Brine Shrimp

[olsenshouse]

Are live Brine Shrimp good for the saltwater tank? Can you breed these and then feed them to your tank? Are they better then copepods?

Thanks,

Bry

 

[returnofsid]

They aren't near as nutritional as copepods. Brine Shrimp lose most of their nutrition within a few hours of hatching. You can keep them "nutritional," by "gut loading" them. This requires feeding them foods that are high in nutritional value. Frozen Cyclopeeze is much easier and more nutritional.

 

[NWDiver]

+1 to Sid, the only real reason to use live brine is to train picky eaters.
You should gut load with Selcon or similar because as Sid says, they are "junk" food with little value.

 

[olsenshouse]

what is gut loading? and where do you get selcon?

 

[olsenshouse]

can you hatch brine shrimp in a saltwater tank?

 

[NWDiver]

You can, typically done with a hatchery. Much easier to do outside the tank.
Here is a site with lots of info http://www.brineshrimpdirect.com/
Gut loading is placing the sea monkees in an enrichment solution to add food value.
Selco or selcon is Self-Emulsifying Lipid Concentrate.

 

[NC2WA]

+2 with what Michael (sid) said..

Brine shrimp is not very nutritional unless it is gut loaded..

Mysis shrimp is better, but not to be use as the only source of food unless you soak it in vitamins and selcon/zoecon

 

[returnofsid]

Brine shrimp typically need a more salty environment than our reef tanks offer, in order to hatch. Once hatched, they can easily be acclimated to the salinity of our tanks

 

[olsenshouse]

can you breed mysis shrimp?

 

[NWDiver]

You can, but the protocols are much more complex than brine shrimp.
I just started doing some phyto, rotifers, and brine cultures, I might try mysis down the road a bit. It requires much bigger tanks to grow out any reasonable amount, and a bunch of sizing and moving to keep them from eating each other.
Do look at cultured rather than live caught.
Many people can keep a small viable population in their refugium.
http://www.aquaculturestore.com/swinverts.html
http://www.reedmariculture.com/mysidshrimp/

 

[rayjay]

First of all, if people would do research on artemia (brine shrimp) they would find that the shrimp are not devoid of nutrition but only certain facets of nutrition, being the fatty acid profile.
Protein levels of brine shrimp juveniles and adults grown from GSL cysts range from 50% to 62% which is higher protein levels than most commercial fish foods made for the hobby. (ref: - Manual on the Production and Use of Live Foods for Aquaculture edited by the Artemia Reference Centre at the University of Ghent)
Gut loading can be done for many things, like improving the low fatty acid profile, feeding medications that otherwise can't be given to your fish, or even adding a larger amount of protein.
The selco emulsions, have been a good source of product to gut load (there are many versions depending on what you want to accomplish) but I much prefer to use the Algamac products like their Protein Plus or their 3050 which is the fatty acid profile enrichment, even higher in DHA than the Selco DHA emulsion.
Because it is a dry product, you can keep it in the freezer for long periods whereas the selco emulsions even when properly refrigerated have a very limited life span.
The best I've found now for enrichment, especially for raising fry is the "Dan's Food with Beta Glucan" which uses Algamac products for it's base but has more material added. (available at seahorsesource.com)
While I culture brine shrimp for all my seahorses, I use enriched (Dan's Food) rotifers for feeding my reef tanks because the smaller particle sizes are more appropriate for the corals and micro life in the tanks.
I only use enriched live brine in the reef tanks on an occasional basis when I want to watch the fish go crazy chasing down the live food.
RAISING LIVE BRINE SHRIMP TO ADULT

 

[pledosophy]

The first question here should be what are you trying to feed?

IME raising brine shrimp, pods, mysis, and ghost shrimp are not the diffucult, and all are very nutritious if treated right, but you want to use the appropriate food for your need.

There are several species of fish that brine is the easiest starter food to provide, giving them larger things would be futile.

JME

 

[FreakinReefin]

First of all, if people would do research on artemia (brine shrimp) they would find that the shrimp are not devoid of nutrition but only certain facets of nutrition, being the fatty acid profile.
Protein levels of brine shrimp juveniles and adults grown from GSL cysts range from 50% to 62% which is higher protein levels than most commercial fish foods made for the hobby. (ref: - Manual on the Production and Use of Live Foods for Aquaculture edited by the Artemia Reference Centre at the University of Ghent)
Gut loading can be done for many things, like improving the low fatty acid profile, feeding medications that otherwise can't be given to your fish, or even adding a larger amount of protein.
The selco emulsions, have been a good source of product to gut load (there are many versions depending on what you want to accomplish) but I much prefer to use the Algamac products like their Protein Plus or their 3050 which is the fatty acid profile enrichment, even higher in DHA than the Selco DHA emulsion.
Because it is a dry product, you can keep it in the freezer for long periods whereas the selco emulsions even when properly refrigerated have a very limited life span.
The best I've found now for enrichment, especially for raising fry is the "Dan's Food with Beta Glucan" which uses Algamac products for it's base but has more material added. (available at seahorsesource.com)
While I culture brine shrimp for all my seahorses, I use enriched (Dan's Food) rotifers for feeding my reef tanks because the smaller particle sizes are more appropriate for the corals and micro life in the tanks.
I only use enriched live brine in the reef tanks on an occasional basis when I want to watch the fish go crazy chasing down the live food.
RAISING LIVE BRINE SHRIMP TO ADULT

That's great info! I have some brine shrimp egg packet thingys that I have been thinking about raising but have yet to do so. I am going to follow your link and give it a good shot! Thanks!

 

[Gabriel121]

Artemia is a genus of aquatic crustaceans known as brine shrimp. Artemia, the only genus in the family Artemiidae, have changed little externally since the Triassic period. The historical record of existence of Artemia date back to 982 from Urmia Lake, Iran, although the first unambiguous record are the report and drawings made by Schlösser in 1756 of animals from Lymington, England. Artemia are found worldwide in inland saltwater lakes, but not in oceans.

 

[Scooterman]

I goggled the exact quote, please next time don't lead people into believing your some sort of genius! This isn't a good way to start out as a new member!

Artemia is a genus of aquatic crustaceans known as brine shrimp. Artemia, the only genus in the family Artemiidae, have changed little externally since the Triassic period. The historical record of existence of Artemia date back to 982 from Urmia Lake, Iran, although the first unambiguous record are the report and drawings made by Schlösser in 1756 of animals from Lymington, England. Artemia are found worldwide in inland saltwater lakes, but not in oceans.