Maintaining Pods in a Saltwater Aquarium

Have you ever wanted to get a Mandarin Goby or any other Goby for that matter? I bet you heard/read they are hard to keep alive or heard they have a short life span in aquariums. The reason for that is lack of pods, Amphipods and Copepods.

Copepods are a group of small crustaceans found in the sea and nearly every freshwater habitat. Many species are planktonic, but more are benthic, and some continental species may live in limno-terrestrial habitats and other wet terrestrial places, such as swamps, under leaf fall in wet forests, bogs, springs, ephemeral ponds and puddles, damp moss, or water-filled recesses (phytotelmata) of plants such as bromeliads and pitcher plants. Many live underground in marine and freshwater caves, sinkholes, or stream beds. Some copepods are parasitic[1] and attach themselves to fish, sharks, marine mammals, and many kinds of invertebrates such as molluscs, tunicates, or corals.

Amphipoda (amphipods) is an order of animals that includes over 7000 described species of small, shrimp-like crustaceans.

Most amphipods are marine; although a small number of species are limnic or terrestrial. Marine amphipods may be pelagic (living in the water column) or benthic (living on the ocean bottom). Pelagic amphipods are eaten by seabirds, fish, and marine mammals. Terrestrial amphipods such as sand fleas can often be seen amongst sand and pebbles or on beaches.

While some Amphipods and Copepods can be parasitic, most are not, and are on the lower end of the chain. A lot of the Gobie's and Blennies feed on pod's as a main part of the food source. If their belly area is not fat/swollen to the naked eye, then they are not eating as much as the should which can lead to their demise.

How do you know if you have pod's or not?

If you have any liverock, and purchased it as liverock, more then likely you already have them in your tank. They look like little bugs ( see attached photos). If you do not have any that you notice, you can also purchase live pods from various online retailers. Once you get them, you need to know how to get them to thrive in your aquarium. You have to know their needs to successfully maintain them. I have always used what I call "pod mounds".

Pod Mounds

Pod Mounds are nothing more then a pile of rubble. Pods need a place to eat safely and reproduce, the pod mounds do just that. Not to mention a place for your Gobie's and Blennie's to congragate and feed. If you do not have any small live rock pieces like 1/2"-2"s, Im sure you can go to your local fish store and purchase some from the bottom of their liverock tank plus you might even pick up some extra pods from their rubble. While you are at your local fish store, see if you can purchase one feeder shrimp, this will be the food for your pods. Building the Pod Mounds

.First decide on where you are going to build it. Then lay out a small 2-3" base for it with rubble. Next cut off the head of the feeder shrimp, and place it in the middle of the base, be sure to be ready to cover it quickly because other fish will want to try and eat it. Once its covered with rubble, you should be set for a few days. In a week or so, check the piece of shrimp and see if it has been eaten, if so, replace with the rest of the shrimp (be sure to refrigerate the rest of the shrimp after you cut off the head for later use). In a month or so, your Pod Mound should be overrun with pods.

You can also make more then one Pod Mound if needed. Just be sure to run some kind of carbon filtration to help keep the Ammonia/Nitrites/Nitrates down.
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