Nematode Culture Starters

Micro Worm - Banana Worm - Walter Worm

The walter worm is much smaller (about half the size ) than its cousin the micro worm and is a perfect first food for very small fry. Walter worms were first isolated and cultured by Helmut Walter of Germany in 2002, and were introduced to California aquarists when he visited there that same year. Walter worms can stay alive in the tank for 24 hours or more and float in the water column longer than their larger cousins which gives your fry longer to find them.

Banana worms are a relatively newly acquired worm similar to the walter worms but apparently more prolific. My current strain in fact are almost scary in terms of population doubling time. They are also smaller than micro worms and share the wally worm's ability to stay alive in tank water longer than micro worms. After a few days of walter/banana worms, very small fry are able to progress to micro worms and then over the hump to newly hatched brine shrimp. Even newly hatched larger fry like cichlids will benefit immensely from a few days of walter/banana and micro worms.

The micro worm (Panagrellus redivivus) is the larger of the three nematodes commonly used in the hobby as first and second live foods and is on a par with newly hatched baby brine shrimp in terms of vital nutrients and protein, but is much easier to culture and maintain. The ropes on the lid of the culture below are composed of micro worms waiting to be wiped off with a fingertip or knife blade and swished into a tank of hungry fry.

These nematode worms thrive in a simple culture medium of oatmeal enriched with a small sprinkle of active baker's yeast - supplied with your starter. Room temperature up to about 85 F is acceptable, and the worm throw 40 or so young from the their 4th day on. There will ALWAYS be enough worms on hand for all the fry you can produce. Within literally days (some buyers report the same day) of starting your cultures with our large starter portion you will see the surface of your cultures shimmering with millions of worms. The white areas on the sides of the culture below are many thousands of micro worms.

You also get three of my 7ml feeding pipettes

These heavy duty - and most importantly wide barreled - six inch long pipettes are graduated in 1/2 ml increments up the 3ml stem and hold a total of 7ml. They have multiple uses in any fish room or breeding setup. They will come in handy for dispensing medications, transferring fry and eggs (just snip the tip wider with a pair of scissors), delivering small foods right to the fry that need them without spreading them all over the tank, and a whole host of other applications.