it's not likely that you would have a good clean culture in the end if you do it like that. Thank you for watching the video.
Instead of expensive wheat berries could some stone ground whole grain spelt flour, filtering out the course bits for boiling, be used?
Give it a try. If it works for you, then that would be great in your case. But there's nothing cleaner and easier then just boiling some kernels. I do not know if the "ground" grain will cause any cloudiness, but you'd just have to try it out. Let us know by a reply post how it turns out for you. Thank you for your idea.
@@FishEZ Thanks for your thoughts. I did go ahead with your 'recipe' but strained only the large particles in the stone ground wheat. I left the flour powder out. I will know in a couple of days if I have success. I may have found some infusoria in water in which I was trying to grow seeds of a dwarf water lily, that are dead now, but the old water in that container was slimy. I added a squirt of it. Here's hoping it helps.
Anything used for bread would work including flour. You need something for the yeast bacteria to eat and multiple for the paramecium to eat and multiple off of.
@@sparkyjones560 Well, that answers my other comment to you, then..
-Yes, something needs to feed the system. - Cool!
Hello sir .... How many days required for this culture ?
I have found that after adding the little bit of starter culture, within several days you should see a very large multiplication of the small organisms. However, if you are asking how long before you can start using it to feed your fry, I would recommend waiting at least two weeks. But after 8 weeks the culture may be too much and might crash so start a new culture every week in a new bottle and you'll have plenty of paramecia to feed to your fry on a constant basis in just a short time.
You need a culture for this? Sadly its impossible to get in my country. When you put in the culture in the jar?
To cultivate the paramecia, only a small amount of culture is needed to start. I place them into the preparation from the very beginning after all of the ingredients are introduced. One does not have to wait. Only a small sample or number are needed to begin the culture. In time the whole plastic container will be thriving with a large number of specimens. I use up the cultures within 6 weeks of their start. I can use them earlier if I have the need. After 6 weeks or so, I find it best to start a new culture. I have about 8 bottles going in my fish room at any given time. That way I always have plenty on hand.
@@FishEZ Did I miss something? I thought was just to mix yeast in water and then put cool down boiled water with wheat berries in a bottle to start the culture
@@andressaakie4031 Even I did the same but no results, so I am not sure if we need a small amount of culture to begin with.
@@andressaakie4031 Sorry for the delayed answer, I didn't notice your response until now. There must be an original paramecia in the culture in order to multiply. They do not come from the yeast. That is what is meant by the term "starter" culture. There is a small animal that must be used as the 'start'. If you are in US or Canada, I can send a starter culture, but once you have it you should be able to keep it going and use a few drops from the previous batch as the "starter" culture for the next.
@@rajdettpeterson6891 Sorry for the delayed answer, I didn't notice your response until now. There must be an original paramecia in the culture in order to multiply. They do not come from the yeast. That is what is meant by the term "starter" culture. There is a small animal that must be used as the 'start'. If you are in US or Canada, I can send a starter culture, but once you have it you should be able to keep it going and use a few drops from the previous batch as the "starter" culture for the next.
Alternative Recipe: 3 weeks later, all still looks good... plenty of Paramecium like yours! (it is stable)
-What's different? (store was out of Wheat Berries...)
So, I needed to add 30 to 50 percent More, using RYE Berries!... as they are very skinny. :)
-as my previous attempt with Rye had failed and crashed (too few berries, my bad), I also sliced about 1/3 of them in half for good surface area exposure to the water... may not be necessary.
I only had gallon spring water jugs with small caps... so, I didn't cap them. (more oxygen)
I doubled your recipe to 3.5 liters...
-My Starter culture was filter medium squeezed into a jug with airstone... from my puffer tank.
I wiggle the jug every 2 days to break up the surface scum... and circulate the millions of critters.
-Thanks again for this Amazing culture tutorial!! -Cheers! -Scotty on Maui.
p.s. - The mostly crashed culture had Paramecium still alive on the top, so those were skimmed off to make my first big Success! (The first diluted attempt had a smaller yield, then ran out of gluten, as you said.)
-so, if your tank water makes any Paramecium, you will eventually succeed, as well.
