BBS hatchery simple and easy

[timg]

here is an idea that I have used to great effect with my BBS and have been asked to pass on the info on how, so here it is:

To make a hatchery this way is very easy. All you need is an empty 2 litre cola bottle, a polystyrene tile, a piece of air piping that you can connect to a pump via a control valve and a sharp knife. You might need a vacuum to clean up the polystyrene afterwards, but that's DIY!)

Cut the bottle just above the label, so that the bell and screw cap are left. See image 1
Take the polystyrene tile and cut a square just a little bigger than the bottle diameter.
place the cut neck of the bottle onto the center of the square and press down so that it leaves an indentation in the tile.
using the knife, cut out the round shape, leaving you something like image 2.

float the tile in your tank
fill the bottle with water from the tank to half an inch from the top
drop it into the center hole in the tile
add the air pipe making sure that it goes right to the bottom of the cone and connect to the pump, adjusting so that you get a gentle bubble in the bottle
add the salt to the water, roughly a heaped tablespoon is right.
add 1/4 of a teaspoon of BBS eggs
leave for 18 - 24 hours
You now have freshly hatched BBS to feed to your fish!

A useful hint: Use a syringe to take the BBS out of the cone, it saves a lot of bother! take the airline out and leave to settle for about five minutes, then I use one full syringe per feed for about 50 fry. This saves the need for a fine mesh net etc and the rest continue to survive in the cone until needed again. The amount of salt you are adding to the fry tank is so small that it will not do any harm.

The advantages with this is that you don't need a heater or a light, as both are already fitted. The water temperature of your tank should be enough to maintain the BBS hatchery with a maximum of 24 hours turnaround.The disadvantage is that you have a bottle floating in the top of your tank, which you may not like, but if you have fry, they have to be fed!

P.S. If you need more than one hatchery, just cut the tile large enough to take two or four cutouts and put more bottles in with extra airlines!
have fun!

[atmmachine816]

Good Idea, yet another one of your DIY ideas

[timg]

sorry, can't help it!

[Trpimp147]

good job, water looks dirty, i plan on building my own some time to feed my fish. this is an easy and fast one to build

[atmmachine816]

Originally Posted by timg

sorry, can't help it!

LOL you make me jealous, I'm not allowed yet to do all your DIY projects or come up with one before you. Your going to need your own DIY board soon

[timg]

good job, water looks dirty, i plan on building my own some time to feed my fish. this is an easy and fast one to build

It's not dirty, it's working, making BBS.

[COBettaCouple]

great idea.. could be quite handy with the next mahachai spawning. funny, that's the same 'recipe' i ended up with after some trial and error to get the best output without wasting a lot.

i wonder.. would it be possible to put a lid of sorts on top of the cola bottle with a small hole in the center and sitting on top of that lid would be the a small collection container upside down so that the 2 holes would meet. The lids could be adhered together and if you used a dark cola bottle, the BBS should swim up into the collection container? just a curiosity.

[timg]

anything is possible with DIY! Personally, the syringe works very well for me and it's quick, clean and simple. With so many fry, I don't have the time to wait for the little blighters to make up their minds, and the syringe just speeds the job up so much. It's an old one from the ink refill packs we get here.

I can see the idea of the bottle, but seems like a lot of un-necessary work.

[tan.b]

I love this idea! then again....i've loved all of your ideas!!

[Amnagrla]

Where do you get BBS eggs

[tan.b]

Originally Posted by Amnagrla

Where do you get BBS eggs

i get mine off ebay!

[Amnagrla]

lol... interesting...

I love the idea... but with only a 10 gallon tank and a big breeder net in there, I don't think I could fit it in the tank!! however, I will DEFINITELY remember this for when I get a bigger tank!

[COBettaCouple]

Originally Posted by timg

anything is possible with DIY! Personally, the syringe works very well for me and it's quick, clean and simple. With so many fry, I don't have the time to wait for the little blighters to make up their minds, and the syringe just speeds the job up so much. It's an old one from the ink refill packs we get here.

I can see the idea of the bottle, but seems like a lot of un-necessary work.

yea.. i wonder if some sort of pump and valve could be integrated into that and make it sort of an automatic thing, where you turn on the pump or valve to suck BBS up into a tube and have them spit out the other end into the tank? just theorizing here.. does it sound possible, ridiculous or somewhere in between?

[atmmachine816]

Originally Posted by Amnagrla

Where do you get BBS eggs

I get mine at a LFS, come in a little tube and are very cheap.

[COBettaCouple]

Originally Posted by Amnagrla

Where do you get BBS eggs

we get ours from the DFS website.

[timg]

yea.. i wonder if some sort of pump and valve could be integrated into that and make it sort of an automatic thing, where you turn on the pump or valve to suck BBS up into a tube and have them spit out the other end into the tank? just theorizing here.. does it sound possible, ridiculous or somewhere in between?

I think it might need a larger production unit if you wanted to automate it! How many BBS can you get in 6' of air tubing? lol

[COBettaCouple]

yea, just thinking aloud.

[≈ D ≈]

Ok, definitely a good read but where are the images?

[darkwolf29a]

Originally Posted by HarleyMan

Ok, definitely a good read but where are the images?

They disappeared. Will they return??

[armadillo]

I am afraid it's unlikely. The disappeared as a consequence of the forum upgrade. Mike worked very hard at restoring 75% of the pictures, but there is a big technical problem recuperating the rest. The galleries took quite a bad hit too. Sorry guys.

Tim, could you possibly re-attach the pictures next to the initial posts? That's what I did to some of my species gallery pictures.

[Trpimp147]

for mass production of bbs i have seen some one take a ten gal tank and put a black devider in it and place it just far enought from the bottem of the tank to let bbs swim through. next they paint one side of the tank black so no light can get through and put a black top on it with one hole to put a bubbler in it and another hole to put the eggs in (make cover for the egg hole so no light gets in tank, and use black colored air hose) fill tank with water and have a heater in it. fill the black side of the tank with eggs let them hatch and on the other side of the tank the light will draw the bbs out of the black side. thats why you put the black center peice in the tank almost to the bottem of the tank and this alows you to harvest them in mass. would suggest getting a 5-1/2 gal tank a little smaller and easyer to handle. but for you tim&karen you may need a ten gal.... and alot of bbs eggs hahaha. if any one has any questions ill try and find a few pics for you... this is all off the top of my head and what i wrote might not sound proper haha... sorry im not that great of a writer...

[armadillo]

We've tried our first BBS hatchery tonight using an airpump and a 1L bottle, and it makes suuuuch a racket!

Wondering how to keep it at 26C, though, as I believe that's what we're supposed to do? I guess we could just stick the bottle in a bucket with a heater in it overnight.

[≈ D ≈]

Originally Posted by armadillo

I am afraid it's unlikely. The disappeared as a consequence of the forum upgrade. Mike worked very hard at restoring 75% of the pictures, but there is a big technical problem recuperating the rest. The galleries took quite a bad hit too. Sorry guys.

Tim, could you possibly re-attach the pictures next to the initial posts? That's what I did to some of my species gallery pictures.

Ahh, now I understand why some posts have no pictures when they should. Was thinking something was wrong with my ISP or system.