Question about using brine shrimp as food

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illuminum

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Aug 6, 2003
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Do any of you feed your freshwater fish with brine shrimp? Is it ever done? I bought a pack of brine shrimp eggs and am hatching them as I write this. I don't know if it would be a good idea to use them as food or to just get rid of them.

By the way, I have a reedfish that doesn't seem to like beefheart. I am goint to try to feed bloodworms. If that doesn't work, I hope he'll eat alot of the tin brine shrimp.
 
My lfs recommended a small amount of brine shrimp once or twice a week for my tetras and zebra danios. I've been using the frozen kind and the fish love them. I would imagine that they go absolutely crazy for live brine shrimp.
 
They are a fine treat, but not the thing as regular diet. Baby brine that you hatch at home are ideal for fry, because they are sooo small that many larger fish won't see them very well. I don't fool with BBS except for fry, and get live adult brine shrimp from my LFS about every 2 weeks. It is kind of a pain to raise BBS to adult, but it can be done if you are interested, and there are several articles discussing it on the web. I definitely don't have the patience for it! My fish do like frozen mysis shrimp, but they really go nuts for the live food.
 
Brine shrimp are fine once a week or so as a treat, but not as a staple food, because they are not very nutritious. The smaller, newly-hatched ones are more nutritious than the adults, though, but an adult fish may not be interested in the newly-hatched brine shrimp because they are so small. This is what I've read here and also what the person I bought my bettas from told me. I bought the bettas at a hatchery, not a LFS.
 
As someone put it to me [ I think it was Alli ]


Brine Shrimp are like potatoe chips, Their a great snack every once and awhile.. but you shouldn't eat them all the itme :)
 
So right William!! :D Adult brine shrimp have a shell which can be tough for some fish to digest. The fish do love them though. If you want to feed live food, try some CBW (California Black Worms). They are very high in protein and are quite safe to feed.
 
these are very interesting ideas. Thanks everyone. What would I feed brine shrimp until they grow to adult size? I honestly have no idea what I'm doing here trying to raise baby brine shrimp... lol. I thought the fish would love it though b/c I've never given them any live food before.
 
Well the reason that Baby Brine Shrimp are so good is their yolk sac. That little bit of protein that they hatch with that feeds them for a few days before they fully absorb it and look for other sorces of food.


Thats why adults are not so good, Like potatoe chips. A great snack, but not nutrional because of the lack of that protien rich sac.



BTW, www.google.com " Brine Shrimp Raising "
 
I hate brine shrimp(and baby). I only use bbs them 1-2times a week for fry, and only cus they give them growth spirts. I think they are just too much work, cus you gotta set up the hatchery, hatch the eggs, wash the bbs, feed em, then they only live for a few hours in freshwater, and you can't use them again the next days cus they lose all there nutritional value.
PLUS,(baby & adult) brine shrim are very unnatural for freshwater fish, and from what I have expirenced cause bettas to eat their eggs, and not have very good spawns. Also if you feed fry too much they can get SBD

Thats just my opinion...

ashley
 
SBD? Whats dat?
IMO
Here in mexico were adviced not to use live foods not hatched by the aquarist beacause "it can contaminate your tank, hence you can get all of your fish sick..."
I dunno why but through my six month as an aquarist i feel ive saved a lot of trouble by feeding frozen, veggies and flakes...
Whaddaya think?
 
I agree Neuve. Live foods can cause a host of problems and should only be fed when really needed. I feed a lot of live black worms to my discus but a I rinse them very well before feeding, and they are in a bare bottom tank. No way to get into gravel and decay.
 
SBD= Swim bladder disorder

Ya you have to be carfull where you get your live food from, but then again some frozen food can also contain diseases and whatnot.
I don't buy my live food, I culture it all myself.

I beleive feeding live foods are the best for fish. They don't pollute the tank, where as frozen and dry can if the fish don't eat them. And what fish doesn't like a nice squirmy meal ;)

ashley
 
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