HouseDJSTL
Premium Member
Anyone have some info or a link on how to breed brine shrimp?
Thanks!
-Jeremy
Thanks!
-Jeremy
Breeding Brine Shrimp....
- Thread starter HouseDJSTL
- Start date
DARKSILENTTYPE
New member
I am just researching breeding brine too. I do not have seahorses but am about to get a coral beauty and have heard that they can be hard to acclimate and start eating. I don't know if it is going to be necessary but I want to be prepared with some live food at hand ;-)
Thank you for the suggested articles. They contradict each other on the point of salinity. As per Melev:
you add 2 cups tank water and one cup RO water, so it makes SG around 1.018; which is significantly lower that what we keep our tanks at.
The Aquarticles Article recommends 1.022 - 1.026 which is pretty much regular salinity.
Which is right? This last article says you could breed them to adulthood into a tank. I was wondering if I could save myself the whole hatchery thing and just breed them into my quarantine tank. I have a fish trap installed in it (Item # CD-12890 on www.drsfostersmith.com) and I hoped to breed the eggs there all the way. Is this possible and how to do it right??
__________________
In this business, only BAD things happen FAST.
Hobby Experience: 3 months
Current Tanks: 26 bow (FOWLR)
Interests: Each and every one of my Fish; film, literature, psychology
Thank you for the suggested articles. They contradict each other on the point of salinity. As per Melev:
you add 2 cups tank water and one cup RO water, so it makes SG around 1.018; which is significantly lower that what we keep our tanks at.
The Aquarticles Article recommends 1.022 - 1.026 which is pretty much regular salinity.
Which is right? This last article says you could breed them to adulthood into a tank. I was wondering if I could save myself the whole hatchery thing and just breed them into my quarantine tank. I have a fish trap installed in it (Item # CD-12890 on www.drsfostersmith.com) and I hoped to breed the eggs there all the way. Is this possible and how to do it right??
__________________
In this business, only BAD things happen FAST.
Hobby Experience: 3 months
Current Tanks: 26 bow (FOWLR)
Interests: Each and every one of my Fish; film, literature, psychology
Hmm, breeding and hatching are two different things. I know nothing about breeding them, but I can wax eloquent on hatching.
People who hatch these little gems everyday use lower salinity than we use in our reef tanks, because normal seawater salinity is not necessary, and if you do it a lot, ya got to use a lot of salt, and we are all too cheap.
In fact, you can use the same low salinity water day after day as long as you rinse the hatched shrimp before feeding.
Which brings me to another important point: When these guys hatch they release a lot of nasty things in the water, which, while it doesn't bother them, it will bother the critters in your reef tank, or fish tank etc. Don't hatch them in the sump, the hang on filter, or the coral beauty tank. Hatch them in a hatcher, and rinse before feeding to your precious pets. A plastic coffee filter works very nicely to capture the newly hatched shrimp and allow you to rinse them with fresh saltwater. Merely backwash the tiny gems into your tank. Everything loves them. I routinely hatch more than I can use for my babies, so I can give a treat to the larger fish and the corals in my tank.
Decapsulated brine shrimp cysts (eggs) have the outer shell oxidized away. That is why they hatch faster. It is not necessary to siphon them from the hatcher. Merely pour them into the filter, rinse and serve. There are no capsules to float on top. The unhatched ones stick to the sides of the hatcher. One should avoid trying to get them in the filter, but it is a simple process. I decapsulate them myself, because I use a lot, and baby clownfish can choke on the cycst shells if ingested.
If you don't decapsulate, then the settling and careful siphoning of the newly hatched harvest is required.
ALWAYS RINSE THE BRINE SHRIMP BEFORE FEEDING. Sorry to shout, but I don't want anyone to miss this message.
Brine shrimp can be grown out in a small tank if you wish, they should do fine as long as you feed them. I have no experience there, but I suppose any fish food will do. Before you feed them to your fish, however, you should enrich the brine shrimp with something nutritious for the fish, because grown shrimp alone are nutrient poor. They have been compared to potato chips. Clowns love them, but they don't do much for the clown. Spirulina is a fine food to enrich them. I suppose if you keep growing them they will breed in the tank as other shrimp will, but I have no experience with this.
Brine shrimp eggs are cheap from Brine Shrimp Direct, so I just keep a hatchin'. They sell hatchers, too, or you can make your own.
Probably you will not need to do this at all. Coral Beautys from a reputable store will eat frozen or flake food. Make sure it is eating at the store before you buy it. Take it home right away and acclimate it properly, and you should have no problem. Mine did fine from the get go.
Good luck,
Kathy
Kathy!!
