Artemia or brine shrimps belong to the crustaceans. The best known species is Artemia salina and they are ideal food for young and newly hatched Axolotl. Artemia can also be bred at home without much effort.
What are Brine Shrimp?
Artemia also called brine shrimp are ideal live food for young axolotls and belong to the crustaceans. They can grow from 0,3 to 04 inches long (a few mm to 2 cm) in size and contain chitin, making them very high in fiber.
Since brine shrimp, as the name suggests, live in saltwater, they can’t introduce parasites into the freshwater aquarium that would survive in that environment. Despite the fact that they live in saltwater, they don’t have an increased salt content and after they have been rinsed briefly, they can be fed safely.
Their movements also triggers the hunting instinct in young axolotls, making them an ideal live food.
Advantages of Artemia are:
- easy to breed
- ideal food for baby axolotls
- rich in fiber
- no danger of parasites
Artemia lay permanent eggs, also called cysts, that are very hardy and can hatch decades later if stored well. Brine Shrimp feed on floating algae and bacteria.
What do you need for breeding brine shrimp at home?
Equipment needed:
- Small Aquarium* around 5 to 10 gallons or Artemia Breeding Dish*
- Airstone* or air pump*
- Artemia salt*, Artemia sieve* and a light source
- Artemia food, e.g. powdered spirulina* and yeast suspensions
- Artemia eggs*
As a container for your new Artemia you will need either a small aquarium or a shallow bowl, like an Artemis breeding dish. The airstone provides sufficient water movement and oxygen, and it is also important that enough light reaches the Artemia eggs, as they need it to hatch. A normal lamp or a place on the window sill is usually sufficient for this. The water temperature should be between 77 to 86 °F (25 and 30 °C). Depending on how warm your home is, you may need a small aquarium heater*.
To get the right salinity for your Artemia, mix 8 tablespoons of salt per gallon of water (32 g of salt per liter of water) and the ideal pH for Artemia is pH 8.
If you don’t want to buy the equipment separately, you can also buy a complete Artemia Breeding Kit*, which includes everything you need.
How to breed Artemia?
1. Artemia eggs
After you have mixed the salt water and set everything up, you can add the Artemia eggs to the water. A rule of thumb is about 2 teaspoons of eggs per gallon of water (1 to 2g of eggs per liter).
For the salt content, you should never use table salt, as this usually contains anti-caking agent that Artemia can’t tolerate, as it gums up their gills. Instead you can use Artemia salt or sea salt.
2. Artemia nauplii
The eggs hatch after 24 to 48 hours with adequate lighting. At this stage Artemia are particularly rich in nutrients as they are still feeding from their own yolk sac and are called “nauplii”. You should feed your Artemia at least 48 hours after hatching, as they have emptied their yolk sac and now require food. Yeast suspension or powdered spirulina is particularly suitable as a rearing foods.
If you have particularly small or newly hatched axolotls, you can feed them the Artemia nauplii.
3. Adult Artemia
When you want your Artemia to continue to grow and reproduce you have to wait a few days longer.
After 12 days the adult Artemia become sexual mature and start to reproduce. Now you can also feed additional yeast suspension, which is a good food source for the larger Artemia.
Artemia food:
- Spirulina*
- Yeast suspension
- Soybean powder or wheat flour
- Egg yolk
To feed the spirulina powder you can mix about 1/2 teaspoon in one cup of water and add it to the tank. The water should clear up after 2 hours, when the brine shrimp consumed all the microalgae. To prepare the yeast suspension, you can add about 4 to 5 drops of yeast to every 5 gallons of water.
How do you feed Brine Shrimp to your Axolotl?
Depending on whether you want to feed nauplii or adult Artemia, you harvest them at different times. Nauplii can be harvested and fed directly after the first days following hatching, for adult Artemia you have to wait a little longer.
Brine shrimp are fully grown after about 10 to 12 days and you can now harvest live food for your Axolotl every few days. The easiest way to do this is to skim them off with a Artemia sieve and rinse them briefly with tap water, so that you don’t bring any salt water into your Axolotl tank. Then you can add them to your Axolotl.
You can also freeze the brine shrimp in freshwater, similar to ice cubes, if you have a lot of Artemia and store them for a longer period of time.
Here is an article with a complete feeding guide for axolotls at every phase of their life as well.
What problems can occur when breeding Brine shrimps?
You followed the instructions and still no Artemia hatched or they don’t reproduce? Here are a few of the most common problems:
Old or bad Artemia eggs
Even though Artemia eggs can last for decades, how many Artemia hatch depends greatly on their quality. If no Artemia hatch, buy eggs from another retailer for your next attempt.
The wrong salt or high salt concentration
Artemia don’t tolerate normal table salt, because they die from the added anti-caking agent. Also, too high of a salt concentration can cause them to die.
Poor water quality or soap residues
Too high levels of heavy metals in the water will cause the Artemia to stop growing, or not hatch at all. Soap or detergent residues in the tank can also be harmful to them.
Conclusion
Brine shrimp are excellent live food, especially for young Axolotl and can be bred without much effort. Instead of purchasing all the equipment individually, you can also simply use an Artemia breeding kit and thus always have fresh food for your Axolotl in the house.
Another live food option for young axolotls are Daphnia, and for larger axolotls earthworms. These can also easily be bred at home, click here for an article on breeding daphnia and here for breeding earthworm.