♥ashley♥

my guppy is pregnant and is due in about 2-3 weeks. so I have some time to prepare for them. but I have already bought the "first bites" for them but I herd that baby brine shrimp will help them grow faster and make their color show quicker. is this true and if so then where do I get baby brine shrimp? do I have to grow them?

COBettaCouple

hmm.. we got the shrimpery kit shown here: http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Produc...&N=2004+112975
and some tubes of 90% hatch BBS eggs (
http://www.drsfostersmith.com/Produc...&N=2004+112975)

what we did was used aquarium salt and treated tap water with some BBS eggs in the box with an air stone in it to keep the eggs moving around until it was time to collect the shrimp. when we collected the shrimp, we filled the plastic tube with treated tap water and put the lid on it, then put it into the spot on the box. the bbs are attracted to light so they swim up into the tube.

♥ashley♥

well I hate to buy things off the internet so do normal pet stores carrie these? or am i going to have to buy the off the internet

and also what is air stone?

sirdarksol

Petsmart, at least, carries them. I would have to assume that a dedicated fish store would, too.

An airstone is a porous stone to which a tube is attached. The other end of the tube is attached to an air pump. Airstone goes in the water, air pump out of the water (tried it the other way, once, and ended up with crispy fried fish), power input end (normal people call it the plug) goes into the power output stations of the domicile (your house's electricity outlets), and it makes pretty bubbles, which also have the advantage of agitating and oxygenating the water.

hmmm...
...
...
I think that I may need to cut back on the Kool-Aid.

♥ashley♥

lol.......koolaid? lol that's hularious!!!

so which is better? those water filters that hook up on the side of the tank that filters the water and airates the water, or the airstone?

jsalemi

Well, they serve different functions, and usually compliment each oter. The filter than hangs on the side of the tank (or any filter) does three things: mechanical filtration, chemical filtration, and biological filtration. Mechanical filtration means cleaning out the gunk that collects in the tank (old fish food, dead plant leaves, etc) and keeping the water clear. Chemical filtration, usually done by activated carbon/charcoal, takes pollutants out of the water. Biological filtration is the most important of the three -- the filter provides one of the most important places for the bacteria that convert the ammonia that waste generates into nitrites and then nitrates, which partial water changes remove. See http://www.fishlore.com/NitrogenCycle.htm for a full explaination of this.

The filter does add some air back into the tank as it pumps the water back; air stones, however, do nothing BUT pump air into the tank. They're not absolutely necessary, but they do add a nice effect to the tank, and some fish love playing in the bubbles.

♥ashley♥

oh. so the filter I have is the way to go?

jsalemi

For your tank, yes -- for the brine fishery, you'd need the air pump. What kind of filter is it (make/model)?

COBettaCouple

petsmart may have the stuff for it.. they have the eggs at least and i think they also have a net for bbs so you could DIY a box and net out the bbs to put in the tank for the fish if you can find those.

sirdarksol

Petsmart (at least the ones near me) have the entire "Just Add Water" kit, so it shouldn't be a problem. It seems to be a standard stocked item.

For this, you should only need the smallest air pump, and I have seen them for a few dollars, and the smallest air stones usually cost from fifty cents to a dollar, so the whole deal shouldn't be very expensive at all.

neverendingninja

Look for the "bulk airstones". They're in a box together, all individually wrapped in plastic, like peppermints, heh. They only cost about 20¢ each.

COBettaCouple

i love those! i always grab a few when we're in there (if the box isn't empty).. good way to have plenty of spares on hand.

jsalemi

Especially since they seem to fall apart every couple of months.

♥ashley♥

so how much is the air pump?

jsalemi

Depends on the size, and they're cheaper online. The smaller ones are under $10. Here's the type I like: http://www.drsfostersmith.com/produc...8&pcatid=12738

COBettaCouple

surprisingly enough, we get our air pumps at wally world.. it's like $6 or 7 for a 1-outlet pump or $10 for a 2-outlet pump.. we've had some running since January and no problems with any of them along with quiet operation.

♥ashley♥

can you just buy frozen baby brine shrimp. wouldn't that be easier

COBettaCouple

i think you can buy it, but it's much better for the fry, nutrition-wise, to have live BBS and some fry will only go after live BBS.

Allie

We just bought one of the BBs hatcheries...it works well but we ended up putting the eggs in a 3g. We had left over salt from our old SW tank we had so we had them going for the first 3 weeks until they started to died off. The baby kribensis were ready flakes by then. We fed them the bbs with a syringe & a piece of air line tubing attached to it. It collect the bbs well.

♥ashley♥

are there little kits were you can buy thay has everything you need. like the toobing,tank,air pump and brine shrimp eggs all together?

COBettaCouple

i'm not sure that there are total kits like that. But you can get the aquarium salt, air pump, air tubing and air stone at walmart and pick up the black box with collection container and the tubes of bbs eggs at petsmart probably. If you have a Dollar Tree there, you can pick up a set of measuring spoons to measure out the salt and bbs eggs.. or you can get those at walmart too.