Peristaltic pump feeding system

[Sammy]

Anyone have a peristaltic (dosing) pump on a timer to feed infusoria/ paramecium to nano fish fry? 

My paramecium tank is above my Ricefish, CPD & Emerald dwarf rasboras fry tanks. I started to just use a siphon hose setup with valves but it is still time consuming to get the right amount of feed at consistent times.

Would a DIY dosing pump be possible? Does anyone have a setup like that? I have a solar/ battery bank setup for power outages for air pumps but I'm not sure where/ how to hook these up for regular use.

Any pics or places that I could get a start with?

[Rube_Goldfish]

On 7/5/2024 at 8:59 AM, Sammy said:

Anyone have a peristaltic (dosing) pump on a timer to feed infusoria/ paramecium to nano fish fry? 

My paramecium tank is above my Ricefish, CPD & Emerald dwarf rasboras fry tanks. I started to just use a siphon hose setup with valves but it is still time consuming to get the right amount of feed at consistent times.

Would a DIY dosing pump be possible? Does anyone have a setup like that? I have a solar/ battery bank setup for power outages for air pumps but I'm not sure where/ how to hook these up for regular use.

Any pics or places that I could get a start with?

This sounds like a cool project! I have no experience with any of this, so I'm afraid I won't be much help.

My immediate thought, though, is fertilizer auto-dosers. Since infusoria/paramecia are so small, I think they shouldn't clog up the nozzle, but I'm just spitballing. It might require more frequent cleaning, since you'd be using it "off-label".

[rgb_aquarium]

I thought about this idea but never test it out because I feel like there is no need. The fishes I am currently keeping doesn't need paramecium constantly. But if you should try using an automatic water plant watering system.  People use it to water their houseplant indoor. It run on battery and you can set timer.

[Sammy]

On 7/5/2024 at 8:28 AM, Rube_Goldfish said:

This sounds like a cool project! I have no experience with any of this, so I'm afraid I won't be much help.

My immediate thought, though, is fertilizer auto-dosers. Since infusoria/paramecia are so small, I think they shouldn't clog up the nozzle, but I'm just spitballing. It might require more frequent cleaning, since you'd be using it "off-label".

I would likely use open-ended tubing as I THINK the pump rollers would seal it off enough so as not to siphon out the entire tank of paramecium above the grow out tanks. Daisy's Ricefish fry are hard to get past their 3rd week- they're prolific breeders but I would like to get more past the micro-fry stage, currently a bit better than 50%. 

200 fry eat a LOT 😲

[Sammy]

On 7/5/2024 at 6:54 PM, rgb_aquarium said:

I thought about this idea but never test it out because I feel like there is no need. The fishes I am currently keeping doesn't need paramecium constantly. But if you should try using an automatic water plant watering system.  People use it to water their houseplant indoor. It run on battery and you can set timer.

Right! I forgot about those! 

Hope I can find one that can run with the source above the pump. My wife had one once but it must have the water source level or below the pump because they are impeller driven and don't stop flow.

Thanks for the reminder!

[Phirefase]

KeepingFishSimple did a system like this. I have thought about doing something like this or taking a ziss brine shrimp hatcher and putting microfoods in the hatcher and drip it into a fry tray.

 

[tolstoy21]

I’ve been considering trying something like this for some time now as I have one of these sitting around unused for a bunch of years now.   https://www.amazon.com/Jebao-Programmable-Auto-Dosing-DP-4/dp/B014KKCILE

i don’t think the source can sit above it, but honestly never tried. 

[Sammy]

On 7/8/2024 at 9:46 AM, Phirefase said:

KeepingFishSimple did a system like this. I have thought about doing something like this or taking a ziss brine shrimp hatcher and putting microfoods in the hatcher and drip it into a fry tray.

 

Thanks for that video! 

Exactly the direction I was going!

I do want to try to keep it on my 12v battery bank but I can always figure that out later.

As I use 5 gal carboys for green water, paramecium and daphnia cultures, I'll just have to experiment a bit to get the volumes right. Daphnia are not going to be fed via the pumps, it's too easy to put a bunch in every day as they just cruise around feeding until they get eaten. But the feed lines can be moved according to food size required by the fry size in the different tanks.

