# Unknown Moss/Copods Gone Wild.....



## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

Can anyone ID this piece of moss for me. I have an emersed tank growing on the back patio and this moss started fairly small and in 2 weeks grew into this mass. Secondly, if anyone knows, I would like to throw it in my shrimp tank where I keep cherry shrimp. Is it safe?

Second question, anyone know how to get rid of copods, or whatever they are called. They are like locusts... I am amazed they don't eat the shrimp. They are in my nano shrimp tank and I have tried all kinds of stuff to get rid of them. I tried the small, innocent tetra trick. I think the baby shrimp must taste better because it did not take him long to figure that out. Those are 2 pieces of blanched squash they are collected on. Sometimes I wait until they cover it and I scoop it out with a brine shrimp net and dump it into my 90 gallon planted where it becomes a free for all with tetras jumping out of the water in the chase. That is fairly entertaining. 

Anyway, thanks for looking. By the way, this moss, like all of the plants in my outdoor planted tank, is exposed to temps in the low 100's almost every day. The tank water often hits about 91-92 degrees in the day and drops to the low 70's at night. Thanks, Darrell


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## scitz (Mar 16, 2004)

Thats crazy. I didn't have that many copepods in my 10g nano reef tank!


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## erijnal (Apr 5, 2006)

holy crap that is nasty! i thought copepods were the teeny period-sized white dots that fly around near the substrate.


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## neonfish3 (Feb 12, 2004)

Hi Darrell,
I'm sure that plant is not a moss. 
It's a Bladderwort! A carnivourous plant!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bladderwort
I think I have the same species in my tank. Its very hard to get rid of. The stems are very fine and break easily making it hard to remove all of it. Mine is growing in my shrimp only tank and dosn't seem to be able to eat the baby shrimp I have. 
Good luck trying to get rid of it. I learned to let it live and try to use it as a 'scaping element simulare to moss. I have mine tied to driftwood, and trim it often.
I don't know what to do about the copeopods, but I've heard they are also VERY hard to get rid of.


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## John N. (Dec 11, 2005)

That's disgusting!

I have no idea what to do about those things, but they look like the gather in groups so maybe you can pick/net them out like we do snails.

Now, excuse me for a second, while I go puke my dinner! 

-John N.


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## lildark185 (Jul 7, 2006)

Aren't copepods good to have in a tank, at least in marine tanks? If you have copepods, you're one step closer to a self sustaining environment.


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## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

Yes, the copods are nasty little guys and they have had a major population explosion in my shrimp tank. As for the moss mystery that's not, bladderwort? You know, I think it snuck into my tanks about 3-4 months ago with some moss that I bought on Aquabid. It never really grew in my regular tanks and then I got the emersed tank going and bam, there it was. I saw little pieces growing and was gone for a week and it had turned on the gas. I think it has been eating ants. I have had ants getting into the tank outside for water source, other bugs, eat the emersed plants I am trying to grow....
Well, maybe I can get rid of the copods by hoping the bladderwort will eat them once they climb in. I am keeping it in my shrimp tank and you can see that here it has been in for a few hours tonight and the cherries are all over it, inside it, etc. Thanks for the comments and observations guys. Darrell


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## wiste (Feb 10, 2006)

copepods == Disgusting?
One person sees an aesthetically displeasing pest and another person sees a source of live food for their fish in other tanks.


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## dhavoc (Mar 17, 2006)

yeah i have the same problem with one of my CRS tanks, they are almost impossible to get rid of but are usually kept in check by fish. but since there are no fish in the CRS tank BOOM they went nuts. they eat mosses to the stem so watch it if the population gets too large. i take a small bunch of java moss and out it in a small net and once or twice a day scoop it out and dump em in another thank with rummy nose, bumble bee gobies and a dwarf puffer. they wipe them out in no time. i set up another CRS tank and did my best to keep them out (rinsing of plants etc) but a few still got in anyway. i scoop them out when ever i see one so i think i may have a chance of wiping them out in that tank. gave up on the other crs tank, and just use them for fish food. one other thing, if they are allowed to, they can get pretty big (4-5 mm) and turn an irridecent blue-gray, but not nice enough to keep me from feeding them to my puffer...


