Culturing Acartia (Copepods)

by Bob Campbell
This information is from a series of messages between Bob and myself which I have edited together. Comments in Italics are mine - Todd Zebert

I am a Marine Scientist at the University of Rhode Island, specializing in zooplankton ecology. I have had experience culturing different species of copepods including: Acartia tonsa, A. hudsonica, Pseudocalanus spp., and Calanus finmarchicus.

I am sure hobbyists can grow copepods as long as they use easy to grow species like Acartia. Acartia spp., in general, are the easiest to culture, and we have maintained cultures of A. tonsa in the lab for more than 2 yrs at a time.

The requirements for successful Acartia culturing are:

1. Appropriate food - a mixed diet works best. We have had success using Rhodomonas baltica (cryptomonad), Heterocapsa triquetra (dinoflagellate), and Tetraselmis sp. (prasinophyte). Other small flagellates and dinoflagellates in the 10 to 30 um size range should work as well as long as they are not toxic and are nutritionally replete. Heterotrophic ciliates or dinoflagellates, in addition, would be a great food source, but they may be more difficult than the copepods to maintain and are not neccessary. Use a total food concentration of approx. 500 ug Carbon/liter for maximum growth rates, but make sure not to let the food concentration get too dense.
   

   Most of the phytoplankton or ciliates that we feed to our copepods we isolate ourselves or obtain from the Provasoli-Guillard Center for Culture of Marine Phytoplankton, West Boothbay Harbor, Maine USA (ph: 207-633-9600). For more information on a possible source of supplies for hobbyists suggested by Bob, see below
   

2. Copepod densities - less dense cultures are better. Start at densities for
   naupliar stages no greater than 1000/ liter and reduce to no greater than 200/liter by the adult stage. Adequate oxyen can be maintained through gentle aeration or mixing.
   

3. Rear in separate batches. We have had more success rearing in separate batches of similar age than trying to maintain some sort of equilibrium population. Acartia are broadcast spawners and therefore release their eggs into the water column. The eggs are approx. 70 - 80 um in diameter while the adults are 800 - 1000 um and thus the eggs can be easily separated with a 150 - 200 um mesh. For A. tonsa reared at 20 C, it takes about 10 to 12 days to go from egg to adult. We generally start a new cohort of animals at 3 to 4 wk intervals. The adults will lay eggs for 2 to 4 wks before their fecundity drops off, and we are able to obtain 100 - 150 eggs /female /day during the high reproductive period. We
   have raised batches of animals in containers from as small as 1 liter up to 200 liters and I don't see any problem in rearing larger batches; the limiting factor will probably be the amount of food you can grow.
   

Although I have not tried this (yet), I'm sure a resourceful hobbyist could be successful.

Possible SOURCES of supplies:

Aquaculture Supply (33418 Old Saint Joe Rd., Dade City, FL 33525 USA; ph: 352-567-8540) seems to have everything a hobbyist might need, except for the copepods, at a much cheaper price than the Provasoli-Guillard Center . Though I have not used their products, so I can not personally recommend them. They have two species of algae that would be fine for growing Acartia, Tetraselmis and Isochrysis. Both are considered lab weeds in that they are very easy to grow, and they are also high quality food. Aquaculture Supply also sells nutrients, Micro Algae Grow, for culturing algae. I noticed that they sell a book, "Plankton Culture Manual", that gives step by step instructions for culturing phytoplankton and zooplankton including copepods. I have not seen the book so I don't know if it would be useful.

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Used with permission. HTML'ized for RTO Features by Todd Zebert. All Rights Reserved.