Excellent information, thanks for sharing. I have been experimenting as well with using tank water as the starter just to see if it would thrive in the media mixture. It has indeed! but didn't see the larger sized paramecia in the resulting Infusoria. Just smaller organisms and lots of them! This is good to know because it allows me to suggest this method to people who do not have more pure paramecia culture starters. Anyone can actually get a good culture going and concentrate it enough to use it for fry food. I merely used water from the corner of the tank--I didn't squeeze any of the yuk stuff from a filter. Again, no foul smell. I would think the Rye berries would work just as the wheat berries, but as in all cases, individuals should experiment a little to learn the best way to make it work. It takes a little trial and error. I have come to the conclusion that the best cultures are with 5 to 7 kernels and no more. Any more than that, the seeds can rot and produce too much "yuk" that only get's in the way and isn't for feeding to the fry.
@@FishEZ My first attempt with the filter goo... it was squeezed into a chopped top gallon jug with air stone for a week already (saved because meds were going to kill my filter organisms in the big tank)
The longer bigger Paramecium dominated in Huge numbers by the second round (skimmed from my diluted mistake jug)
-You have the Best Paramecium video I could find!
So, my 3.5 liter culture maybe has 15 to 20 grains of Rye.
Can you feed paramecia to adult guppy fish? Can paramecia replace baby brine shrimp?
No, the paramecia are just to small for adult guppy fish. They do not notice the small micro-organisms. However, any fry in the tank that come from the adults will find the paramecia very appetizing. Once the fry are large enough to eat baby brine shrimp, I recommend switching over to BBS completely. Stop feeding the paramecia at that point. Thanks for your question.
How much time can this water container bottles hold the paramecium for?
Thank you for your question. I have been actually monitoring the time frames in which the culture sits around for a while now and I've come to the conclusion that after initial creation, I find it best to let it sit for 2 weeks before the culture is outstandingly concentrated. At that point it should be used but I've found that after 4 weeks the culture has slowly begun to die out. In some instances, the culture rebounds and will grow in higher conditions again, but I would recommend merely starting a new one each week no longer than every two weeks to ensure a very good supply of paramecia. This has been my observations. If you are referring to the "water container bottles" that I use in the videos to actually pour and feed to the tanks, the truth is that I've wondered that question myself. So I've tried leaving them in the water *drinker* for a long period but have noticed no die off. I believe the organisms actually feed off of the bacteria in the water, not the decaying wheat berries.
This was a great video. Tks.
I am glad that you liked it.
A nice Swirl of Barbs (if that's what they are at 0:22. Impressive!
-and a simple to follow video, sets us up for Success!! -Cheers, man!! -Scotty on Maui.
I had some (aerated) filter sponge water sitting around, while I medicated my tank with meds that shut down the Nitrogen Cycle... So, I added Yeast to that jug... and had plenty of Paramecium-like critters in a few days... Then, skimmed those off for a fresher start, as when you poured some into the next jug... with the berries... Successful, already!! -Great technique, and not too smelly!
A new and Happy Subscriber!!
@@bubblerings Yes, thanks for sharing your experience. In my live stream today, (#4) I talk about using the same concoction to grow Infusoria out of tank water and again, there's small (very small) organisms that thrive on this stuff. The odor stays minimal and there's lots of small stuff, but in comparison to the paramecia, the Infusoria is very small and the paramecia is a bit larger and can be more easily seen with the naked eye. I'm glad that this works for you.
You are the first person to ever ask about the intro videos. The first two fish-videos shown in the intro are both Odessa Barbs. The smaller fry are shown in a 5G tank over marbles that was used. (I now use a different kind of bottom.) The next video is also Odessa barbs (probably a different batch) that are growing out in a 90 G tank. When you get that many barbs in a single tank, it turns out that their behavior is completely different than when they are in smaller groups. It's a very interesting and mind-dazzling sight.
@@FishEZ ssince I have no Green Water yet... It saved my repeated dying hatches of Fairy Shrimp eggs... the babies never lived more than 48 hours... Now, no losses in 3 and a half days... Hooray for Infusoria!
The straight yeast just fouled the water, but did not keep them alive.
