I was just watching the "how to hatch brine shrimp" podcast, which, btw, was excellent and now i am all excited to do it. I do have one question though, how much brine shrimp do fish eat (for a fish only tank)? I imagine that too many is bad, as they will die and add to the detrius of the tank. Also, and i know this is Talking "reef," but does anyone happen to know if they are good in freshwater tropical tanks as well? I use the frozen ones all the time and the fish love them, so i am guessing the live ones would be fine too. Never hurts to get a second opinion though :)

samuel

well, they are saltwater shrimp, not sure how long they would live in FW, but i have ZERO experience with this, so dont quote me.

as for a FO tank, i would cut it down to 1/2 tsp of cysts and you should be fine. the fish will eat alot, and whats left over will not add that much, unless you have a nano tank

brine shrimp can live for a few hours or even several days, depending on the salinity that they were hatched and raised in and the parameters of your freshwater tanks. in a soft freshwater tank like discus or tetras, they will live a couple of hours.......but put them in a tank with african rift valley cichlids, and the brine may live and reproduce. it is a good food for freshwater fish with much less risk than feeding brine in a saltwater tank.

I could have written Astrivian's post... his questions are so similar to mine.

Since most people consider a nano as 29 gallons and below, I have a nano. I have 3 small fish, a bunch of zoos and mushrooms and a frogspawn that is probably 3-4 inches across when fully extended.

How much should I use? I don't want to exacerbate my current overfeeding problem. But it might be nice if I could put some food in the tank that stays in the water column without dessication. Plus, I think it would be a fun thing for my 4 year old son and I to do!

i think the same would apply to you also, start with half a tsp, and go from there

well, they are saltwater shrimp, not sure how long they would live in FW, but i have ZERO experience with this, so dont quote me.

Rob, this statement scares me. can you rephrase this? :eek:

My eggs have been bubbling around for 24 hours... no sign of any hatching yet.

I am still concerned the water may be too cold... I guess technically I have 12 more hours to worry about it, so we'll see.

Another one of those "probably should have asked this first" questions...

So the brine shrimpies hatched! I did the whole strain and rinse thing, then I put just enough RODI water in the "net" to suck all of them up with a syringe! I put half of them back in a little bowl (because I don't want to overfeed) and the rest... into the tank!

It was really cool watching them under the moon lighting. Like fireflies.

The question I have Rob... you said you fed your tanks this way to feed the corals. Pretty much everything in my tank is asleep right now. Did I just waste the shot? Clearly some will stay in the water column, but many will be heading for my filter as well. Will this create a decay problem?

Or as usual, am I just worrying too much?

Anyhow, it was a fun little project. And the hatch was pretty much 36 hours on the nose. Next time I need to do it so they hatch during the day and my son can see it. He'd get a kick out of seeing that. :thumbs: Two thumbs up! Hopefully I'll have as much luck with phyto!

Well, there were *some* in the water column still this morning, and my fish were going to town. There can be no doubt that these guys thought the brine shrimp were a real treat! Now, I still need to determine the efficacy of night feeding for my particular setup and go for there.

This may be the perfect solution for when I am out of town and need someone else to feed the tank. Shake up this container, turn off the pumps, put X cc into the tank, wait 10 minutes and voila! No messing with subjective measurements for flake or frozen foods, how cool is that?

I hatch 1/2 tsp every 2 weeks in my hatchery and feed the tank everything that my brine net will strain. Mine hatch fine in 24 hours at room temop (73). I also will put 2 drops (decapsulated) in the tank on the off week to feed the corals and of course the fish love them.

well honestly, many corals actually feed at night. so feeding towards the latter hours of the days is a good thing. depending on the type of corals, you may or may not actually witness the feeding.
but besides this there are MANY other invertebrates and filter feeds that will eat the stuff up, so i wouldn't worry too much

I mainly have zoos, mushrooms and one nice frogspawn.

Also, how long do those brine shrimp keep after hatching? I was kinda surprised they didn't last 24 hours, maybe I should have left them in the bubbler?

in the tank they will likely get eaten or grow until they are eaten.
if they are left in the hatchery they will die with out food and the bubbler running.
i would not live past 3-4days after hatching if there is no food supply

Well they didn't make it past 24 hours in a small tupperware with the lid on. :(

thats likely due to the lack of the bubbler

Hey Rob could you post links on were to get the Brine shrimp? I got the brineshrimpdirect.com but didnt understand the other link for the decp ones you mentioned.

What do they eat? Phyto?

Hey Rob I have heard that adding brine shrimp that you hatch can cause Hydroid outbreaks. Is this true?
I have a link that describes a method to decapsulate that eggs let me know if this would work and eliminate that problem.
http://www.flippersandfins.net/decapbbsarticle.htm
Is the Hydroid attached to the shell?