Want to grow Brine Shrimp

[murph1083]

I would like to grow my own culture of brine shrimp from hatch to adult. I cant seem to find any good articles on how to do it. Can anyone help me with this by giving me a link or perhaps sharing with me their methods.

[Paintbug]

http://www.melevsreef.com/pics/food/bbs/how_to_bbs.html

[murph1083]

thanks..that a big help....but I was wondering how I can raise them to adult hood

[SeanySean]

Its really hard from what I have been told - I am wanting to do the same thing in another tank just not sure how I can skimm or filter the tank withought removing them..

Anyone?

[SeanySean]

What do people think about this idea I really want to get brine shrimp growing in a fug with zooplankton I was thinking of the net to stop the naupli and bio balls for the filter

Does anyone think this might work?

[bertoni]

I don't think brine shrimp grow well in regular saltwater, but I might be wrong. The breeders forum has links to lots of information on brine shrimp. Growing them isn't very difficult, from what I remember, but it can be time-consuming.

[A.G]

according to Natural Reed Aquarium written
by JHON H.TULLOCK

"To rear adult brine shrimp, a large container should be used and is filled with old tank water and allowed to sit in a brightly lit area until the water turns green, inicating a thriving population pf micro algea.To speed the process, add a pinch of house-plant fetilizer to supply nitrate and phosphate for the algea and Nauplii ( hatched brine shrimp) are then added,They will feed on the algae and grow to adult size (about 1/2") in about three weeks."

I have never tried it though.Hope that helps

A.G

[SeanySean]

Thanks had a little difficulty searching the forum for info

So I suppose it does not need a filter more oxygen was wondering about amonia problems, as so many hatch I will be putting them in a 20G tank so I could just put lighting on 24/7 for added algae.

Got the first batch bubbling nicely...

[GRREEF]

Originally posted by bertoni
I don't think brine shrimp grow well in regular saltwater, but I might be wrong. The breeders forum has links to lots of information on brine shrimp. Growing them isn't very difficult, from what I remember, but it can be time-consuming.

Growing brine shrimp is not hard. Just follow the same setup as in Melevs' Reef hatchery. Use only about 1/4 teaspoon of eggs (you can experiment with that). Fill the soda bottle about full. Continue to bubble air the entire time through the bottom. It will take a few weeks. During that time feed them powdered fish fry food. You can use the freshwater fry food for that.

There is an easier way to hatch the eggs also: BUT PROCEED WITH CAUTION:

In a fine fish net place your quantity of eggs. Dip the eggs into a small container of bleach. Keep agitating the net so the eggs are in suspension. This will dissolve the outer egg shell. The eggs will lighten, then turn orange. This doesn't take long, a minute or so.

Immediately rinse the decapsulated eggs in white vinegar then in fresh water. Don't soak them in the vinegar, rise them. In this step, you are neutralizing the bleach. So if they still smell like bleach, rinse in vinegar again then in water again.

Put the decapsulated eggs in salt water and aerate as Melev's suggests. Some of the eggs will "hatch" immediately, others will still take up to 24 hours. However, you have no shells to worry about.

[SeanySean]

That approach is too scary for me... the hatcher I have works great and removes the egss as well just never been able to keep them alive in their so called grow tank of 5l

Hopefully with 20G should be a better setup and if I can get zooplankton to grow as well that would be perfect as I know this is a good food source for them and my tank and would make a perfect food dosing source

[bertoni]

A 20g tank probably will be easier than the 5L bottles if you want adult brine shrimp. You can use Amquel Plus to help control ammonia and depend on water changes. The brine shrimp might be able to tolerate a spong filter as well. This is the thread with all the links, etc:

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/sh...hreadid=135137

[GRREEF]

just get lots of aeration. Or else you won't have a dense population.

[rayjay]

Depending on how many you want to grow at a time, and, in what size of container, it can be very easy or it can be labour intensive.
Sparsely populated cultures can be grown very easy in large quantities of water compared to shrimp densities so that water quality doesn't deteriorate too fast. Feeding very light with foods that stay in suspension is a key to longevity with less work.
On the other hand, I prefer to raise large numbers of the brine and this entails more work proportionally than the simple way.
The more you grow in the same size container, the more work doing water changes.
I used to grow phytoplankton and supplement feeding with a "spirulina ball" that fogs the water, but now I primarily use Tahitian Blend, a cryopaste.
I also used to recycle the water with bio balls in garbage containers, but now, using a cheap home made salt water formula, (Randy Holmes Farley advised on quantities of the chemicals I use) I pulled the bio balls and grow the brine shrimp in the 20g garbage pails, and I have 55g olive barrels on hand for expansion.
For the basics of my operation, see my brine shrimp page, where it describes and shows, my basic set up with some addends at the end for some changes I've made.
RAISING BRINE SHRIMP

At the bottom of the page there are links to informative sites, especially one from a United Nations PDF on Live Foods For Aquaculture from the Laboratory of Aquaculture & Artemia Reference Center, University of Gent, Belgium, which includes a large section (section 4) on Artemia, that includes nutrition, feeding, commercial sized grow outs and more, that one can use to scale to their own operation.
If you click on the square box between the two arrows at the top of the page, you will get the table of contents for the complete file which includes information on micro algae, rotifers, the above mentioned artemia, zooplankton, and daphnia.

[SeanySean]

That info is brilliant thanks every so much - appreciated,


Sean

[murph1083]

In your honest opinion, with cost and labor and everything else factored in, am I better off buying them all ready grown or growing them to adults myself?

[bertoni]

All in all, I wouldn't feed brine shrimp very often, and I wouldn't bother raising them. I tried rotifers for a while, and it was too time-consuming for my lazy carcass.

[SeanySean]

They do not cost hardly anything and for a 55G FOWLR you are better off buying them, I want some big ones for the fish as well as the naupli for feeding to the corals - It also means I can load the little things with choice food so I know what my fish are getting

[rayjay]

Better off buying them when you can.
Where I live, we have none available to us so I grow them as well as mysid shrimp.

[GRREEF]

rayjay....590 Gallons??? Have any pics?

[rayjay]

Click profile and then click the link to my home page. I think there is about 25 to 30 pages of pictures from my tanks, as well as specific pages like my brine shrimp page.

[sleepercivic88]

Brine shrimp is easy to grow. I had a brackish set up years ago with a figure 8 puffer. I added Brine shrimp eggs they hatched and the puffer eat them. I think they even reproduced