phytoplankton culture experiment

after about 3 days my first batch of phytoplankton crashed and i had to throw it out. i tried another batch (LEFT) that same day and within 24 hours i had dark dense chunks settling at the bottom, which is one of the first signs of a crash. the first two batches were made with a warm water saline solution like the kind i used for hatching my brine shrimp cysts while my latest culture (RIGHT) was made with a cold water solution. i figure since the phyto-feast lived in the fridge the warm water was probably scorching and shocking the poor little phytoplankton. either that or my live phyto-feast is really old and is probably all dead. i guess we'll see how it holds up. so far so good!

UPDATE: 2013-04-30 

i ended up throwing out my second batch (LEFT) and starting over with a cold water solution.   sadly, both are starting to go translucent after only about 48 hours.  i started a thread on reef central to enlist the help and advice of others and they're saying i may be better off trying an isolated species as reef nutrition's photo-feast is a mixed bag. luckily, i had gotten fed up with all the failed experiments and ordered some photo-food formulation and a nanno culture from aqua farm nursery DOT com off of eBay the day before! i'll keep you posted how it goes...

ps: i make sure my culture vessels have plenty of aeration via my little DIY air bubble lasso! :)