-I am expecting even better results with Fairy Shrimp, once I have the algae water going.
-Also added the Yeast Soup recipe I found on Forums.
@@FishEZ Beautiful intro!
-Merry Christmas!
After you put the yeast in and the water goes cloudy when does it clear up?
It clears up very quickly. I'd say in just a couple of days. However, there's that film-like substance that forms on the surface, and I like to give the culture a quick stir in order to get it off the surface. I will then float to the bottom. I think it's best to have the surface clear so that O2 can exchange.
I am not in luck to culture paramecium even though I tried so may method. I can't see the condensed paramecium like yours. Is it OK to feed my first day blue gourami fries with the vinagar eels or micro worms? Anyone know?
Thank you for experience, but I have used the same method and just used aquarium water to culture the infusoria. I did not get any paramecia in the batch, but the bottle did fill up with very small single-celled micro-organisms that filled the bottle. There was no offensive odor as well. I would recommend you try that. I don't know about blue gourami fry because if they are very small, the food has to be very small for the best turnout. I recommend you watch my live-stream #2 (th-cam.com/video/982AVxDbcWM/w-d-xo.html)
It's as small as betta fries. I believe.
@@lanphanh Then I suggest you use the infusoria or paramecia for the best results.
@@FishEZ you know what?
I have my Blue Gourami fries for just second day without any paramicium. I don't want them to die. I try to feed them with spirunila powder with hoping they can eat. I used a good pair of 10x magnify to check the spirunila powder. Then I see my tank with full of paramicium 😀😀😀.
I am so happy to share with you 😍😍😍😍😍
@@lanphanh That's great news. I didn't want to say it, but from now on I'm going to suggest that a person use a magnifying lens in order to double-check their cultures, just to be sure. I'm glad you have a lot of infusoria in your tank. Your fry will likely benefit from all those snacks!
Hey, one question, .. how did you get the fist colony? Or will just just appear out of nowhere (I can't just add some from my previous jar you know..)
Thank you for the very important question. Yes, you must start with a culture that is already existing. I received my colony from Greg Sage of Select Aquatics in Colorado. I ordered some fish and purchased a colony starter at the same time. So he sent a small bag of paramecia. Now I'm not sure if he still has the colonies at the moment. I send out culture starts to those asking who are in the United States or Canada. Greg got them from a source in Florida (I don't know where) but it had college (or university) connections. I believe they culture these for examination in biology classes. But of course, we culture them for something entirely different. ;-)
I have shared this to the Trans Canada Guppy Group! Thankyou.
Thank you very much for the share. I know it can be something very useful for many people who have smaller fry. I don't think cultivating paramecium is necessary for guppies since they can take on larger foods from day one, but I would imagine that people with guppies may have other species of fish that they are trying to breed as well. I try to provide videos on my channel that are helpful to others because in some way everything that I practice in my fish room has come from other people sharing their ideas as well. I just keep trying to refine or improve upon what I learn. Experience teaches us many things.
@@FishEZ Sir thanks for sharing this method.
@@rajiv9819 You are very welcome. I hope that the information was not only helpful but a great help in rearing those very small fry.
@@FishEZ yes it was very helpful. Thanks again
My english is little, so i dont uderstand what you say, would you like to write the ingredients for me? Please...
Boil wheat kernels (wheat berries) for 10 mins. Pour into about 1.5L water, add pinch of yeast. Add small amount of culture starter. Wait one week. Feed to fish.
Fishez thank you very much, nice from indonesia...
Glad to help.
@@FishEZ Thank you for this video. What do you suggest as a source to secure the a starter culture of paramecium?
@@dbielby Depends on where you live. I recommend you get the starter culture from someone who actually has just the pure culture. I don't recommend trying to get it from local water sources because you will without a doubt introduce some other item with it that may or may not be desirable. So if you live in Canada or the US I could probably help out, but if you live somewhere else, it might be more difficult. See my webpage: fishez.ca
We have very different methods for culturing paramecium! I don't boil or prepare as you do. Typically raising them in planted community cultures (snail aquariums essentially)
Great video though. Thank you for sharing.
