Feeding Fry tip..BBS

[brewmaster15]

Hi all,
Just wanted to share a tip here. Alot of fry require BBS (Baby Brine Shrimp) to grow and thrive. We hatch these out daily to feed the fry. Its a pain but once you get in the habitat its pretty quickly set up and accomplished. Add the Brine shrimp cysts, salt, water, and aerate at appropriate temp with light and in 18-24 hours you have fresh healthy and nutritious Baby Brine shrimp. Here is where the tip comes in..always always always, Freeze some. Its easy to do and if you have a problem with a batch of BBS you can easily get by 24 hours for a new batch. Batches do fail... I've forgotten to add salt,had airlines pop off,dropped containers. All of these things can really put a crimp on feeding your fry.

Like most of my fish keeping, nothing is high tech in my methodology.

Hatch a batch of shrimp, I like to transfer to a jar to let settle out. Then I use a turkey baster to transfer to a paper coffee filter.. filter the BBS, rinse with a little fresh water and move to a bag..label and freeze.


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Now if I need some I just break a piece off, thaw and feed. Also the way I do this as outlined here, there is virtually no shells in the bag. This process is also good when you will not be able to feed fry and are relying on others.. just freeze smaller bags. I have used these to go away a few days when I had discus fry on parents and relied on a pet sitter.

al

[Second Hand Pat]

Great idea Al and I have done this before. One thing about me is I am a absolute klutz with a turkey baster. So I use a syringe with air hose attached to where the needle goes and attach a piece of rigid tubing to the other end. I suck up the BBS (with water added) into the syringe then you can squirt the BBS anywhere you wish by placing the end of the rigid tubing near the fry. Let me know if a picture would help?
Pat

[jwcarlson]

I freeze extra in a little silicone ice cube tray. I don't have much extra anymore, but it works pretty well.

[gimaal]

Great idea Al and I have done this before. One thing about me is I am a absolute klutz with a turkey baster. So I use a syringe with air hose attached to where the needle goes and attach a piece of rigid tubing to the other end. I suck up the BBS (with water added) into the syringe then you can squirt the BBS anywhere you wish by placing the end of the rigid tubing near the fry. Let me know if a picture would help?
Pat

I use the airline tubing method too, Pat. And I use the flashlight function on my phone to attract the BBS to one corner of the jar.

[AquaticNerd]

Such a gem of a tip when feeding fry BBS. It honestly had never occurred to me to do something like this, and I definitely would have been the one to drop the bottle/jug and lose an entire day of fry food because of it.