Good place to order Amphipods?

[schmunkel98]

Looking to stock up my tank on these guys in preparation for the octopus I plan on putting in there. Anyone know of a good place to order them from? I'm in Dallas, and would love to find someone local, but as long as they ship to me it's ok. Also, how many of these little guys are needed for a 135 gallon tank? 1000? 2000? Let me know.

 

[joel_ang]

A good supplier of amphipods is Florida Aqua Farms. Here is their site.
www.florida-aqua-farms.com

 

[schmunkel98]

Ok cool, but can they be rasied in my tank or do I need something separate to house them in? Aren't they beneficial to my tank as cleaners as well?

 

[rrtanton]

I can't give you all the details you may want, but perhaps my own experience with them will be helpful to you:

My tank's a 55 gallon, with live rock. I purchased amphipods from Florida Aqua Farms and they were more than sufficient to keep my tiny octopus happy. They would breed like crazy and live in the live rock, and the octo would eat them like popcorn. With the octo gone, they're still all over the place, only more so. They do not seem to be pests or any sort of problem.

I would suggest that, if you have live rock, these guys are probably a nice addition to your tank's ecosystem, though i'm not sure how much they contribute to tank cleaning. Perhaps they do eat up detritus. If you have an octo and it's fairly small, they might make a good supplement to his diet.

rusty

 

[schmunkel98]

Great, Florida Aqua Farms is not selling any more Amphipods for at least another 3 weeks. Anyone else know of another source for these guys?

 

[rrtanton]

Yeah, my tank, if I could catch the little buggers! :?

Sorry...I had to try pretty hard just to find that store. Hopefully someone else has an idea...or if someone DOES know how to trap decent quantities of them in a tank...

rusty

 

[Nancy]

There is a source for amphipods listed under Buy,Sell,Trade (see the Forum Index for Buy,Sell,Trade, then look under Octopets' posting)

Nancy

 

[rc]

i am preparing a 55 for an octo right now, i was thinking of getting the clams for sale by octopets but i read somewhere that they were not a good choice for octo food, anybody have any info on this?

 

[Nancy]

I have heard that some of the tank-raised baby octopuses are fed on baby clams, but have not verified this.

Not all octos will eat clams - bimacs eat scallops and mussels in the wild, and they love shrimp and crabs. Some owners have reported their young octos will kill and eat clams, others not.

Shrimps are hard to catch - I don't know at what age baby octopuses take on shrimps and crabs, but I had good luck feeding pieces of fresh scallop to my little bimac.

Nancy

 

[shannen74]

FYI, Florida Aqua Farms has amphipods available now, I received some from them on wednesday for my mandarin.

Shannen

 

[rc]

im assuminga are talking about a mandarin goby? i have heard that they can release toxins into the water if they die, is that true?

 

[Colin]

Its more the fact that their skin secretions are poisonous while alive than them being poisonous after death.

so sometimes people get away with keeping them with bigger fish that would normally eat hem but they dont because they taste bad. Bugger is feeding them! :?

 

[shannen74]

Yup, technically mandarins are dragonets. Mine is not in with the octo, she's in with the reef tank. She's still pretty skinny, we got her because she & her boyfriend were a mated pair, but they were both malnourished. He didn't make it, but she is getting better. We ordered amphipods and the amphipod starter kit from www.ipsf.com/ as well as amphipods from florida aqua farms, 'cause we were in such a rush to get food for 'em. If I was doing it again, I'd only order from florida aqua farms. They are muuuuuch cheaper because they ship 2 day ground without the styro cooler (they packed their water bags in insulation!).

Shannen