BBS, decapsulated, Artemia info

[Bumblebee]

found a brand that sells decapsulated brine shrimp eggs in a small bottle, in liquid. (new-tech Artemia revolution) I was expecting them dried and in a bag as usual so it came as a surprise.

anyone else use brine shrimp eggs stored in liquid?

[Bumblebee]

They seem to be very good, most have hatched within 24 hours. Need extra airation as they have a bit of a problem with clumping + sinking due to the decapsulation.

[sassybees]

I have a liquid one that came with the brime shrimp Hatcher......None of them hatched, ( Tried twice) must have been a old batch. The powdered ones were fine.
What salt do you use??

[Bumblebee]

I just used some old sea salt (sold for hermit crabs) at 35 gm (7 tsp) per litre of water. I was reading up on the liquid eggs and it said they needed very strong airation otherwise they stuck together at the bottom and died, the decapsulation process apparently removes their bouyancy and stops them floating around in the water like normal eggs. If you can get enough air to them and keep them afloat in the water apparently they have a much higher hatching rate than normal eggs 80%+.

over 50% of the ones I have used have hatched so far. good thing is they have no little shells to fish out.

[sassybees]

Is there a good way of buying the eggs. dry or liquid. Up here they are expensive! Id like to know how to breed the brine shrmp to full size and collect my own eggs but from what Ive read its a time consuming hard thing to do. Im out of eggs at the moment. Frank my husband got frozen brine shrimop from his work..... Cant say Im impressed, they are full grown and man they stink when you defrost the cubes. I defrost so I can pour the liquid off ( Also when I was adding levamisol to them which I might add the fish didnt eat)
I know Im niave at alot of fishkeeping habits but I was truley stunned when I found brine shrimp are sea monkeys!!! I went to kmart and the set was over $20!! I remember buying them for 8 or 9 bucks when my kids were small.
Anyway have a good day.

[Bumblebee]

from what I hear the best (but also more expensive) way is decapsulated, dry. these you can feed directly to guppies and fry without even hatching as they dont have the hard outer casing that can stop up and kill small fry. The 'cheapest way' is to buy in bulk dried normal eggs from overseas. you can get around a KG for $30 if you look carefully, then again at $20 for 30gm it is well worth it. Just ask your local customs authority before buying to make sure it is safe. These you can decapsulate yourself or hatch.

decapsulating: www.aquaticeco.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/popup.techTalkDetail/ttid/83

Artemia FAQ (raising, nutritional value, decapsulating):
www.ee.pdx.edu/~davidr/discus/articles/artemia.html

[killieorcory]

I find it is a bit of a hit and miss when it comes to BBS eggs. Some years the harvest is good; ie. high hatch rate, and some years harvest is not so good in terms of average percentage hatch.

On the whole though unless one is a really high volume breeder personally there is not much difference between 70% hatch rate and 90%+ hatch rate really. As long as one is hobby scale (says the guy with almost 60 tanks ) it is not that important I think.

You can always decapsulate the eggs you have yourself, just google for what to do.

If you ever get a can of eggs (which will last you years and years and years!), keep the portion you are hatching regularly in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. That's what I do and the hatch rate is still great a year on.

Cheers,
Serkan