wild caught-need marine shrimp

[iluvmyfishes]

We struggled against gas bubble disease and parasites, but after 3 months I think she is going to be alright!:fish1: The air bubble is gone. She is definitely feeling better. She does eat a little frozen Mysis, starting to train on feeding dish, and I have ghost shrimp but I really want to find marine feeder shrimp. Does anyone know who has some in stock?

 

[pfan151]

I found these. Haven't ordered yet though. I'm planning to try these when I go on vacation this summer since I don't really have anyone that I would trust to keep my seahorses fed. I'm hoping if I just put 40 or 50 in the tank they will keep my seahorses fed for the 5 days I'll be gone.

(Near the middle of the page)
http://www.livebrineshrimp.com

 

[vlangel]

That is a long time not to have anyone check on them. When I go away I premeasure their mysis in a dixie cup. Then all my fish sitter needs to do is add tank water which thaws the frozen mysis and feed. Then she nets live ghost shrimp and dumps those in before she leaves. Even if you could have someone come in the middle of your trip. It is better to under feed than over feed for sure though.

 

[pfan151]

I'm going to see how they do on the ghost shrimp before leaving. I might get the neighbor to feed mysis once or twice but getting him to come over every day would be tough. Hopefully I'll have them well trained to eat out of the feeding dish by then so he could just shoot the mysis down in the dish.
I'm a little worried that after feeding the ghost shrimp for five days they might not be interested in going back to mysis. Have you had any issues with yours getting stuck on ghost shrimp?

 

[iluvmyfishes]

When I lived on the east coast I collected the glass/white/feeder shrimp that lived in salt water marshes. I added about 10 at a time every few days or so in addition to their twice daily frozen just to give my seahorses live food and something to do. The live shrimp ate the excess frozen so it kept the water cleaner. They also bury in the sand so it helped my sand bed. My seahorses lived over 5 years and always ate frozen from their feeding dish. I really want to find a local supplier, the link above is very expensive for shipping to the west coast.

 

[iluvmyfishes]

Sorry to correct you but ghost shrimp are fresh water and will live for a few hours, not days. The shrimp you want are called either glass/white or marine feeder shrimp. They are like ghost shrimp but live in salt water. I just ordered 300 live mysid shrimp that came today. I am hoping they will reproduce enough in my fuge to provide an ongoing supply of live food. I am hatching brine to feed the mysid, I also have ghost shrimp that I throw in since I cant find local glass shrimp.

 

[pfan151]

I always thought glass and ghost were interchangable common names for the same shrimp. That's what is appears to say online as well if you google glass shrimp. I thought they were the same thing just some are adapted to fresh water and some to brackish and salt. I could be wrong though. I always grew up calling them grass shrimp whether they were from fresh or saltwater.

 

[iluvmyfishes]

No ghost shrimp are fresh water although you can try keeping them in a very low salinity so they live a bit longer when you add them. I used to think they were the same too but they are different. Otherwise we could just acclimate ghost shrimp to salt.

 

[ThRoewer]

Back in Germany I caught live Mysis and rock shrimp on or right behind the coast. I had some spots that were so good that I could also freeze kilos of them - enough to feed 30 tanks for a year.

In O.C. I would try if you could catch some live ocean Mysis in harbors or lagoons. I know there are plenty of brackish and salty lagoons in S.D. county, but I wouldn't know any in O.C. right out of my mind. Some scouting may be required and I have no idea if you can actually do it legally.

Breeding Mysis at reasonable densities is very difficult due to their cannibalistic tendencies. It takes quite some effort to breed enough for feeding purposes.
I have a fairly stable Mysis population in my Chaetomorpha scrubber/fuge and there are also plenty populating the rocks and gravel in my tanks at night, but they are very fast and hardly ever show up during the day.

An alternative may be Daphnia - they are easy to breed in high density and live long enough in saltwater for a feeding. I had a culture on the balcony but shut it down in favor of another tigger pod culture.

 

[iluvmyfishes]

I do not know of any places in the OC to go collecting, it seems illegal everywhere. I would love to go collect shrimp if I could find a spot.

 

[redhorse]

http://www.aquaculturestore.com/home.php