Anybody else growing their own....

[JennM]

Brine Shrimp?

I mentioned in the good morning thread that I cleaned out my cultures and re-seeded them this morning. I strained out the nasty old leaves that served fine as "insulation" for dormant brine... I now have 8 pails going (I added a couple today). I strained all the leaves out, kept all the nasty reddish phyto, and surprisingly more than one bucket still had live brine in it. One bucket has been teeming with brine since the weather warmed up but the others were a bit sluggish...so I strained out the leaves, and added some new (old) tank water and distributed the brine from the abundant culture into the rest - in a few weeks I should have oodles of fat brine! Currently I have brine of all ages and sizes. many females with egg clusters on them, and more mating These are amazingly hardy creatures!

The culture is totally un-scientific, dirty, nasty, I'm sure no two buckets have the same parameters, and I don't measure anything, in fact it's the first good cleaning the cultures have had in about a year. I started the cultures from leftover newly hatched brine in August of 2001, and they've been self-sustaining ever since. I was harvesting a lot of brine for baby seahorses until January when I weaned one little one who survived, onto Mysis, then with the cold weather the cultures went dormant. They even freeze in the winter. The first winter I brought a couple of buckets indoors to keep the supply up but they don't seem to do as well indoors as they do outdoors. There is no aeration, no filtration, no heat, just a bunch o'buckets sitting on my back step in the sun, rain, heat, cold and whatever Nature throws our way...

Does anybody else grow their own? I'd be interested in hearing your experiences...

Jenn

[Casey]

na they stink to bad

[Mrs Smith]

When I have baby Banggais, I hatch them. We made the mistake of ordering a pound of Brine Shrimp eggs from BSD awhile back, and I'll never use that many!

In any case, we use a modified phytoplankton "station" consisting of suspended 1L bottles, air bubbler tubes, and a grow-light. It kind of looks like a meth lab. In any case, it's a little more work than your system, but not much. I just have to plug it in.

Danielle

[JennM]

Originally posted by Casey
na they stink to bad

My outdoor cultures don't stink. The nasty icky leaves in the bottom of unattended cultures did stink, but that had nothing to do with the cultures themselves.

Jenn

[MsReeReee]

Jenn
How do u keep Mosqutoes from growing with them

[JennM]

High salinity. Have never had mosquito larvae in them.

Before west nile became a problem, I had a small FW bucket for mosquito larvae for my cardinalfish, he loved them! I would harvest ALL the larvae before they matured, and if I didn't need them I would dump them.

Needless to say I don't do that anymore...

Jenn

[Mickadee]

sounds interesting
could you post a pic of the setup??
do you use a airstone or something for circulation?
sounds like soemthing I would be interested in starting up 1 or so for treats and fishes.
my FW are pigs with brine LOL
thanks
Mike

[MsReeReee]

So Jenn how would i start one

[rayjay]

Unfortunately because of where I live, I can't grow brine shrimp outdoors for most of the year. I DO grow them indoors but it's a PITA and I don't know why I keep it up. If I could buy live brine shrimp locally I would do it that way, but there are none to be had around here.
RAISING BRINE SHRIMP

[Doug1]

Jenn, just in time, I no longer have my alarm clock, those Brine Pans work everytime

[JennM]

I can post pics, but they would be pretty boring -- 8 white pails sitting on the back deck with various shades of murky water -- right now they are brown, but they change to green from time to time, whatever dominant strain of microalgae is happening is what's happening.

No filtration, no aeration, no heat, just buckets of old nasty tank water, teeming with live brine.

They won't be as dense as the brine tank at the LFS (that's a temporary system), but if you thin them regularly or whenever you think of it (!!!) by starting another bucket, you'll always have lots!

I just go out and swish the net around in a bucket or two, bring it in, rinse them off and voila! Instant treats!

Jenn