pamd

I'm thinking of hatching brine shrimp because I think my bettas would enjoy chasing down some live food as a treat and I know moderate amounts would be nutritious for them.

I'm concerned about buying either live or frozen brine shrimp from the pet stores because of possible introduction of mercury from harvested wild-caught shrimp, parasites or other nasties. Am I being overly paranoid? Would hatching my own be perfectly safe?

Here's why I became concerned about mercury:

Toxic Brine Shrimp?

What do you think of this guy's DYI advice? It looks pretty good to me:

http://www.cichlid-forum.com/article...p_hatchery.php

I'd plan to rinse them using a coffee filter (as he suggested) using treated water or tank water immediately before feeding.

Also, can I freeze the unused ones for later use? If so, how?

I used to hatch my own brine shrimp when I had a saltwater tank, but that was quite a few years ago. For all practical purposes -- since best fish-keeping practices have evolved -- I'm a newbie at hatching them. I can't remember why I went to the trouble even back then to hatch my own rather than simply buying them, but it probably had to do with worry about introducing parasites, viruses and/or bacteria.

I apologize if my questions have been previously answered, but spent some time searching and didn't come up with the answers I seek. Thanks for any advice you can offer!

Shawnie

gm Pamd!!

Ive been using the frozen brine shrimp & bloodworms for years and havent had an issue...hopefully I wont!! but the hatchery sounds very interesting if you have the time and means to do it....and I would say yes you could freeze the leftovers as I freeze the left over fresh shrimp that I buy for my guys...goodluck and let us know what you do!! id be interested to see how much detail and money it takes to do this

Fishies-for-me

I tried the pop bottle method and I to find it easier to just use a large jar. I also filter thru a coffee filter ...then I rinse to get the salty water off and swish the rinse filter into the tank to get the shrimp into the tank. My gups go nuts for these. If you are planning on feeding them to the betta I think they need to be grown on a bit as my betta don't even notice the newly hatched shrimp.... unless I put a glob of them on a wooden pick I have then they grab at the pink blob which breaks apart and they miss a lot of them that disperse and then they don't notice them as they are so small. I have a batch now that is about 1 week old...lol I can acually see them with out the magnifying glass now. I have to completely change the water on them every 4-5 days or they start to smell. I am feeding them disolved yeast and crushed disolved algae wafers and they seem to be thriving on them.

Edit: I just took these pix of the baby brine shrimp that I have...they are appox 1 week old and pretty tiny still but much bigger than they were when hatched

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	crystal 050.JPG (372.6 KB, 14 views)

pamd

Thanks for the replies!

Shawnie, it would take almost no $$, at least for me. I already have an almost perfect-shaped clean jar and all the other stuff from the DYI guy's instructions. All I'd need is brine shrimp eggs, a bit of salt, and some patience. (That's the hard part, lol.) I remember hatching them used to be a bit messy, but worth it to see the salties going with gusto for the live shrimp, and I felt my home-hatched ones were perfectly safe. Not so sure any more.

Fishies-for-me, thanks for sharing your experience. I'll probably go your route, and try to raise the shrimp beyond baby brine shrimp before feeding. That's what I did before. However, I hope I don't get attached to any of them. I could do that with any living creature, even if raised for a week for feeding. I'll be a big girl and try not to get too squeamish, though!

Fishies-for-me

Yeah I have to keep telling myself...there only brine shrimp...there only brine shrimp...lol but I still feel bad every time I feed some to the fish. I could never have a pet where I had to feed live food all the time. certain fish...snakes..lizards. My 18 yr old son was at a friends house where they have a monitor lizard. He was feeding it a mouse one day while he was there ...he said Mom it was horrible. It was a live mouse ( or rat I can't remember) and the lizard grabbed it and kept smashing it against the glass side of the tank. He said I felt so bad for the food ...it was so scared. I could never do that!!!

COBettaCouple

I found those black boxes they sell to work pretty good. I just use 1 tbsp of aquarium salt, 1/8 to 1/4 tsp of eggs (depending on how much bbs i want) and barely warm treated tap water. I run an airstone all the time in the box, except when collecting the shrimp.

I use a lamp right over the hatchery to bring the bbs up into the collection container, filled with treated tap water.

JD OSCAR

Dino

www.kensfish.com

Buy the decapsulated eggs.
They are a bit more expensive but are usable within minutes, vs hours on the shrimp you have to hatch.

JD OSCAR

Allie

Most LFS store have them.

Allie

That is exactly what we do here too... I was using a huge cleaned jar with the air stone too, but I broke it when doing the fish room.

JD OSCAR