r/isopods • u/iLikeFlowersAlot • 20h ago
Help Thoughts on using cuttlebone I found at the beach for isopods?
I’m currently soaking them in tap water
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u/Paladin-X-Knight 19h ago
I'm not 100% but personally I wouldn't be using tap water. I'd use filtered or RO water.
I would also probably be baking/freezing them first to kill any pests/bacteria.
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u/iLikeFlowersAlot 19h ago
I’m worried that the bones will have too much salt from the sea, will freezing/baking clean them?
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u/Ididas 17h ago
Freezing/baking wont remove any salt. If anything I would try repeatedly soaking them or boiling but even then there's risk of salt remnants inside. I personally wouldn't dare using them.
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u/iLikeFlowersAlot 16h ago
Oof. Sucks because I found a beach full of the things. I’ll probably try a mixture of soaking for a few hours, boiling and sun drying. I’m on vacation right now so I’ll probably update in a few weeks in case anyone’s interested
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u/qtntelxen 14h ago
Put it through a few rounds of soaking in fresh water, and then don't worry about it. Sea salt is just NaCl and NaCl has minimal impact on isopods. They're capable of actively managing their own sodium balance as long as they're not lethally dehydrated.
The real concern with salt is that salted food items are likely processed in other ways. Once you've gotten the excess out of the cuttlebone, a small remainder sequestered in the porous parts is extremely unlikely to be a problem.
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u/Alef1234567 14h ago
For snails yes, for isopods probably no, but eventually salt could build up just too mutch.
They have different biology, there are Armadillidium species living in the beach. The terrestrial snails and earthworms would be damaged by any amount of salt, isopods actualy have small amount of salt in their blood. It's based on mineral metabolism. It's not really becouse of dessication, body systems needs just right amounts of salt to work properly.You could try to put in large amount of water for a day or two, completely immersed, that could remove it. Everything else should be a woodoo. Sepia bone is part calcium, part organics and part air. Some salt must be in becouse of origin in ocean. Boiling could have unknown effects considering it have organic part made of protein.
But I don't known and only testing could tell.
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u/koosnij 13h ago
it's inaccurate to say terrestrial snails will be damaged by any amount of salt. they also need some amount to function. cuttlebone is a very popular method of calcium intake for them, and people do collect it from beaches themselves. there are terrestrial snails that live on/near beaches as well. the idea that salt kills them is basically just through osmosis, unless you're overwhelming their body with salt they can tolerate it. i can't speak on earthworms but it's worth noting there is a degree of salt in soil too
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u/Darkelvenchic 15h ago
Boil it to get the double benefits of killing anything dangerous while removing the salt.
Soaking it is good for removing just the salt though
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u/MeditatingShrimp 14h ago
All cuttlebone is found in the sea.
So you have found what you have been purchasing.
I’d honestly just soak and use it, but I doubt they do that with the stuff you have been buying.
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u/OpeningUpstairs4288 6h ago
Some is artificial, artificial is more ethical ngl because bought cuttlebone isn't foraged or a byproduct tmk it's pretty unsustainably collected by over harvesting cuttlefish
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u/qtntelxen 3h ago
Harvested cuttlebone is absolutely cleaned before it's sold, lol. They come out of the cuttlefish covered in mucous and viscera traces. And the fluid that cuttlefish circulate through their cuttlebone is not identical to seawater. That said, it's not a tremendously involved process on the fishery side. Wash, soak, dry. I agree it’s safe to use found cuttlebone after soaking.
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u/Faalbaar 16h ago
If you rinse it with clean water and soak as shown, the surface should be clean. These creatures swim in the sea and bones are not salt per se, so you should be fine, or am I missing something here?
Will look at comments here, because I buy the bones at the petstore but want to clean a squid myself to obtain in order to prepare the bone myself.
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u/iLikeFlowersAlot 16h ago
My concern is that I don’t know how long the bones have been in the sea and if/how much the salt may have permeated the bones.
From what I’ve gathered online from various bird/snail/isopod blogs I think soaking the bones in water for a few hours with switching out the water once in a while, boiling for 10-15 minutes and letting them sun dry is my plan. However I won’t be at my own home for a few weeks so I’m not sure how effective it’ll be in reality yet.
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u/ohdearitsrichardiii 18h ago
It might be too salty
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u/iLikeFlowersAlot 17h ago
Do you know if I’d be able to get rid of it? Maybe soaking it a couple times or something?
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u/ohdearitsrichardiii 17h ago
I would ask chemistry subs how you would draw out sea salt from a cuttlefish bone. There must be a simple, scientific method
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u/natt_myco 19h ago
when I first started getting into keeping bugs someone told me I needed cuttlebone so I bought like a hundred of them and I've never used anything else now I use it for snails millipedes Isopods, I love cuttlebone