How to Hatch Brine Shrimp Eggs

Many freshwater aquarium fish like live food as a treat. Occasional meals of live foods are essential for maintaining healthy fish. Live foods are also important for bringing tropical fish into breeding condition. Live foods are also essential to the successful rearing of baby fish. Brine shrimp makes a wonderful live food for small to medium sized freshwater fish. Newly hatched brine shrimp makes a wonderful first food for larger fry such as livebearers, or cichlids. It also makes a splendid 2nd food for smaller fry such as tetras once they have grown enough to be able to eat them. Brine shrimp eggs are stored dry, and can be hatched whenever you need them.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Brine shrimp eggs
• Non-Iodized salt or aquarium salt
• Clean, empty 2 liter soft drink bottle
• Turkey baster
• Aquarium cement
• Aquarium air pump
• Aquarium airline tubing
• Brine shrimp net

1. Cut off the bottom of a 2 liter soda bottle.

2. Drill a hole in the center of the soda bottle lid that is the size of your airline tubing.

3. Push some aquarium tubing through the hole so that about a ½” of tubing will be INSIDE the bottle when the lid is on.

4. Seal the tubing in place with a bit of aquarium cement.

5. Tighten the lid of the 2 liter bottle.

6. Mount the 2 liter bottle so that the lid is at the bottom, and the open end (where you cut the bottom off) is at the top. You can do this many ways. One way is to strap the bottle against a wall.

7. Connect the other end of your airline tubing to your aquarium pump. Make sure the pump is place ABOVE the level of the open end of the bottle. You don’t want water to flow back into your pump.

8. Fill the bottle to within an inch or two of the top with aquarium water.

9. Add 2 tablespoons of non-iodized salt or aquarium salt to the water in the bottle and dissolve it.

10. Add enough brine shrimp eggs to cover the surface of the water in the bottle. It doesn’t take too many. The eggs are very small, and a single layer of eggs will hatch MANY shrimp.

11. Turn on the aquarium pump. The goal is to keep the eggs moving in the water.

12. Let the system run until the eggs hatch. It usually takes about 36 – 48 hours if the water is about 80 degrees. Longer if the water is cooler.

13. Stop the flow of air after that amount of time and let the water come to rest. Look through the water and if you see the baby shrimp (they are tiny) wiggling through the water you can harvest them.

14. Place a light near the bottom (cap) of the bottle. The shrimp will gather toward the light, and the eggshells and unhatched eggs will float to the surface.

15. Use your turkey baster to suck the water near the bottom of the bottle into the baster. Remove the baster, and shoot the shrimp and water through the brine shrimp net to collect the brine shrimp. Let the water run down the drain or back into the bottle.

16. Rinse the shrimp gently in fresh water, and then release the shrimp into your fish tank that contains the fish you are wanting to feed.

Tips & Warnings

• Keep your unhatched eggs in the refrigerator in an air tight container until you are ready to hatch them. This will keep them fresher, and you will get better hatch rates.
• After you start your first brine shrimp hatchery, start another one the next day. This way, you will have brine shrimp that are ready to harvest every day if you resent them each time after use.
• Brine shrimp can only live in saltwater, so only feed as many as the fish can eat at one time. They will live at least an hour in your freshwater tank, but it is better to not depend on that.