Moving The Blog!!!

Hello!!!!'
Please visit: jellykeeping.wordpress.com The blog has been moved and now has 2 editors!!!

We plan to promote the new blog with advertising, and give it its own domain name!!!!

EDIT

On second though... I may still update this blog!

Little Update

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http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jelly-Keeping/125217950896980

Hello!

I'm just making a quick update! The tank is cycling. I will be cycling through next week. I'm keeping the tank at 82°F to raise the metabolism of the bacteria colonies and help them reproduce more quickly. Next week, I will be done cycling. The week after, I will slowly lower the temperature down to 63°F, and when I'm there, I'll be able to buy three 2" moon jellies!

I'll keep you posted!!!

Schedule!!!

Check out my blog for future updates:

Late April - Early May: I plan to have my chiller!
Late June - early July: I plan to have three moon jellies!

Next year: A Spotted Lagoon and Upside Down Jellyfish tank.

Keep checking in to see my progress!

I have just bought the chiller. I'm a little ahead of schedule!
It's a JBJ Arctica Titanium 1/10 horsepower Chiller

500 visitors so far!!!

If I am able to allow my moon jellies to thrive, I will build a sea nettle tank. It will probably not be too large (maybe 45 gallons at most). I believe that jellyfishart.com would be able to supply me with some pacific sea nettles, but I much prefer the atlantic sea nettles (chrysaora quinquecirrah). I love how they are white with subtile brown stripes. I haven't made up my mind, and plus this is far into the future. Who knows if my moon jellies will be successful. I am also thinking that the tank will possibly be made completely out of acrylic by an aquarium manufacturer. However, I will probably end up making it with a glass tank.

I plan on getting my moon jellies very soon!!!

"Slight" change in plans

I have decided to do cold water moons instead of warm water moons. The reason being that warm water makes jellies grow at a much quicker rate, however I suspect it will shorten their lifespan and possibly make them more susceptible to disease. By the end of April, I should have the money to buy myself a small chiller. I am planning on getting the JBJ Mini-Arcticta Chiller. This chiller is discontinued and was $400 when it was for sale. I have found someone selling surplus for $300. I'm going to connect it to the plumbing in my tank, and then have it return water to the pump chamber in the tank. I have decided not to do the refugium in my tank and just make that compartment a "reservoir" for the heater and any other additional things that I want to add to the tank. I returned the light and mud for the refugium, and now I have $100 more for the chiller

Because the chiller is rated for up to 40 gallons, I can add another 25 gallons onto it. That means I will probably be adding a 24" x 24" x 8" tank to the system in the future to hold larger jellies. (considering i am successful with the tank I have now)

Also, Sunset Marine Labs sells coldwater moons (3"-4") for $30 a piece. If I am not able to obtain some jellies from the public aquarium, I will definitely go with these.

If you are not planning on keeping strong life support systems and being very serious with this hobby, you should go with warm water moons in a cheap jellyfishart tank. You'll spend a fraction of the money and time, even if it means replacing lost jellies a few times.

Since I'm not doing the refugium, the jellyfish tankmates article will have to wait a little longer than expected. I need to get some Cassiopeia, Catostylus, or Mastigia jellies to do some experimenting with.

Setting Up the Tank Again!!!

Hello!!!
So I've decided to set up my tank again. This time it will not be used for breeding though. I'll keep grown jellies in it.

So far, I've spray painted the whole thing black so it will be better as a display.

The pseudo-kreisel will be used for moon jellies. I'm going to get a Multi-Color E27 LED Light Bulb with Remote to put in the goose neck lamp above the tank.

Then, what used to be my polyp chamber will become a refugium. I've already got a T5 fixture for the refugium. It has two 10,000K daylight bulbs in it for now. Do you think I should put an actinic bulb in there?

I will keep a few macroalgaes, a snail or two, and some small upside down jellies in it. I will start off with the macroalgaes while the tank is cycling and maybe a piece of live rock. Then I will add some hermits and snails to make sure the tank can hold animals without killing them.
Then I'm going to get two upside down jellies to make sure the bio-filter is jelly safe.