Thanks for sharing that idea. It would work like that too, but I don't have spare aquariums to do that. Sometimes I will even have a tank that gets overrun by the paramecia and what I need to do is to do continuous water changes in order to clear the water of the population explosion. If allowed to grow in a tank where the fish are not eating the infusoria / paramecia, they will eventually kill the fish. I have seen it several times. Although in your case, I think you are saying a planted tank without fish (correct me if I'm wrong). My method works well for keeping / containing the paramecia into 2 liter bottles where I can control them and replace them easily enough. Thanks for your comment, it's much appreciated.
What a great resource!
What is the temperature for heating in Centigrade
Not sure what part you mean for heating, but if you are referring to the boiling part, it would be 100 C and if you are referring to the warm water used to kick-start the Yeast, it is about 140F or 60C. (Very hot to the touch).
@@FishEZ I add yeast to the bottle and the water was regular room temperature
It is OK to just add the yeast at room temperature. I keep the yeast in the fridge, so to see if there is any difference, I take the yeast and put it in a small glass of warm water and stir it until it completely dissolves. I then add it to the solution. I put this in the additional notes of the video. However, I have not seen a big difference in doing it this way, but I do notice that the yeast is more "dissolved" and that there are no yeast particles sitting on the bottom of the solution. So I prefer to do the pre-dissolve first before adding.
@@FishEZ thanks for the info sharing man I really appreciate it
what type of torch is it to see paramecia?
Just about any torch (flash light) can be used. It doesn't have to be particularly strong either. It's usually the angle that one places the light that helps the best to see the paramecia. I hope that helps.
@@FishEZ thx buddy
@@FishEZ I am trying to feed infusoria to common carp fish fry & cat fish fry. Please suggest Can they eat? Your suggestion will be helpful for me.
@@asifriad1 For the carp, the fry will be free swimming they should eat paramecia and other infusoria initally, but typically they are large enough you could just use a micro-powder food such as the one from Sera brand (made in Germany) fry rearing powder. As for the catfish, since they often stay near the bottom I use micro-worms. I have a culture going at all times. cflas.org/2015/04/14/walter-worm-care-sheet/
can I use cereal to.replace wheat berries ?
Thanks for visiting my video. I have never tried cereal, but I would imagine that in small quantities that it might work. Probably anything that is decaying would work, BUT the reason for using the wheat berries is because it is a tried and proven way to provide medium and at the same time not decay to the point that the culture would produce a very objectionable odor. As with culturing worms, the cereal might very easily produce too much bad odor. I used Corn Husk leaves which did a decent job but there was a smell. I use the wheat berries and can't hardly detect any odor at all even though the culture is several weeks old. Thanks for watching.
How to produced without starter
That is in interesting question because basically it can be done using infusoria. I haven't tried it myself but will sometime. One can take a bit of "starter" from the mature aquarium and no doubt there would be small micro-organisms that would be able to multiply and reproduce in the culture medium prepared in this way. However, it might not be any paramecia, or it might have some. Others collect paramecia in stagnant pools of water outdoors. That's not best because there's a possibility to add unwanted "creatures" to the aquaria. For this reason, using an established culture starter is always best. There are several other videos out there that show how to culture infusoria using aquarium water as the starter. I think Mark's Aquatics has a good one.
If you sell the starter I can buy
Can I feed it to just hatched discus fry
Thank you for your interesting question. Discus fry eat the slime mucous off of the parents skin for the first few days of their lives. They are not typically known for eating other things but it is possible that something so tiny would certainly look good to a small fry. However, I guess is that it wouldn't really be the right kind of food. Once the Discus fry are large enough to begin swimming on their own, newly hatched brine shrimp might be more appropriate. However, if you are trying to raise Discus fry without the parents, it might not be a bad idea to have paramecia in the tank water as any small fish probing about will see these tiny infusoria and will feast on them. That is what I think would be the case.
@@FishEZ I m hatching the eggs artificially . Just after hatching , when and what to feed ?
Hi
Thank you for sharing such precious informations.. I m starting one right now.. but I have no previous culture in wheat.. I have infusoria culture on lettuce.. May I take from it the starter?
