sea Monkeys?

[Rumor]

Someone just told me that sea monkeys would make a good live food for my fish tank, i'm not really sure what they are other than little underwater critters, was this person right? or could this cause issues in my tank?

 

[NativeKeeper]

Sea monkeys (Brine Shrimp) are indeed good for your fish, especially newly hatched, which are great first food for newly born fish of any kind. They are really easy to hatch yourself, using a 2 liter bottle, with an air stone, and you can buy the eggs at any good quality LFS or online.

However being that im known as an( Aquarium Advice Apprentice)
<<< anything i say should be taken with a grain of salt......maybe Instant Ocean

 

[JohnPaul]

Some pet stores (typically not big chain ones, but more like mom & pop ones) will sell live brine shrimp as feeder food for fish. I've never met a tropical fish that didn't go nuts for live brine shrimp.

However, the nutritional value for brine shrimp (well, adult brine shrimp at least) is somewhat limited. They are a nice supplement to add to you tank once in a while, but they should never make up the majority of a fish's diet. Because they are a live food, they are great for conditioning fish that you want to encourage breeding.

As NativeKeeper mentioned, newly hatched brine shrimp (baby brine shrimp, or BBS for short) is a great "first food" for young fish fry, especially if you gut load the BBS with something nutritious like 100% spirulina powder.

 

[MarkA123]

No what have the sea monkeys ever done to you?! Lol poor sea monkeys. I don't have much experience with live tropical fish foods I just feed my Betta betta flakes and pellets and my albino Cory catfish bottom feeder pellets. Every once in a while I feed them frozen bloodworms. I use to have sea monkeys in my 1 gallon aquarium they were pretty cool but I'd just buy regular brine shrimp because they're probably cheaper and all the sea monkeys I've saw you have to buy the little tank and all that stuff.

 

[krap101]

Something more recent that has come out is fairy shrimp that can survive and reproduce in freshwater. This also makes it easier for raising fry, as you can just add the shrimp eggs with the fish eggs, and the population of shrimp will grow with the population of fish until they can eat flakes/other frozen/live food. Another easy alternative is live daphnia. The fairy shrimp are very popular for raising killifish.

 

[mudraker]

Brine shrimp (artemia) are indeed excellent foods for fry, and live bearers also. We hatch them for guppy fry about once a week. Has anyone tried the new - and expensive - instant hatch brind shrimp? They come decapsulated and supposedly hatch instantly when put in water....

 

[Deep Seven]

They seem to be extremely resilient too. I've seen them added to a cycling tank and they seemed to survive some pretty extreme conditions; PH fluctuations 7-8.6, amonia 2-4, nitrites unsure, and nitrates 50+ and days later they were still swimming around vigorously