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## scitz (Mar 16, 2004)

I wonder how well a copepod laden ball of moss would ship to pennsylvania. These things would be great to grow in nano tanks and used as a live food culture. I have 2 1 gallon nano cubes I have set up side by side with plants which would work great for this sort of thing.

Copepods in reef tanks is most definately good. One major reason people set up 'refugiums' in their systems in order to use the constant spawning of these copepods as food for corals, as well as for veggie filtration via a species of algae resembling riccia. 

I am facinated by microorganisms and used to watch the copepods and other barely visable critters that filled the water and every possible surface.


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## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

Oh yes, in a reef system they are very important because they burrow around in the sand, all over the live rock and there are some fish which actually specialize in eating them, like the mandarin gobu, that really cool looking psychodelic fish. If they don't have enough copods, they whither away and die. I wish I could put something in the shrimp tank. I thought I had dinged their population when I went after them about a month ago by scooping out the squash when they were all over it. I fed hundreds to my fish, but they have made a serious comeback. There is a guy on Aquabid who sells them by the package of 100. John, how would you like to thousand of these things swarming their food. I am setting up a new tank in about 3-4 weeks and I am going to be taking this one down and moving my shrimp into the new tank. I will be making an all out effort to preclude my little crusty friends. Scitz, if you want some I will start collecting as many as I can for you and see if we could ship succssfully. It doesn't take many to start a colony. Darrell


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## rain- (Dec 16, 2005)

They don't look like copepods, maybe some species of Gammarus or Hyalella, in other words amphipods?


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## Burks (May 25, 2006)

Whatever that moss is, sure is pretty!


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## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

Rain hit it on the jackpot. They are Amphipods. Hyalella azteca, or commonly known as "scuds". We used to tie flyfishing patterns of scuds for flyfishing small lakes and ponds in Colorado. The guy that sells them on Aquabid sells them at $15.00/100. However, he is in Germany so I think there would be this small issue of international shipping. Anyway, I have attached a photo of the 2 pieces of blanched squash that were put in yesterday at 3 PM or so. Scuds are gone, lounging around all over after Thanksgiving dinner. Here's the funny thing, I had been feeding the tank 3-4 pieces of this squash for the past month per week and the scuds were leaving the moss I had all over the tank alone. I quit for a few weeks, just feeding the shrimp Crab Cuisine, so they went crazy and literally stripped every stem of Taiwan and weeping moss I had in the tank. That's when I tried to start the scooping out process. In the one photo you can see a scud in a wall crack next to an almost full grown cherry female. 

As for the moss, I don't know about the Bladderwort. Maybe they are some other kind of bladderwort? It is almost lime green, but that could easily change under the pc tank lights. They don't look anything like the post that Steve sent me yesterday. Any other ideas? It is just floating at the top of the tank and the shrimp are all over it today. It is full of the babies.


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## dhavoc (Mar 17, 2006)

yeah they can get nasty with mosses once their preffered food is no longer available. stripped mine to the bone in no time, even started nibbling on my najas grass but it grows too fast for them to do any real damage. pests yes, but great fishfood. as for starting a breeding colony, all you need are a few (5-10) give them food and BOOM instant infestation.


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## rain- (Dec 16, 2005)

Good to be able to help with the critter species. 

I didn't write anything about the bladderwort in my previous post since it is quite obvious that the beautiful lime green thing in the pictures really is a bladderwort species because of the bladders it has. Utricularia gibba looks a lot like yours, but I am not a bladderwort specialist, so I don't know if there's many similar looking species. But we are definitely talking about a bladderwort species. =)

I really wish I'd have some too. I think bladderworts are really beautiful. [smilie=w:


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## dstephens (Nov 30, 2005)

Just a quick uodate. I have been out of town all week and upon return last night found the amphipods had eaten all of the bladderwort.... These are some nasty little critters when they don't have other stuff to eat. They go through a cycle with regard to population and man,they are all over the fricking tank today. I feed them blanched zucchinni and they are all over it. More later.


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