Allie

In my betta book it says that if you want you can start feeding your babies rotifers the little micro organisims that live in algae infested waters. This would be thier first food. They say to set a jar with plant matter, or the actual grow out in a place where alage accumlates the best. Let it go until the water is green. In the book it say it will make your fry stronger even the smallest ones. I would like to try this method just to see if there is a difference. I wanted a low survival rate this time so I started with baby brine shrimp and fry food...well I went from 109+ to about 30-35 count not final. I cannot seem to count them all, some are too small and fast for me. lol
So have any of you started with the rotifers?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotifer

Martinismommy

Allie, as a matter of fact I did that with my 1st spawn...I set hronwort in a jar with water in the sun for 3 weeks before I spawned...I put it in the tank after spawning...Those fry are by far the largest ones I have and not just age wise...I will be doing this again with my next spawn in Jan...

Pandora

I tried when I was first starting out... but something didn't go right, not sure if it was not enough light or something else... anyway, I didn't end up with green water or algae, just a putrid stinking mess that I wasn't about to add to my babies! Parents were NOT impressed lol

Allie

That is good to hear, no one mentioned the process to me...so I thought I would investigate it.
I have read much online about it. My 15g is full of algae infested waters all the time. Next spawn I am trying it too. Just b/c I noticed how fast my fry numbers went down the past week. So the book is right about making them stronger.

Allie

lol I am going to leave my 15g right where it is and put the fry in their as their first grow out next time, then to a bigger tank.

Pandora

I used boiled lettuce... using a live plant like Martinismommy sounds like a really good idea. Would probably help prevent the smelly part. It was really bad.

Allie

I read to use plants...lettuce would be messy lol. I have my 15g bare with potted plants, full of green water already, so I imagine it will be well ready for the next batch of fry.

Butterfly

Allie that is what I was trying to do for my ram fry and could never manage to make green water. But the frozen rotifers worked well.
Carol

Red1313

Green water eh?
At home we specialize in growing green water. Nice to know that it has a good purpose!

Allie

Frozen? I am not sure how well frozen rotifers would work with new born baby betta. The need it to move so they can see it to eat.
Why is when we want green water it doesn't happen, but we don't want we can rid of it? lol

Red1313

To steal (sirdarksol's ?) line:
it feeds on negative energy, the more we hate it the better it grows!

Allie

Ain't that the truth.

Butterfly

So I wasn't hating enough then

Allie the thawed frozen Rotifers are so tiny they look like dust so I fed them to the Ram fry (who are tiny). Ram Fry seem to need movement also to trigger that snap and gulp reflex so I stirred them into the water with my finger to give them the appearance of moving
Carol

Matt

Haha that line from SDS was a classic. You have to hate it for it to grow.

-Matt