Anyone hatch and feed your tank with live brine shrimp?

[pmrossetti]

Show us your hatcheries. I think everyone should hatch and feed these. Nutritious and fish love them. Great for QT fish, too. :fish1::fish1::fish1:

[seapug]

The young ones are nutritious but the adults are aquatic popcorn. Good for getting new fish to eat but not a good long term staple. Many people here do hatch and feed them to their tanks on a regular basis. I remember Paul B mentioning it in his article on his 35 year old reef tank in last months issue of reefkeeping.com.

[pmrossetti]

Yeah, I meant the newly hatched ones. A great inexpensive food. Great to get picky eaters going. See.......

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8sNx9zTOnQ&feature=channel_page

[Snakebyt]

great tutorial, thanks for posting

[pmrossetti]

Thanks Snake, I wish everyone knew how easy it was to have these. Picky eaters love 'em. Gets almost anything to start eating. I hope lots of folks see this. :)

[widmer]

[QUOTE=seapug;15820534]The young ones are nutritious but the adults are aquatic popcorn. /QUOTE]

LOL!

ps if im not mistaken paulb swears by feeding brine shrimp and somewhere in his ten mile long thread he shows his neat hatchery

[pmrossetti]

Great! Wasn't aware of that. Maybe this thread will help, too.

[lordofthereef]

What is it about the adults that is so not nutritious?

[eros]

I started hatching brine to feed the shore shrimp I feed to my cuttlefish. I feed it to my reef too now since I'm hatching them anyway and my fish love it. The tangs don't pay much attention to it but the chromis, clowns and firefish love it. It's good for food for pods and mysis shrimp too.

[jenglish]

What is it about the adults that is so not nutritious?

They lack some essential fats or something that is still there when the yolk sac is still attached on BBS

[pmrossetti]

Good question. I don't know except that they're healthy at first because they feed on what's in the egg with them. As they grow if not fed don't have the same nutritional value? Just a guess.

[Paul B]

ps if im not mistaken paulb swears by feeding brine shrimp and somewhere in his ten mile long thread

I actually think it is only half a mile long ;)

[lordofthereef]

They lack some essential fats or something that is still there when the yolk sac is still attached on BBS

Interesting. How long before they reach adulthood? I imagine pretty quick?

[wetWolger]

Interesting. How long before they reach adulthood? I imagine pretty quick?

Baby brine are only considered nutritious for 24 to 36 hours from introducing eggs into the water. Not sure how long that is from when they actually start to hatch.

Becoming an adult takes much longer....and requires the addition of more food. Most forms of brine shrimp in the industry are feed yeast to bring them to their adult forms.

[lordofthereef]

Baby brine are only considered nutritious for 24 to 36 hours from introducing eggs into the water. Not sure how long that is from when they actually start to hatch.

Becoming an adult takes much longer....and requires the addition of more food. Most forms of brine shrimp in the industry are feed yeast to bring them to their adult forms.

Thanks! So it sounds like hatching these at home and feeding them is kind of an all of the time thing? Could you hatch a bunch and freeze them?

[adunne02]

Great vid!! What do you do with all the extra that u didn't feed that day?

[pmrossetti]

Feed em the next day. Couldn't hurt. As long as it's not the only thing you feed, right?

[pmrossetti]

Also, you don't have to make that large amount each time. After a few batches you'll know how many you want to hatch. They're nutitious for a couple of days so measure accordingly. :)

[Paul B]

Could you hatch a bunch and freeze them?


You could but you could buy newborn frozen brine fairly cheap.
I hatch them every day because I have a lot of smaller fish like gobies and pipefish that need the baby brine. If I did not have these fish, I would not hatch them

[pmrossetti]

Thanks, Paul.