Yes, if you already culture infusoria using lettuce, you can try using the wheat berries and it might be even a better media for you. It might be less smell. I would give it a try and please do share your results here in a reply.
@@FishEZ
Sure I will share the experience.. I used ordinary wheat not the red berries one.. I hope it works too.. Thank you so much
@@FishEZ Excuse me sir, may I use wheat grass seed as culture media? 🙏
@@walaeabdel-ghaffar3465 Did the ordinary wheat work? Please do share the results. I would think that it would.
@@conanthesilverb I would imagine that it might be similar. However, I've never tried wheat grass seed, so I can't say for certain.
very well explained
Basically I culture Infusoria using dry banana leaves and old water from aquarium nd leave it for a couple of days to produce Infusoria. You can see whether it is an infusoria or not , if it is attracted to light
Yes, thanks for the tip. As I stated, I've used also a culture with corn husks. Basically the idea is to use something that does not produce an odor that is objectionable. Other items can be used. When a culture starter cannot be obtained, I would say using aquarium water would work as well. But I do not advise using water from outdoor source so as to avoid contamination being brought into the home aquarium. Thanks for watching!
I don’t have those berry seeds you used. Do you know what alternative I can use?
They are called "wheat berries" but basically they are just hard wheat kernels. I do not know why they call them that. But I would be surprised that you don't have some wheat around. As I mentioned in my video, the truth is that you can use the leaves of corn-on-the cob which is what I used for some time before. But the odor as the leaves decay is stronger than the wheat berries.
On my first try, I used Rye berries, since I have them already... It worked pretty well!
I had no starter culture then what I do? pls tell me bro
If you have a aquarium at home then use that water it is the starter culture itself.
@@jt9513 thanks bruh
One can use natural water, e.g. water from established tank, however, the infusoria will not necessarily be paramecia. But it might work. I recommend you look for a source for the starter culture. If you are near Canada, I send starter kits very reasonable. fishez.ca/store
@@FishEZ thanks for your response.i am from india sorry
How long do you use it for feeding
Just depends on how many tanks of small fry you have. I have several jars of rainbow fish hatching all the time so I can go through one of these bottles in less than two weeks. But if I have a 5G tank full of fry, perhaps hundreds, I like to add more so I might go through the bottle in just a few days. There are so many paramecia, that I can just use a turkey baster to give about 1 oz of paramecia to a tank and that' s a lot.
@@FishEZ Great thanks for you sir please keep it going, wish you best wishes
I hard to find buy starter culture of any live food from market, is there anyway that i can attract these things from wild ?
Yes, you should be able to use some water from the river / creek / ponds / etc. It likely will have some paramecia in there, but for sure it will have some infusoria. However, you might get some additional creatures growing in the culture instead of paramecia. That's fine, if they are all good for fish food. You will have to be discerning. Once you have the culture going, it can be used to start additional cultures.
@@FishEZ thanks for the reply man
@@Mothana808 You are welcome. Have you been successful using water from nearby ponds?
Good one sir. But can we use milk water for growing it?
I have never tried it, but I would guess that the parameters are not the same, i.e. the amount of gluten and other things that make for a clean culture whereas the use of milk in my opinion might cause more of an odor. But since I've not tried it, I couldn't say that with certainty. If you try it, please do post your findings.
@@FishEZ I Think milk water will be bad for getting the culture out. I never tried it. Maybe someday, I will check it out. Thanks n best regards, Sir.
Thank you for checking out my videos.
Take aquarium water and use a small drop of milk you will see infusoria grow very fast. You can use banana peels as well. Indian almond leaves also works very well. I have tried and tested all these options. Good luck.
@@jt9513 Thanks for the comment. I'll have to try it myself. I guess is the Indian almond leaves or any other decaying leaf would be better than the banana peels to keep the odor down. I use the wheat berries and it works like a charm every time. Of course, there's many types of infusoria out there, some are better than others for this purpose. The paramecia seem to be a very good choice for young fry.
