How to hatch baby brine shrimp (BBS)

Stop emptying when the water turns clear

WHAT YOU NEED

+ Brine shrimp eggs
+ Salt (non-iodized, i.e. standard supermarket rock salt – also called “aquarium salt” to make you pay a bit more)
+ Water (tap water is fine and it doesn’t need to be “aged”)
+ Bottle (0.5 – 2L, glass or plastic)

WHAT YOU MIGHT NEED

+ Air pump (unless you want to shake the bottle, the cheapest air pump will do just fine)
+ Super fine strainer (e.g. tea strainer)
+ Air stone (for less noisy operation)
+ Turkey baster (for seperating the baby brine shrimp from the left over egg shells)
+ Heater

PREPARATION

Making a brine shrimp hatchery is very simple. There are a few methods, some of which I will describe here.

THE UPRIGHT HATCHERY

+ The simplest of all methods
+ Quiet

I prefer using this method with a glass bottle during winter when I can’t leave the hatchery outdoors. The glass bottle is less noisy (the bottle neck and glass seem to kill most of the noise) and because I spend most of my day close to where I keep my hatchery it’s great – I can’t stand the bubbling noise (I’m a freak, I know).

Setup:

+ Nothing needed. If you use an air pump you simply sink the tube into the bottle (all the way to the bottom and with an air stone if you want it to be less noisy)

THE UPSIDE-DOWN HATCHERY

+ Most popular method
+ Reliable
+ Efficient
+ Somewhat noisy

You will need an air pump and plastic instead of glass bottle for this.

Setup:

+ Cut off the bottom off a plastic bottle and fit something to the edge so that the bottle can be hung upside-down
+ Make a hole in the cap for the tubing. Don’t make it too big, it needs to be water resistant (blue tac works fine for this).
+ Fit the air pump tube to the cap. I use a special little plastic piece that I screw into the cap. You can get these from any hardware store. Otherwise you need to make the hole just big enough for the tube and make it water resistant with blue tac or glue. The tube should be fitted so that it doesn’t go too far into the bottle – the less the better.

MEASURING THE AMOUNT OF SALT NEEDED

+ I use one teaspoon (15ml) salt per one litre water. A bit more, a bit less doesn’t matter… you pretty much can’t go wrong!
+ If you live close to the sea, just get some salt water from there. You can keep it for about five days.

MEASURING THE AMOUNT OF BRINE SHRIMP EGGS NEEDED

This can be a bit complicated at first – you need to find out how much your fish eat. To give you some idea I currently use about 1.5ml/day to feed 300 1cm fry. Sometimes I use more, sometimes less. To be honest I haven’t found a perfect solution to measuring it yet as it totally depends on the number of spawns I have, the age of the fish and size of each spawn. All I can say is do more than needed at first, watch how much your fish eats and adjust the measurement to that. Remember never to overfeed your fish!!

INSTALLING AND RUNNING YOUR HATCHERY

Place your hatchery in the warmest spot of your house. I’ve hatched them all the way down to 15C at night, but with poor results and it takes more than 48 hours for the eggs to hatch. Best temperature I would say is 20-28C. If you can live in the temperature without warm clothes, so can the baby brine shrimp.

You need to measure the time it takes your brine shrimp to hatch. If it takes one day you only need one hatchery, if it takes two days you need two… If it takes three days something is probably wrong (see trouble shooting).

+ Fill your hatchery with water a few centimetres from the top
+ Add salt and brine shrimp eggs
+ Start the air pump and wait 24-48 hours. (if you don’t have an air pump shake the bottle five times a day. I haven’t tried this myself, but have heard that it works fine – sometimes even better than with an air pump).

You do the above every day! Rotate the hatcheries if you’re using more than one (I keep stickers on the containers for my salt and brine shrimp eggs which tell which hatchery is the oldest. Every day I put one container on top of the other which lets me remember.) and make sure to clean the bottles when they get too dirty (every two weeks perhaps).

HATCHING

+ After 24-48 hours the eggs will hatch given the right conditions (otherwise see trouble shooting).
+ You want to feed your fish the brine shrimp as soon as they hatch – this is when they contain the most protein – so keep a close eye on the time it takes.
+ Turn the air pump off and let the water settle for five minutes and you will notice tiny orange creatures swimming in uncoordinated directions throughout the bottle. Generally they settle on the bottom of the bottle after a while and the left over egg shells float to the top.
+ Before feeding the brine shrimp to your fish you need to seperate the baby brine shrimp from the salt water and the egg shells (see below).

SEPERATING THE BABY BRINE SHRIMP

Your fry hate the left over egg shells and don’t want dirty salt water mixed with their water, so you need to seperate the baby brine shrimp.

There are three variables commonly used to seperate the BBS – time, light and gravity. Brine shrimp are attracted to light and generally sink to the bottom of still water.

METHOD 1: GRAVITY + TIME

If you’re using an upside down hatchery this is the best method.

+ Turn the air pump off and let the BBS settle on the bottom for five minutes. You’ll notice the orange color filling the bottom.
+ Detatch the tubing from the air pump and empty the BBS to a seperate container that way. Alternatively you can use a turkey baster to suck the BBS up from the bottom, but this usually leaves you with a lot of egg shells in your fish tank.
+ Strain the liquid through a tea strainer (or normal serviets if you’re desperate) and empty into fresh water before feeding to the fry.

METHOD 2: LIGHT + TIME

This is useful when you’re using the upright hatchery.

+ Empty the content of the hatchery (eggs and all) through a strainer and then into a seperate container with fresh water.
+ Leave the container for five minutes with light shining through one corner.
+ Use a turkey baster to suck up the BBS and feed straight to your fry.

Another method is to empty the egg shells+BBS+fresh water into a dark container with a small hole in it (e.g. a film jar). Place the container in your tank and watch the BBS swim out themselves.

METHOD 3: DECAPPING

I have yet to try this as it sounds more complicated than my current methods. Using bleach people remove most of the outer layer of the brine shrimp egg. That way no seperation is needed. Just strain and feed.

FEEDING

Once you’ve seperated the brine shrimp from the salt water and the eggs shells you can feed it to your fry.

+ You don’t want to overfeed! Too little is better than too much.
+ Start with a small amount. Spread the BBS throughout the tank and watch your fry eat it (it pays to have a glass tank). If your fry eat all BBS within a few minutes you can feed a bit more.
+ I normally feed my fry only once a day but would say it’s better feeding 2-3 times a day. This way it’s also easier to control the amount.
+ Never overfeed your fry (I can’t stress this enough) and let the baby brine shrimp rot on the bottom of your tank!! This has been the number one reason fry of mine have died.

SOME TIPS

+ If you can’t get salt solution working and live near the ocean. Hello!? Salt water.. ocean. I was oblivious to this at first and looked all over the web for the right measurements. :-)

+ If you don’t have a spare heater, but have one in your aquarium… just put your brine shrimp hatchery in there, I’m sure your fish will find it exciting.

+ If you don’t use all BBS at once you can keep them for up to 12 hours by putting a bit of salt in with the fresh water – no airation needed.

TROUBLE SHOOTING

If you’re getting poor results, here are a few causes:

+ It’s too cold where you keep the hatchery.
+ Not enough or too much salt. I use one tea spoon (15ml) per one litre water.
+ Not enough air in the water. If you’re not using an air pump you will need to shake the bottle regularly (well worth the $5 for an air pump don’t you think?).
+ The eggs are of extremely poor quality