Adding scuds- bad plan?

14629 Views 18 Replies 10 Participants Last post by Canmanak, Jan 30, 2021

Betta132

Discussion Starter · Apr 24, 2014

I'd like to establish a colony of scuds in my 65g to provide food for my fish. Mostly I just have tetras and pencilfish, though there are some checkerboard chiclids, a female betta, and a hovering goby from Sulawesi (no clue what kind).
The tank is lightly planted with aubias and java fern. Would the scuds eat it all up? There are 20-ish fish, mostly pencils, and I'm going to add more soon.
What I'm hoping for is a colony of scuds that will last without going out of control and causing lots of damage to my plants and/or bothering fish.
Also, do they bother snails? I have a few nerite snails in there, ones that I want to keep.

1 - 19 of 19 Posts

sbarbee54

· #2 · Apr 25, 2014

They might try and eat the snails if there is not much food. Also make sure the fish will eat them tetras probably wont.touch them. To big for their mouth. They might pick at them but not be able.to eat them

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Betta132

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 25, 2014

Are there smaller scuds?
Do you think a female betta, a goby, and 5 checkerboard chichlids would be enough to keep them under control? 4 of the checkerboards are still babies...
Maybe some other kind of bug-critter that will breed in the tank and be good tetra-type fish food?

Art by Stef*

· #4 · Apr 25, 2014

Beeeeewwwwaaaarrrrreeeeee........
I tried the scud dealio for betta enrichment treats and it was a disaster. They ate everything in sight-snails, plants, and each other.

For cheap, easy access supplemental live food, just put a cup of water outside for a couple days and you will have plenty of mosquito wrigglers that almost all fish enjoy and are nutritional. ( Unless you live in the North Pole or something, which I believe they are even found there.)

-Stef*
After the warmer months are over, I'd check out another live alternative, but not scuds.
Just my experience with those lil bastards. First I thought they'd never multiple as a food source, never saw them, then I had to nuke the tank to get rid of them.

cjstl

· #5 · Apr 25, 2014

I have tons of tiny creatures in my shrimp tanks. Nematodes, planaria, seed shrimp, daphnia. Just buy some plants from one of the major online sellers and let them sit in an undisturbed tank for a while and see what you get. I don't see many in my fish tanks because the fish keep the numbers down. But they're everywhere in my other tanks, bowls, etc.

cjstl

· #6 · Apr 25, 2014

And nematodes are gross. Nothing ruins shrimp-watching more than a bunch of white, wriggling worms...

orhunterfisher

· #7 · Apr 25, 2014

Art by Stef* said:
Beeeeewwwwaaaarrrrreeeeee........
I tried the scud dealio for betta enrichment treats and it was a disaster. They ate everything in sight-snails, plants, and each other.

For cheap, easy access supplemental live food, just put a cup of water outside for a couple days and you will have plenty of mosquito wrigglers that almost all fish enjoy and are nutritional. ( Unless you live in the North Pole or something, which I believe they are even found there.)

-Stef*
After the warmer months are over, I'd check out another live alternative, but not scuds.
Just my experience with those lil bastards. First I thought they'd never multiple as a food source, never saw them, then I had to nuke the tank to get rid of them.

+1 Agree with Steff and Steve
BAD IDEA

I found them to be a pest in artificial habitats. The mosquito larva are great but if you are going to go through the trouble of doing that, you might as well buy a bag of daphnia and drop them in as well. You will get both daphnia and mosquito larva

Betta132

Discussion Starter · #8 · Apr 25, 2014

I've been doing the 'skeeter wrigglers thing, but I'm looking for something that will actually multiply in the tank.
Do you suppose daphnia will do that? There's plenty of leaf litter, so maybe some could manage to hide...

LionelC

· #9 · Apr 25, 2014

I tried to start a scud population in my 55, but between the tiger barbs and the Gulf killifish, they never stood a chance. I tried a couple times, but my fish would wipe them out in no time.

You migh be better off just doing a culture in an old bucket and just feed them perioticaly.

LionelC

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cjstl

· #10 · Apr 25, 2014

Daphnia will multiply, but it would be a good idea to keep a reserve colony going so you'll always have more if the fish wipe them out. I keep mine in a 2G bowl under high light and use MGOCPM to fertilize the algae that they feed on.

thedudeabides

· #11 · Apr 25, 2014

If your want only small ones that the fish can eat in your tank use a floating breeding box and put them in there with some moss. The adults can't get out and will breed in there and only the little guys will escape and be eaten. This might not work for all scud sizes. Also works for large daphnia like magna that way you can have your culture right in the tank with little maintenance.

I do this and when I want to show off the tank just remove the breeder box and put it in a bucket of water temporarily.