I heard from aquarium coop and dean that he feeds his ram fry paramecium for first food. I am new to breeding and want to try to breed rams. Thanks for your video
I too breed Rams. The paramecia is not needed for a very long time with Rams because they will be eating Baby Brine Shrimp in a very short amount of time. I think I only use Paramecia & Walter Worms for the first couple of days just to give them a kick start, after that, they are eating BBS and no longer need the small stuff. Having the paramecia in the water from the beginning, however, can make a big difference from the outset. Thanks for visiting my channel.
@@FishEZ do you ship your starter cultures to USA or are you only shipping in Canada?
@@stealthswim223 Yes I do. The cost of shipping is much higher than the cost of the starter, but for anyone who needs it to get started, it is only a one-time purchase. Just go to my store at: fishez.ca/store and select USA at checkout. Sorry to other folks but only USA & Canada is possible.
Would wheat flower work
Thank you for your question. I have never tried it so I couldn't say for certain what the result would be. However, in my experience, I would say that the wheat flour might decay out too rapidly and cause too much of a contamination of the water for the culture to be easily harvested and put into your tank. i.e. it wouldn't be easy to separate it out. I can't see how that would be better. The kernels of wheat berries are very hard and even after the boiling, they retain their shape. If you try it, please post your results in a reply here.
Hi. U keep this culture in dark? They grow better in the dark?
Thank you for your question. I have not found that darkness or light affects their growth, but I have not tried to completely darken them either. I just leave them in the upper shelf of the fish room. I have them in a box most of the time. The box does not have a lid, so it's not completely dark, but it's not bright either. I do not believe these organisms depend on light or lack of light. The decay of the wheat causes a source of bacteria which these organisms feed from. Paramecia are cultured for many reasons other than just fish, so there's a lot of information available on the internet for some of the finer details. Thanks again for checking out my video.
@@FishEZ thank u so much. It is quit complete
Do you use water conditioner in your cultures?
That is a very good question. I do not. However, I aerate my water for 24 hours before using it. That means that I don't have a chlorine problem with the water because the chlorine has been removed by that period of time. However, you might try some de-chlor if you have issues with chlorine in your water. I do use Prime on ocassion and for this amount of water used in the Paramecia culture, it would be one drop of the Prime that is needed. -very little.
If you please.. I can't find red berries wheat.. what else can be used instead?
Great video, thank you I learned a few things from it. I found that I get much better results if I use spring water rather than tap water. Tap water contains lethal ions from the metal pipes it runs through. Rain water might be another option but I never did try it.
I have tried tap water and also RO water, but have not noticed much of a difference. Perhaps Rain water is best, but I have not tried it. I get good results with tap water, so I don't see the need to get more complicated. Thanks for sharing your comment.
Great video! I've just started mine and it's doing well so far. Do I need to feed a second dose of yeast to each culture after a few days or is the initial amount enough for the whole time? Thanks.
I have found that adding the additional yeast over time doesn't actually improve much. I have experimented with both methods, no more after the initial, and a consistent little bit being added. I don't see a big advantage (if any) for the repeated feedings. After the first time or two, that seems to be sufficient. After 6 or 8 weeks, the culture will max out anyway, so it's a constant process, but easy to work with. Thanks for watching!
@@FishEZ mone
@@prakashponnaiah913 Not sure what you mean't by "mone".
So they dont grow for they own on this? you need to introduce a culture?
Hi John. I think I understand your question, but the answer is: YES you can grow infusoria by merely using any culture media and then adding some tank water that has infusoria in it. The culture should become dense, but sometimes it does not due to the competition within the infusoria. But, you won't necessarily end up with any paramecia, just infusoria of differing kinds. Some people just squeeze their filters out and let the muck form the food for their fry. However, if you want to have a culture that is a lot cleaner, hardly any smell, and consist of only the larger sized infusoria known as paramecia and visible to the naked eye, then you would want to have a culture starter by introducing only the desired paramecia. I hope I answered your question. If not, send another reply.
maybe you should consider running the paramecium through a filter sock so you can get rid of the rotted wheat smell and keep the food for the fry.... just an idea.
