Brine Shrimp Hatchery

What you need
A 1.5 liter plastic bottle with a cap
A one-way gang valve
An air pump

Tools
A knife
A sharp object

How to do it

  1. Use the knife to cut off the bottom one-third of the bottle.
  2. Use the sharp object to make a small hole in the bottle cap. The hole should be somewhat smaller than the gang valve to avoid leakage.
  3. Force the gang valve through the hole in the cap. (If the hole got too big, you will need to seal it using silicon.)
  4. Fill the bottle with ordinary tap water and carefully check for leaks before you prepare the saltwater.
  5. The saltwater should consist of 1 tablespoon of marine salt for each liter of water. It is important not to use ordinary kitchen salt.
  6. Pour the saltwater into the bottle.
  7. Add a small scoop of brine shrimp eggs. It is important not to use too many eggs.
  8. Screw the lid on and connect the one-way gang valve to the air pump.
  9. Turn on the air pump and wait for the eggs to hatch. It will normally take at least 24 hours.
  10. When it is time to harvest the brine shrimps, close the gang valve, add 0.5 L of tap water to the bottle and wait. After approximately 5 minutes, three layers will have formed in the bottle. The top layer will consist of empty egg shells, the mid layer of clear water and the bottom layer of brine shrimp.
  11. Release the gang-valve and let the solution flow into another bottle. As the water level in the first bottle decreases, the empty egg shells will get stuck to the sides of the bottle. If you are careful it is therefore quite easy to get the brine shrimp to flow into the new bottle and leave the discarded egg shells behind in the old bottle. They are now ready to be fed to your fishes.

Brine shrimp tip # 1
When you have purchases brine shrimp eggs, place them in the refrigerator at once. Ideally stick to shops that store their brine shrimp eggs in a similar fashion since this will increase the chances of a high hatching rate. The vegetable compartment of a refrigerator will normally hold an ideal temperature for storing brine shrimp eggs.

Brine shrimp tip # 2
The nutritional value of brine shrimp drops by the hour after hatching. You should therefore feed them to your fish right away, or place them in a growing aquarium where you can fatten them up on nutritious food, thus restoring their nutritional value.

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