Later, in a month or two, I'll add one moon jelly to make sure the pseudo-kreisel is moon jelly safe. Then if he does fine, I'll add two more.

Here are some pictures of the tank all painted up!

Front of the Tank

Filter Side

Refugium Side

And I know I was promising an article on Jellyfish Tankmates, I've just got to get a little more experience so I have no false info. Hang in there!

I regret building my own jellyfish aquarium. I do not yet know if it will work, but the siliconed edges aren't as nice as I would like them. If I could go back, I would have bought the P-E combo system from Jelliquarium.com as a starter tank. I spent about the same amount on my tank that I would have on the P-E combo tank, or maybe a little less. It's better to start off with a perfect tank, so you don't end up disapointed with the flaws in your DIY tank.

New System

Here's my new system. It's the most basic thing I could think of.

The light helps me see the polyps and ephyra better.

There is a jar with slow moving bubbles for the ephyra and a dish with a slow bubbler for the polyps

The ephyra jar with frozen rotifers in it. There are three epyhra in it.

The polyp dish has an acrylic slide that I scratched up with sandpaper so that they could attach better.

I'll be upgrading this with glass petri dishes and v-shaped beakers as soon as I order them.

Doing things right.

I've decided to keep my jellies the right way. For almost a year (or around six months) I've been failing at keeping the ephyra alive. It's because I'm trying to keep them my way. Clearly my way doesn't work. I'm going to have a chat with Jellyfishart.com so they can give me some tips (Thanks Alex!). I'm going find a method of raising jellies that works! So stay tuned. Soon, I'll have a system that works and perhaps some of you may try also.
And I'm losing my polyps for some reason.
There is a thick brown algae growing around them and they are disappearing.
I hope I can pick up this slack!

Keeping Polyp Colonies

When you are keeping a colony of Jellyfish Polyps, use a small tank. The food is more concentrated and the water changes are smaller. I recently set up a 2.5 gallon aquarium for my polyps. The water flow is too fast to allow the ephyra to not get sucked into the filter, but now I'm just trying to expand my polyp colony.

What I have is a 2.5 gallon tank, a whisper 10i (internal filter), and a large heater with my polyp colony on it.

(pictures coming very soon)

I will try to add a piece of rock to the tank and make sure it has no hydroids. I think it will be much easier for the polyps to stay attached to some rock than glass. The rock will also provide biological filtration.

Sad Update On My Tank

The tank hasn't really changed lately. The polyps are growing in numbers and forming a small colony.
I've been feeding them baby brine shrimp every other day.
I have no medusas though. I am not able to keep them alive for over a week.
The psuedokreisel that the ephyrae were supposed to go in still doesn't work (but I have some ideas of modifying it again)
So when I do get ephyrae, i feed them daily. I put about 4 or 5 in a small water bottle lid with water in it. I dissolve some frozen rotifers in the water too. I put them back in their dish i keep them in about 5 or 6 hours later. They live in a little dish about 5" in diameter with about 3" of water. I give them daily water changes.
Any ideas?

I had hoped that I could have some pictures of 4" moon jellies for you by now. Sorry

But here is a picture of my polyp culture. They are growing on the heater. odd. When I feed them, I have a light up against the glass that attracts the brine shrimp.

Warmer water = more ephyrae. So growing on the heater isn't necessarily a bad thing...

Ephyra Problem

I added a new page up there ^Jellykeeping Basics^
Check it out!