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

@Sammy I run a 1.1 ML per minute doser pump ( .037 oz / min) to run paramecium aurelia for spotted congo fry. They take 14 + days to graduate to bbs size. I have a day job and they need frequent feeding for those 2 weeks. Necessity became the mother of invention there. I can add pictures tonight once I'm back to the fishroom. 

My set up is a 1/2 gallon wide mouthed mason jar with distilled water, a +/- 4" version of the normal aquarium plant pots. That size pot sits inside the jar perfectly.  I boil wheat berries and put those in a mesh to hold the food within the basket. the berries and a little yeast to make the system work and produce paramecium here.

My version stays close to the tank so that the aquarium light is above it and attracts the paramecium. For me the light and the food location help to concentrate the paramecium by the intake black COOP airline tubing. 

When the doser runs it pulls a higher concentration of paramecium around 3" below the surface of the container and avoids the junk that settles on the bottom of the jar. Kasa timer is how I run mine. 3 minutes every 6 hours (+/- .135 oz per feeding). I top off the culture with distilled water every evening and rotate out the berries as the water clears fully.  

For me, A flow through fry tray is the best option for this method. A  ziss breeder box or breeding ring could also work decently. The water volume in those set ups helps me to dilute the culture water that carries the paramecium to the fry. I prefer the trays for this stage of food because the mesh in the breeder box and the german breeding ring lets a little more food out and away from the fry than the solid bottom trays do. 

@tolstoy21 i think the source  can be above the doser depending on the design. I believe they are generally designed to not siphon/ back siphon but still hold fluid in the tubing. The one i use kind of kneads the tubing to create the suction and movement of the fluid. It keeps the tubing pinched within the doser at all times and move the pinch clockwise as it runs. 

[tolstoy21]

On 7/12/2024 at 9:27 AM, mountaintoppufferkeeper said:

i think the source  can be above the doser depending on the design. I believe they are generally designed to not siphon/ back siphon but still hold fluid in the tubing. The one i use kind of kneads the tubing to create the suction and movement of the fluid. It keeps the tubing pinched within the doser at all times and move the pinch clockwise as it runs. 

Thanks for the info.

I believe that is how the model I have works, at least I know it prevents back flow the majority of time (I used to run this to dose ferts a while back).In the end, being above or below works for me.  

I was planning on testing this all a bit this summer as I might have to 'go back to the office' part time (ugh) in September. Having a reliable drip for things like tetra fry will certainly (hopefully) help. I've been meaning to do this since Nick at Keeping Fisj Simple posted that video a while back.

@Sammy I would imagine as long as you strain the paramecium culture through a sieve to remove any of the goopy stuff that forms, and the wheat berries or whatever they are cultured on, would prevent possible clogs.  I tend to sieve my cultures before I'm ready to use them and then put them in one of those squeezable, plastic sports water bottles to make feeding faster and easier. 

Edited July 12 by tolstoy21

[mountaintoppufferkeeper]

Took a minute. Im not feeding paramecium currently.so just run it as air at the moment. The intake airline would go lower and into the paramecium. the end one bubbling would go to the fry tray and run a drip into it. 

The pump

Top: 

food goes in the netting in the basket. A coarse sponge plugs the top to keep bugs out.

Food

[Sammy]

Thanks so much @mountaintoppufferkeeper, @tolstoy21 & @Phirefase

This is exactly the information I was looking for. 

Currently, I suspend the wheat berries and rice bran with yeast wrapped in a cheesecloth in a black aquatic plant holder that is kept floating by closed cell foam. I think I'll use my 1 gallon jugs for feed supplies and top them off with the paramecium stock & water from the big carboy jugs (my wife suggested I have them drilled near the bottom and insert a bulkhead valve for easy filling.

I use a Marina/ Fluval external breeding box to drip aerated water into the box, the outflow goes into the grow out tank. I think I'll continue to feed the nano fry in it as they're already set up. 

Once I get a test system going and regulated, I'll give it a test run on the CPD fry first as I get 200 a week with the egg harvesters on the parent's tank (runs beautifully while I'm gone to work for a week).

Huge Kudos to Nick at Keeping Fish Simple... I've watched a lot of his videos but never saw that one. Big thanks to @Phirefase for that. 

I LOVE the ACO brain hive!