Thanks for your idea. Your idea has a lot of merit, but I use a 16 micron filter for cleaning up the green water because the green water goes right through it and any other bug or animal is typically too large to escape the filter. I think in the case of the paramecia, there's not a whole lot of worry if some of the foul water gets into the tank. Even a the berries have been in the tank and just remain there until I later clean them out but I don't bother until the fry are much larger and ready to come out of the tank. Paramecia can take over the tank and kill the fish if left unchecked, but I have merely drip water changed the tank with clean water and the eventually overpopulation of paramecia | Infusoria just vanishes. The overflow is a sponge filter that prevents fry from escaping but the water goes through it and the paramecia with it. With a few cups of paramecia water, the 5.5 Gallon (smallest size tank I have) has enough volume to handle the little bit of intrusion. It does not seem to affect the fry. Smell doesn't occur in the tank, either, only in the highly concentrated bottle used to culture the paramecia.
BTW, only a few kernels are needed, I use about 5 to 7 kernels and no more. So it's kept in check. That's all one needs.
can I replace it with "green bean" bro?
Thank you for your question. As I have noted in the video, the magic is not in what the media is. So paramecia and other infusoria can actually be cultured in a lot of decaying items--green beans being one of them. HOWEVER, the smell is usually what makes culturing infusoria the challenge. Using wheat berries seems to be the least objectionable in my opinion.
This video is awesome thank you
Replayed again sir! 😊😁 appreciate all the information you share ❤
Always welcome. I probably should do an update of this video.
@FishEZ all the fish food culturing videos seem to get a lot of views for quite a few you tubers, but it doesn't look like it always translates to subscribers. Still excellent information 👍
Thanks sir, It’s absolutely work.
Compared to other live food culturing, I find the work involved to be very minimal.
Very good information content....Thanks 👏👍
Very good idea...
shou out to all fish lovers and watchers of your channel
Much appreciated, thanks for the shout-out
can i use quaker oatmeal instead of organic wheat berries?
I guess you could give it a try. I've used corn husks, but the main thing for using the wheat berries is that it is a tried-and-proven source that does not seem to produce an objectionable smell. But if you have a place to store the cultures whereby the smell is not an issue, then go ahead and give that a try. Would probably work.
How did you get your original paramecium. I'm starting from scratch so your video is useless to me.
Hi Gary, it's not hard at all. Rather inexpensive too. Anyone can order them from this website: www.fishez.ca/store/ I ship to US, Australia, and even Europe if you are not in Canada. Kit comes with a starter supply of everything you need. I got them originally from a fellow fish keeper who does not have them now. They died out because he didn't keep them going.
Does your new culture needs to be expose in sunlight or you put it inside the box?
That is a very good question. I have not seen the need for the culture to need sunlight because it does not feed on algae or anything that requires sunlight. So after putting the culture together, I merely place in a box and leave in the upper shelf of the fish room. What it does need is some small holes in the top for air. That's it.
Wonderful video, thank you, woll order to-day
Nice vidio
Thank you very much.
Nice mate..
Thanks 👍
ty
Mantap
Thank you, I have detected your comment to be Indonesian and it means "Great".
Gimana gan berhasil kultur parameciumnya?
Awesome video, I'm going to culture tonight
Have fun! I keep cultures going constantly and find that making them every 10 days is perfect. So three times a month gives me a peaking culture at any given moment.
someone needs to summarize this...
Thank you for visiting the site. In the near future I will be producing a similar video describing all of live foods that I use and how to culture them easily. This new video will take the cultivation of the paramecia experience I have and consolidate it to a short section within the video. The new video will have links to jump to various segments of the video so that you will get the concise summary in just a matter of minutes. In the meantime, just (1) boil the wheat berries for 10 mins and let cool (2) add a small pinch of yeast, (3) add small amount of culture start, and (4) start feeding in 2 weeks. I hope that's a good summary for you.
Broo imagine accidentally drinking it from the bottle 💀
Well, the odor is minimal but not non-existent. Hopefully your nose would prevent you from making such a mistake.
@@FishEZThese paramecia do not cause disease.
I still wouldn’t drink them, though.
Great video michael
Thanks for saying. I believe there's a lot of improvements to be made in my video-making department. But I keep trying. The goal is just to make some videos whereby people can take away something helpful.