This is the most meaningful reply I've received to any of my posts till now!
I learned soooo much!
As of now, I sincerely believe you are a Genius
(certainly in hatching ;-)
How do you decapsulate the eggs?
Do they sell them decapsulated?
Thank you also for your encouragement with the coral beauty. It is just that the LFS person said, I should probably gain some more experience before getting one, bcs it could be difficult to adjust. I don't have reef (FOWLR only) and he said those fish did better with reef.
This is the most meaningful reply I've received to any of my posts till now!
I learned soooo much!
As of now, I sincerely believe you are a Genius
(certainly in hatching ;-)
How do you decapsulate the eggs?
Do they sell them decapsulated?
Thank you also for your encouragement with the coral beauty. It is just that the LFS person said, I should probably gain some more experience before getting one, bcs it could be difficult to adjust. I don't have reef (FOWLR only) and he said those fish did better with reef.
Hi Depth,
I am flattered, but I'm afraid I don't share your belief in my intellect, although I do try to convince my kids of that particular myth. This is so that, when I become totally stupid in the next few years, the fall will not be so hard. My kids are 10 and 13.
Angels do not need a reef. FOWLR will be perfectly fine, althought they do like to pick at the pods and algae on the rock, and 3 months is not a long time to let the populations grow. Hence your LFS recommendation to grow brine shrimp.
Just to clarify the language part, breeding is the act of sexual reproduction, and rearing or raising is what you do to get them to adulthood. I know it can be done fairly simply, but I don't have a need to do that. I neither breed brine shrimp nor raise them, I just decasulate and hatch the cysts. Occasionally enrich. That's it.
Good luck again to you, and by the way, coral beautys are aptly named, they are second only to clownfish in my mind.
Cheers,
Kathy
ps. I had a hard time finding that article. The link does not work, and the website has no search function. I looked thru a lot of freshwater articles before I found the one you are speaking of.
I am flattered, but I'm afraid I don't share your belief in my intellect, although I do try to convince my kids of that particular myth. This is so that, when I become totally stupid in the next few years, the fall will not be so hard. My kids are 10 and 13.
Angels do not need a reef. FOWLR will be perfectly fine, althought they do like to pick at the pods and algae on the rock, and 3 months is not a long time to let the populations grow. Hence your LFS recommendation to grow brine shrimp.
Just to clarify the language part, breeding is the act of sexual reproduction, and rearing or raising is what you do to get them to adulthood. I know it can be done fairly simply, but I don't have a need to do that. I neither breed brine shrimp nor raise them, I just decasulate and hatch the cysts. Occasionally enrich. That's it.
Good luck again to you, and by the way, coral beautys are aptly named, they are second only to clownfish in my mind.
Cheers,
Kathy
ps. I had a hard time finding that article. The link does not work, and the website has no search function. I looked thru a lot of freshwater articles before I found the one you are speaking of.
Sorry for your hard time with the article. I hope you liked it. May be one day in the future you'll grow up to growing brine ;-)
*
So how do you decapsulate?
*
My LFS never recommended hatching.
I thought it would help since coral beauties have trouble beginning to feed.
Now I read that it'd be good if I seeded the sand with copepods, amphipods, bristle worms, spaghetti worms, or miniature serpent starfish.
Do you know where can I get those creatures and what sand would be best?
Eternal graitutde, Depth
*
So how do you decapsulate?
*
My LFS never recommended hatching.
I thought it would help since coral beauties have trouble beginning to feed.
Now I read that it'd be good if I seeded the sand with copepods, amphipods, bristle worms, spaghetti worms, or miniature serpent starfish.
Do you know where can I get those creatures and what sand would be best?
Eternal graitutde, Depth
Kathy!
I was so thrilled by your article that copied it to another thread where people had unanswered questions about brine.
One member, RayJay, has replied to your comments, so I thought you have to know!!
The thread is at http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=7706432#post7706432
Here is a copy of his reply as well (in case you can't open the thread) THANK YOU AGAIN!!!!
You can hatch out the brine at just about any s.g. you wish between 1.010 and up even above 1.040. They will hatch out faster at the lower s.g. though.
I only have one dissagreement with Kathy's statement and that's regarding the erronious part about live adult brine nutrition.
Great salt lake brine shrimp produced in grow out systems for aquaculture have a protein level running between 49% and 62% and wild brine from GSL have levels just a little higher.
Theses levels can be bettered by gut loading the brine shrimp.
Newborn nauplii are low in protein but rich in the fatty acids, but quickly loose the high levels of huffa content while protein levels increase for juveniles and adults.