I have read about the horrors of scuds in planted aquariums but I have never had a problem with them.

cjstl

· #12 · Apr 25, 2014

thedudeabides said:
If your want only small ones that the fish can eat in your tank use a floating breeding box and put them in there with some moss. The adults can't get out and will breed in there and only the little guys will escape and be eaten. This might not work for all scud sizes. Also works for large daphnia like magna that way you can have your culture right in the tank with little maintenance.

I do this and when I want to show off the tank just remove the breeder box and put it in a bucket of water temporarily.

I have read about the horrors of scuds in planted aquariums but I have never had a problem with them.

That is a really good idea. And if you don't want to have a floating box in your tank, Marina and Finnex make HOB breeder boxes. You can either slowly pump water into them using an air pump, or hook them to a pump or in-tank filter to feed water through. I have the medium marina box and feed water through it from a Rio 90 internal filter. The standard grates are a little big, but it is easy to add a small piece of screen or something similar to keep the big guys from flowing back into the tank. I have mine on my 29G right now. I just recently cleaned it out, added Flourite black sand capped with white play sand, and planted it with DHG. Extra filtration and a place to put injured fish if need be, but I might try something like this. My bowl full of daphnia and seed shrimp is out in the garage because my wife was tired of looking at it. She wouldn't notice if I put them in the breeder box

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Mirkinator

· #13 · Apr 25, 2014

I have a 10gal I use to keep all kinds of live foods. Has Scuds (gammarus), 5 kinds of snails, daphnia, and all kinds of critters with a bunch of plants. In the 3 planted tanks I put them in I have never seen an issue. Never seen them touch a snail and they tend to like dead plants and algae wafers.

Cant say Ive ever seen one live in my other tanks past a few days, my fishes always get them...

thedudeabides

· #14 · Apr 25, 2014

cjstl said:
That is a really good idea. And if you don't want to have a floating box in your tank, Marina and Finnex make HOB breeder boxes. You can either slowly pump water into them using an air pump, or hook them to a pump or in-tank filter to feed water through. I have the medium marina box and feed water through it from a Rio 90 internal filter. The standard grates are a little big, but it is easy to add a small piece of screen or something similar to keep the big guys from flowing back into the tank. I have mine on my 29G right now. I just recently cleaned it out, added Flourite black sand capped with white play sand, and planted it with DHG. Extra filtration and a place to put injured fish if need be, but I might try something like this. My bowl full of daphnia and seed shrimp is out in the garage because my wife was tired of looking at it. She wouldn't notice if I put them in the breeder box

Yeah I have the same deal, my wife has limited me to one aquarium but she didn't say anything about breeder boxes

Also good for raising fry if you only have one aquarium.

Betta132

Discussion Starter · #15 · Apr 25, 2014

thedudeabides said:
If your want only small ones that the fish can eat in your tank use a floating breeding box and put them in there with some moss. The adults can't get out and will breed in there and only the little guys will escape and be eaten. This might not work for all scud sizes. Also works for large daphnia like magna that way you can have your culture right in the tank with little maintenance.

I do this and when I want to show off the tank just remove the breeder box and put it in a bucket of water temporarily.

I have read about the horrors of scuds in planted aquariums but I have never had a problem with them.

That is genius. Am now doing it.

lostraindrop

· #16 · Apr 26, 2014

I have scuds in my 10g RCS aquarium, everything is so clean because of them, they got rid of my hair algae problem that i couldnt get rid of any other way. Multiplies like crazy. To control their population I have 1 African dwarf frog. That little bugger cant stop eating them I had to transfer him back out. I'll put him back in if the scuds start doing something i don't like. Personally, I like em.

Betta132

Discussion Starter · #17 · Apr 26, 2014

Doesn't the frog go after your shrimp?

I made a little 1"X6" box out of a spare mesh divider and set it up with some hornwort inside as scud food. Found a half dozen or so in a handful of plants I got from a local lake, and they're now in the box. Let's see if they breed for me!

lostraindrop

· #18 · Apr 26, 2014

Betta132 said:
Doesn't the frog go after your shrimp?

the RCS? nope, not the adult ones atleast, just the baby shrimps. And I have a tank for baby shrimps.

I have nerite snails too, btw. and my scuds (gammarus shrimps) dont bother them.

Canmanak

· #19 · Jan 30, 2021

lostraindrop said:
I have scuds in my 10g RCS aquarium, everything is so clean because of them, they got rid of my hair algae problem that i couldnt get rid of any other way. Multiplies like crazy. To control their population I have 1 African dwarf frog. That little bugger cant stop eating them I had to transfer him back out. I'll put him back in if the scuds start doing something i don't like. Personally, I like em.

This is awesome! I have scuds out in the pond I can get as soon as the ice clears. I have 4 African dwarf frogs in a Planted frog tank with with a couple of corys and plecos.
Thanks for the post.

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