I have a little problem. I put an aerator in the ephyra dish. I thought it would circulate the water enough to keep them off the bottom along with the food. Then they would be more able to catch the food. When I came home that evening, all the ephyra were very small and barely pulsing. I gave up on them and poured them back into the tank. As the water from the dish entered the tank, I saw the fresh water mixing with the saltwater (if you own a saltwater aquarium, you should know what I'm talking about). But that seemed pretty weird because I meant for the ephyra to be in saltwater. I'm guessing that the brine shrimp I'm feeding them had some extra fresh water and that diluted the salt. So, I believe that the fast current and low salinity worked together to kill the little jellies. I turned up the temp and the next day had 5 more ephyra (works like magic doesn't it?). They were forming for a while before but I'm guessing the heat sped them up. So, that's what's going on in my tank.
Also, I'm still trying to fix the ephyra section of the tank to not suck them up in the screen. I emailed Jim Stime (Jelliquarium.com owner). I told him all the specs of my tank and he said my flow was too strong. I will turn it down with the valve I have. I will also get a smaller screen.

The screen I have now is:
Nylon Mesh 60 Micron Opening 47 Micron Thread Diameter 35 Percent Open Area
The screen I'm looking at is:
Polypropylene Mesh 1000 Micron Opening 500 Micron Thread Diameter 44.5 Percent Open Area

So, things I conclude from this are:
Ephyra need little flow.
Put as little brackish water from brine shrimp as you can in the tank.
There still may be a chance in fixing my tank!

New Pictures Update!

Well,
I have some pic updates!
And my ephyrae aren't growing much. I probably gotta be feeding them twice a day to make them grow...
Also, I left the DBS (decapsulated brine shrimp) eggs out overnight. They're supposed to be refrigerated. So, I hope the eggs survived.
Now for some pictures!
Ephyrae



Some fat polyps.

Here's a shot of the tank from the side.

Jellyfish Foods

There are many things you can feed your jellyfish. Frozen foods, live plankton, liquefied plankton, etc. However, there are two you should stick with. Frozen Plankton meant for Jellies and Live Baby Brine Shrimp. In this post, I'll be discussing the pros and cons to each type of food.

Frozen Plankton meant for Jellies
You can buy it from JellyFishArt.com and many other stores online. The reason it has been accepted is because it is so easy. Unfortunately, frozen food can be a bit expensive. You just cut a piece of food, thaw it, and drop it in. Although it must be squirted directly into the jelly's mouths. This is because it's dead so it won't stay suspended for long. The jellies need as much food as possible before all the little plankton fall down to the bottom. Also, you will need to do more constant water changes with using dead food. As they sit in the water, they foul it and release bad stuff into your water. In open-bottom tanks, it is easy to clean up the mess. However, in tanks with substrates (glass marbles, rock, sand, etc.) it is much harder to remove the organisms and you may need something to clean up your leftovers. I'll talk about Jellyfish Tank Mates on another post. Anothe problem with frozen foods is that they will fog up your aquarium water. They have dead parts to the plankton floating around and all the stuff that was frozen in with them.

Here are some sites that sell frozen food:
http://www.jellyfishart.com/Frozen-Jellyfish-Food-p/food6oz.htm
http://sunsetmarinelabs.com/jellyfish-food/

Live Baby Brine Shrimp
The other most common food is Live Baby Brine Shrimp or artemia nauplii. They are easily hatched in a brine shrimp hatchery. The eggs are also, for the most part, inexpensive. That basically consists of a 2 liter bottle with the bottom cut off. Its turned upside down and has airline tubing comming up from the hole where the cap would be (something keeps water from coming out from the bottom, yet allows the airline to put air in the water. It's filled up with saltwater and eggs are added. The airline is attached to an air pump (obviously before it's filled up with water). The bubbles keep the water circulated. Then it must be allowed to sit for about 24 hours with the bubbler on. The egg shells fill up with water and hatch. The brine shrimp are then removed and soaked in an enrichment (I use Selcon). Then they can be fed to the jellies.
There is one thing I hate about raising brine shrimp though. That is separating the egg shells and unhatched eggs from the live shrimp. The egg shells and unhatched eggs can get caught in the jelly's digestive track and hurt them. There is almost no way to completely seperate the egg shells from the live shrimp. However, there is a solution. It's called decapsulated brine shrimp eggs. Most decapsulated brine shrimp eggs you find will be non hatchable (or they are dead). They must be fed directly as eggs. They are 100% digestable. However, I have found some decapsulated eggs from BrineShrimpDirect.com. Here's a link:
http://www.brineshrimpdirect.com/c1/c2/Shell-Free-E-Z-Egg-c202.html
I ordered some and I'll let you know how they work out as soon as I get them and try them out.


