Commercial scale fairy shrimp culture

There is an ancient thread that deals in part with this topic, but perhaps a new one will revive discussion.

It seems that nobody seems to be able to raise large amounts of fairy shrimp at home, either as continuous colonies or those that let the orginal colony dry out and then hatch the eggs.

However, there are obviously people who raise huge numbers of these, including the company from which everybody buys their (priced at a premium) eggs on Ebay - I think they're in Arizona. There are also several companies that produce huge quantities of eggs in Thailand and/or Malaysia. I'm sure that there's trade secrets involved here, but does anybody have any idea how they might be doing this? It would seem that fairy shrimp colonies will succumb to Nitrates eventually, but the densities that the aforementioned commercial operations use much be huge, otherwise the eggs would be even more expensive.

I'm getting ready to try raising them again in a couple of plastic kiddy pools to see if I can't get some sort of a continuous system going with one allowed to grow out and become dry while the other is just getting started. Anybody have any other ideas?

Thanks!

Edited by ignatz, 13 March 2012 - 12:51 AM.

I would guess the commercial growers use shallow earthen ponds, possibly with a greenwater culture. This would not only solve the nitrate issue but would provide food for the animals. The trick would be finding a fairy shrimp species that thrives in those conditions.

If your guess is correct, there's no trick. The right species is obviously the commercially available one.

I don't think that's all of it because the commercially available species are the ones that people have with which to experiment. I've tried raising the "redtailed" and the "dry lake" species (not completely sure which these actually are) from the company in Arizona, and two species of Streptocephalus from Thailand. The Thai species seem to absolutely demand live greenwater to get to adulthood - I couldn't raise them with anything but. One question that I have with the earthen pond idea is how they would separate the eggs once dried, as all the ones I've recieved seem to have no dirt or dust in them whatsoever. I suppose they'd have to be sieved.

here is something you can try. take a kiddie pool and fill it with rain water or distilled water. line the bottom with oak leaves(dead ones).
take a mild green tea, finely ground, and sprinkle it on the surface of the water until it covers the water. you could also use ground oak leaves for this(i grind mine in a coffee grinder).

sprinkle your fairy shrimp eggs out in the center of the pool. the "dust" will keep th eggs from sticking to the sides until they absorb enough water to either sink or hatch. the particles from the leaves/tea will feed the nauplii untill algae starts to grow. i also occasionally feed mine a green soup that i make by blending up aquarium plants that i weed out of my fishtanks. i just blend them up and pour them through a metal coffee filter basket. the solid stuff gets tossed in a special compost/roach(blaptica dubia) bin and the green water gets fed off to my fairy shrimp.

my experience tells me that fairy shrimp do much better with larger surface areas and still water. and be careful about adding water, when they are young they are extremely succeptible to osmotic shock. for this reason i never change my water or even top off until they are at least a few weeks old. a good strategy for top off is to set up two kiddie pools and only use one for top offs. by the time it dries up, they are usually big enough to handle mild water changes.

Auban, thanks very much for these suggestions. I will try them to the letter and report back. My greenhouse is extremely warm if the sun is shining at all, maybe too warm. What species of fairy shrimp do you raise with this method?

Also, would RO water work as well? I'd rather use that then to buy 100 gallons or so of distilled....

Edited by ignatz, 25 March 2012 - 07:38 PM.

Also, are the oak leaves helpful because of the tannins they release? Here in New Mexico we don't really have much in the way of oak leaves - lots of cottonwood, but there's not a lot of tannins in cottonwood leaves. I might be able to go up into the mountains to get some scrub oak or Gambel oak leaves, but these are small and not in any real quantity. I could use Indian almond, but enough to cover the bottom of a kiddie pool would cost a fortune even if I get them direct from Thailand. There's also the possibility of using blackwater tonic or some similar product, but not sure if this is doing the same thing as the leaves.

Ignatz -- I think any deciduous tree or shrub leaves will work, including cottonwood, willow, box elder, maple, alder, elm, etc. Tannins are probably not as important as the bacteria that grow on decaying leaves. Do you have a way to catch rainwater? I use rainwater off my roof for Moina and Daphnia, so it'll probably work for fairy shrimp. Tapwater might work OK, after leaves have soaked in it a few days. Will try to get those food cultures mailed tomorrow -- sorry for the delay.

The only place in NC I've ever seen fairy shrimp wild was near you Auban, in the Sandhills Game Lands. Somebody told me they were Streptocephalus seali. Adult males were greenish, females and young tan, both sexes have red tail.

