Brine Shrimp....poison??

[chris]

My daphnia culture recently became too depleted to use anymore, so until I get more daphnia I was going to use brine shrimp. Well to make a long story short, I`m raising larvae of 2 different species, and since I have been feeding brine shrimp, I have had high mortality. I have been rinsing the shrimp well. Has anyone else experienced this problem?

 

[josh]

Chris`

Alot of times brine shrimp will quickly die and start to decay on the bottom of a fw container, just one reason why this might be happening, I too an interested to see what others say.

 

[michael]

I use lots of fresh hatched baby brine. I set up a new culture every day. I feed it off within about 30 hours of when it was set up. The earliest i feed is 24 hours after it was set up. I find it easier than daphnia and more reliable, I use the 2 liter soda bottle hatchery method. Brineshrimpdirect has lots of good artemia info.

 

[jennifer]

Hi Chris. When feeding baby brine, you may need to clean the tanks more than you did when you used daphnia. You either need to use a well-cycled tank (set up for months before you start) OR you need to do significant water changes and wipe out the inside of the container a lot. The dead baby brine tend to stick to the bottom of the container, creating a layer of fungal/bacterial decay, right where the larvae are sitting.

Another possibility is ingestion of unhatched brine shrimp eggs. This can happen if the bbs have a low hatch rate, or if the hatched ones aren't separated well. I have lost some triturus to this problem. Under a magnifier, you may be able to see a brine shrimp egg lodged in the gut of the dead ones.

 

[colin]

Also, the nutritional content of artemia is practically nil, daph is alwaya a better solution

 

[edward]

Hi Colin,
Atremia naupuli are actually very nutritious provided that they are fed out before the yolk sack is totally absorbed. This usually occurs in about 48 hours depending on the temperature at which you keep the naupuli.
Adult brine shrimp are usually depleted of nutrients by being starved during transit but this can be resolved to some extent by soaking them with a vitamin-mineral solution prior to feeding them out.
I have used adult brine shrimp to rear ambystomid larva to metamorphosis with no problems.

Ed

 

[joe]

I want to confirm Jen's comment about unhatched brine shrimp eggs. I also raise African Dwarf Frogs and consumption of unhatched brine shrimp eggs is a big cause of tadpole mortality with them. David Cecere's account (look here: http://www.pipidae.net/david/Breeding5.htm) provides more details.

 

[michael]

That stuff was pretty interesting. I can see how that guy drew his conclusion. Often you can do a necropsy and not be certain of the cause of death. If you are carefull you should get very few cysts or shells with your shrimp when you harvest. You can also remove the shells before hatching. I think this involves bleaching the eggs to disolve the cysts. You can find info on that at brineshrimpdirect. I've never done that.
I've had problems with hydra in my daphnia. One day I got fed up with the daphnia and threw thousands out. With the artemia you don't get hitchhikers like you can with some live fresh water food. I find the artemia more dependable.
Each method has its' plusses and minusses. I like the shrimp. You have to fuss a little more with the shrimp. It's a trade off.