ARTEMIA NAUPLII

Now, the benefits to live food,
Live baby brine shrimp have a yolk sac for the first 24 hours of their life. This is the most nutritious part. The yolk sac will help grow your baby jellyfish and keep your adult jellies healthy. Live food will also stay suspended in the water all by itself. No more falling to the bottom and rotting. They don't make your water cloudy because they aren't falling into pieces and getting torn up.


Frozen food is easy and saves time. Live food, though, keeps your jellies healthier and keeps your water cleaner. Live food also takes up more time. And, frozen food is a bit more expensive then brine shrimp eggs. You may end up spending more time doing water changes and conditioning the water with frozen food.
It's really your choice. I do live food because it seems more practical.

If you've ever heard of LAFISHGUY (a web show one youtube), he evaluates live and frozen food as well.

So good luck finding a food that suits you!

Ephyra

I have 5 ephyra and more on the way. Most of them were rescued from that death trap I used to call a tank. I have them now in a little dish floating in the tank. They were getting sucked right through the screen. I guess that will be a grow out tank for them when they get bigger. I also got you some pictures!

Brine Shrimp

I fed my little polyps some brine shrimp. (I gave them a lot). They are really happy and have stacks of dead brine shrimp around them. I soaked the brines in Selcon. The nutritional part of the brine shrimp is their yolk sac which is eaten in the first 24 hours of their life. Selcon just adds more nutrition. It's really cool watching them eat! Here's some pictures.

Hatchey

A few polyps from underneath.

Here they are making little stacks of food.

Here's the corner of the tank

Update

I guess you guys deserve an update.
So, the polyps have strobilated some and I got a few ephyra. Unfortunately, there is a problem with the screen. Everything is sticking to it. It seems like the spray bar isn't strong enough. I hope I can fix it before I lose some more jellies =(.

I tested the water and here are the results:
Ammonia : 0
Nitrate : 2.5
Nitrite : .5
pH : 8.5

Nitrates and Nitrites are dangerously high...
I'm cycling the tank to fix it.

Also, I've switched to live brine shrimp. I have my first culture starting now. Hopefully that feeds my polyps more.

And I've decided to move the polyps onto acrylic slides. I'm gonna scrape them off and lay down slides on the bottom. They will reattach to the slides and then I can hang them up.

Add a post if you have any ideas why my screen is sucking all the ephyra away. Or if you see a problem with the way I am going to reattach my polyps to slides.

Okay, Thanks!

And here's a cool video; you can learn something.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pelagia_noctiluca

Polyps

I'm looking at a polyp through the microscope to see if he's alive.
Apparently he is because you can see his tentacles twitching. Sorry about the bad video quality. I might get a new microscope soon.

Polyps Came In

The polyps finally came in! I'm so excited. I've acclimated them. Here are some pictures.

The box!

Inside: A styrafoam box and a hand warmer.



Acclimating.

Still Acclimating...

They are buried in brine shrimp.

Put them in the tank. Most of that, I'm guessing, is brine shrimp.

Floating all around.

The big pink things are the polyps.

Pretty cool huh?

New Video!

I have a new video of the Polyp and Ephyra tank!
I Hope you like it!

Download:

FLVMP43GP

EDIT:
So you may notice that the water in this tank is moving WAY too fast.
Clearly, with more experience, I am able to look back at my past mistakes.

I hope you can learn from my mistakes also. Here's one thing to remember: The water should be moving just enough to sweep the ephyrae off the bottom of the tank. They should not be tossed around like what is happening to these paper towels.

Polyp and Ephyra Tank

Heres the polyp and ephyra tank tha I built. This is an old video. I'm going to make a new better one soon.

Japanese Sea Nettle

Here are some Japanese Sea Nettles at Albuquerque Aquarium.