It hasn't rained here in several months, and the rainwater that comes off the roof is suspect until the monsoons because of the dirty air in this area...so I'm kind of stuck with RO water...will that work? I can of course adjust it for TDS...

RO should be fine. i actually use tap water to hatch mine, as my city water does not use clorine. i only get about a 30-40% hatch rate from it because of the lower osmotic pressure, but when we are talking ten thousand eggs for the first generation or so, in five gallons of water, it doesnt really matter. every time i dry out my sand in my five gallon(dont use the kiddie pool anymore), i end up with far more hatches than i could ever sustain anyway.

there is a live marine algae supplement for reef tanks called phyto feast that i use to establish green water. i discovered it a while ago while experimenting with it. it seems that the "marine" algae they use can also live in fresh water.

one thing i forgot to mention is that you will have better luck if you season your tank/pool first. to do this, simply fill it about half way with water, add clean sand to the bottom, oak/hardwood leaves, and any source of green water. simply leave it out in the sun until it dries. after it is dry, you will be ready to add the eggs and water to start raising your fairy shrimp.

seasoning the tank first puts it as close to the natural vernal pool habitat as you can get. it allows algae time to bloom, go through a cycle, and then produce spores that will begin growing imediately upon rehydration. this works much better than simply using oak leaves alone, although i still find that there is less die off due to bacteria and fungus when the tanins from oak leaves are present. it basicaly just gives the new nauplii a food source that they can eat to help them through the first week, but not so much food that it fouls the water.

the type of leaves is not all that important, even pine needles will work in a pinch, but they MUST be seasoned first. any kind of hardwood leaf should be fine. the idea is that they almost imediately release tannins into the water, which inhibit fungus, while at the same time breaking down and producing bacteria for the nauplii to eat. about 12 years ago i first came up with the idea using half rotten oak bark. i couldnt for the life of me get Triops longicaudatus to surive their first week, but noticed that if i added a tea bag to their water on the first day, they lived longer. that is the idea that led me to the oak bark, as it seemed to produce a more stringent tannin. oak bark led to leaves, as i realized it was easier to grind up and just as effective.

Gerald, where did you find fairy shrimp in the game lands? i have been out there around this time for the past few years and have never seen them. i have been raising the species streptocephalus seali for a few years now and would love to see them in the wild. maybe im hitting them up too early?

my current culture was started right before i came home from iraq this past december and i still have one large green male that is still looking good after 121 days. my wife wanted to surprise me with an active fairy shrimp tank.

Edited by Auban, 26 March 2012 - 08:42 PM.

I was on a trip with the NC Herp Society about 15 yrs ago and I wasnt driving, so I dont know exactly where, but it was a big vernal pool in Scotland County known for its high frog & salamander diversity. Sorry I dont recall the season either. NC Herps has a spring and a fall meeting, so it was probably Apr or Nov..

i have probably been looking in more or less the right place then. i have seen a lot of ephemeral pool life, just no fairy shrimp. im going to do a little google earth map recon and see if i can find a good location this weekend. ill also look into the old carolina bays. if you look at the sat photos on google earth, at the area just north of lake waccamaw, around white lake, you can see plenty of old dried up "carolina bays". i bet some of them still form vernal pools. even if i dont find fairy shrimp, im sure ill find something interesting.

Some of those Bladen Co bays are highly acidic -- not sure how low Streptocephalus can tolerate. Not much algae to eat either.

For "something interesting" to watch out for, go to this website: http://www.herpsofnc...nd/Hyl_and.html
Right under the name you'll see "Listen to the Call". Play it a few dozen times, then go see if you can find one. It's one of those Holy Grail Herps worth seeking.

i have seen them every year at my in-laws place. they have a small vernal pool behind their house out in carthage. when the pool is full, there are hundreds of them around. they used to have a swimming pool, but they tore it down after frogs started invading it. i usually find several different species of frogs there, as well as salamanders. i havent been lucky enough to catch the salamanders out breeding yet, but i see lots of larvae every year.

the one herp that i have been searching for, for quite some time now, is the eastern ringneck snake. i used to have one that would eat worms out of my hand. it lived for a few years in captivity, grew from 8 to 16 inches, and would crawl up to me when i opened its cage. i gave it a new water bowl one day without thinking about how heavy it was and the snake crawled under it and got pinned down and died. been looking for another ever since.

Edited by Auban, 28 March 2012 - 05:48 PM.