I have Daphnia magna culture maintained in natural spring water medium and fed by Chlorella vulgaris. I have potentially a fungal contamination in Daphnia mediums that cover medium surface and all side of glass beakers in which daphnia are grabbed and can not swim. There is some bulky and fungal filamentous like structures turning around in the medium. Also If I have used Chlorella for feeding, the medium turn to very turbid and lead to cause of dead of all daphnids in beakers.
I tried to use autoclaved natural medium (sieved through 0,45), and beakers with a new population purchased, but it going to be happening again. Additionally, I have used Adam medium, but it turned to turbid and kill all the daphniads again.
If it is not a Murphy rule please help !!
Hi Murat,
that's tricky. I have/had fungal contaminations as well in my Daphnia cultures but it wasn't that severe and didn't kill my animals. We could decrease the intensity by exchanging media regularly and autoclaving the beakers. But it's difficult to get rid of it once it's there and you have tried quite a bit already.
You could try raising some cultures in pure tap water for while (make sure you use water from copper free pipes). The fungus might not be able to grow in there (at least that seemed to be the case for us). Also, have you checked if maybe your Chlorella culture is contaminated? If you are not sure you can feed Daphnia for a while with Spirulina (you can get it dried in e.g. pet shops or on the internet).
Best,
Manja
Thanks a lot for your comment. I guess my algae culture was contaminated with an toxic bacteria. Changing all staff for culturing and using new brand ready to use algea saved my daphnia. There is still fungal development but it did not caused problem if I change medium daily. I just wonder that fungal contamination is kind of stress for daphnia, and that culture can be used for epigenetic gene expression experiments.
In Nature daphnias are living together with fungi and bacteria, and algae so stress caused only by special circumstances
hi
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