If you are looking to feed the fatty acids, it's best to feed them to the target right after hatchout which varies with temperature, salinity and whether or not they have been decapsulated.
The figures for protein level come from the United Nations article on Live Foods for the Aquaculture Industry, edited by scientists from the Artemia Research Center at the University of Ghent. It is in section 4.4.1
This article is the most complete article I've ever found on Brine Shrimp and is part of a larger article including rotifers, phyto and other live foods.
CLICK HERE AND SCROLL DOWN TO SECTION 4.0
While brine shrimp can live at s.g. from a bit below 1.010 up to almost saturated solutions, I found best results in my grow out operations to be at normal salt water levels in the 1.025, at temperatures of 80F.
Because brine shrimp eat small particles in suspension in the water, its best to use phytoplankton where possible, with cryopastes second best. However, they will eat pretty well anything that is appropriately sized.
Grow out of brine shrimp can be easy, for low density cultures, and progressively harder and more labour intensive as the culture density increases.
It's best if you can buy them locally already grown out, remembering that they probably haven't been fed properly at the LFS so Gut load them before feeding to the fish.
Anyone interested in reading about my methods can go to my brine shrimp page:
RAISING BRINE SHRIMP TO ADULT
FWIW, I believe the nutrition misconception arose from the fact frozen brine shrimp usually have protein contents on the packages listed as a percentage of "wet" weight, including packaging fluids.
Mysis and other foods have protein contents listed as a percentage of "dry" weight. No fluids.
Mysis still have a slight edge when both are compared in "dry" weight percentages, but mysis are not as easy to grow and don't propagagate anywhere near as fast, so economically for the aquaculture industry the brine shrimp work out much better.
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This last article teaches you how to breed them to adulthood, so that they start having eggs themselves
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For cysts (eggs) to be produced, conditions have to be worsening as in increasing salinity.
Under normal conditions, the brine will produce live born nauplii.
I was so thrilled by your article that copied it to another thread where people had unanswered questions about brine.
One member, RayJay, has replied to your comments, so I thought you have to know!!
The thread is at http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=7706432#post7706432
Here is a copy of his reply as well (in case you can't open the thread) THANK YOU AGAIN!!!!
You can hatch out the brine at just about any s.g. you wish between 1.010 and up even above 1.040. They will hatch out faster at the lower s.g. though.
I only have one dissagreement with Kathy's statement and that's regarding the erronious part about live adult brine nutrition.
Great salt lake brine shrimp produced in grow out systems for aquaculture have a protein level running between 49% and 62% and wild brine from GSL have levels just a little higher.
Theses levels can be bettered by gut loading the brine shrimp.
Newborn nauplii are low in protein but rich in the fatty acids, but quickly loose the high levels of huffa content while protein levels increase for juveniles and adults.
If you are looking to feed the fatty acids, it's best to feed them to the target right after hatchout which varies with temperature, salinity and whether or not they have been decapsulated.
The figures for protein level come from the United Nations article on Live Foods for the Aquaculture Industry, edited by scientists from the Artemia Research Center at the University of Ghent. It is in section 4.4.1
This article is the most complete article I've ever found on Brine Shrimp and is part of a larger article including rotifers, phyto and other live foods.
CLICK HERE AND SCROLL DOWN TO SECTION 4.0
While brine shrimp can live at s.g. from a bit below 1.010 up to almost saturated solutions, I found best results in my grow out operations to be at normal salt water levels in the 1.025, at temperatures of 80F.
Because brine shrimp eat small particles in suspension in the water, its best to use phytoplankton where possible, with cryopastes second best. However, they will eat pretty well anything that is appropriately sized.
Grow out of brine shrimp can be easy, for low density cultures, and progressively harder and more labour intensive as the culture density increases.
It's best if you can buy them locally already grown out, remembering that they probably haven't been fed properly at the LFS so Gut load them before feeding to the fish.
Anyone interested in reading about my methods can go to my brine shrimp page:
RAISING BRINE SHRIMP TO ADULT
FWIW, I believe the nutrition misconception arose from the fact frozen brine shrimp usually have protein contents on the packages listed as a percentage of "wet" weight, including packaging fluids.
Mysis and other foods have protein contents listed as a percentage of "dry" weight. No fluids.
Mysis still have a slight edge when both are compared in "dry" weight percentages, but mysis are not as easy to grow and don't propagagate anywhere near as fast, so economically for the aquaculture industry the brine shrimp work out much better.
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This last article teaches you how to breed them to adulthood, so that they start having eggs themselves
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For cysts (eggs) to be produced, conditions have to be worsening as in increasing salinity.
Under normal conditions, the brine will produce live born nauplii.
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