kent marine phytolplex

[crfish2001]

Anybody use kent marine phytoplex or coral accel with any results or marine snow from two little fishes or is it a waste of money?

 

[Anonymous]

Phytoplex is basically Tahitian Blend cryopaste diluted and in a preservative. Rob Toonen has reported that the plankton cells are essentially pulverized in PhytoPlex but it is unknown as to whether that makes a big difference.

 

[monkeyboy]

Kent just came out with a new red phytoplankton called ChromaPlex, they won't state what species phytoplankton it is in there though. It's red though, so it's definitely different than what is out now. Non-refrigerated.

 

[Anonymous]

We received a sample from Kent last month. I have used it, but that kind of product is somewhat difficult to evaluate in the short term.

If I had to take a wild guess it is Haematococcus pluvialis - or a liquid equivalent of NatuRose and $10 bucks says I'm right

 

[monkeyboy]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by MickAv8r:
<strong>If I had to take a wild guess it is Haematococcus pluvialis - or a liquid equivalent of NatuRose and $10 bucks says I'm right

</strong><hr></blockquote>

My guess was Haematococcus pluvialis also but apparently Mr. Kent won't tell which kind it is because it's "readily available". Thanks Kent!

 

[Anonymous]

Just tried a little spin, I took some Piscine Energetics Mysis and soaked them in Chromaplex to feed to some seahorses. They snapped them up readily. Depending on price it might be a cheaper form of Ocean Rider Vibrance...

 

[monkeyboy]

I've read the article, Rob, and it's been very helpfull. I'm suprised that Mark Weiss didn't want his black powder tested, he couldn't be hiding anything..... could he?

Did you test the black powder? If so could you post the results or will that be an issue w/ Weiss...

 

[Biogeek]

I haven't seen the new Kent product, so I can't comment about it. I did a product comparison of phytoplankton supplements including Phytoplex, Marine Snow and Tahitian Blend, among others. I presented my results at the Western Marine Conference and MACNA last year, and the full write up of the product comparison is in the Fancy Pubs Marine Fish and Reefs Annual 2002 (which should be available in pet shops across the country by now).
The basic results of the tests were that live phytoplankton was generally the best performer if you can easily obtain it. Marine Snow appeared to be too dilute at the recommended feeding dose to be a significant source of nutrition for small zooplankton in a reef aquarium. Kent's Phytoplex performed significantly better than Marine Snow, but not as well as DT's Live Phytoplankton or Liquid Life USA's Bioplankton. With the exception Black Powder (which Marc Weiss asked be removed from the feeding trials), the information and results of all the feeding tests we performed with the various plankton food products available on the market at the time are all presented in the Annual article.
Rather than repeat it all here, I'll suggest that you pick up the magazine and read the article

Rob