Hatching/Growing Live foods?

[auxout]

I am looking for info on live foods I am only finding sites with some basic info. What I want to know they don't seem to say.
Are brine shrimp good for any kind of fish or mostly just fry food?
Whats another live food thats easy to hatch/grow for larger fish I have fish ranging from 1"- 8". I feed them mostly flake food but I just don't get alot of growth out of my fish and one loach in particular seems to be losing his color. Some live food would help out in the color department I have read and I know it's got to be better than flake all the time. Is it possible to grow brine shrimp larger to feed larger fish, what do shrimp eat? and do they reproduce if fed, kept, etc? Any live food sites, experience, ideas, will be appreciated alot.

Thanks in Advance

[Heady]

Newly hatched brine shrimp are excellent food for fry. If you leave the rest in an aerated container and feed them, you can use the adults to feed larger fish. Also the adults will breed and you can maintain your own little colony of brine shrimp.

I believe that while brine shrimp are great for stimulating fishes' natural hunting instinct (and thus can be used to get fish... in the mood), they do not contain much in the way of valuable nutrients. It is possible to buy them frozen or freeze dried and enriched, but living brine shrimp don't have enough nutrients to sustain fish when used as the only food source.

I've used brine shrimp in conjunction with other foods to prime fish for spawning. I have also used it in conjunction with other foods for actually raising fry. As a supplement it is great.

I have heard and read about people who culture their own worms. That is a little too gross for me though, so I've never actually done it.

[125gJoe]

http://gordon.sourcecod.com/images/flagicons/american_flag.gif

I could be wrong here, but from what I have heard is that brine shrimp are great for young fish, but too fatty for the diets of larger, older fish.....

[Stias']

www.wormman.com has worms and a few other things. I grow red, leaf, and african worms. My oscar is very happy about my growing worms, but the wife is not.

You can even make fine food for fry, I dry out red worms and run them through a peppermill. Mickie Mouse plattiees took off much faster on worms than just crumpled up flake food.

HTH
Stias'

[auxout]

Sounds good I will check out the site, I am definitely looking to boost my fish's growth some I just don't think flake food does it once they get around 1-2". My cichlid hasn't grown in forever it seems, and I'd love to see my scissortails and longfin dainos bigger. Worms seems viable, doesn't gross me out I think I remember eating a nightcrawler once for a dare, mmmm :o. But there was one type of worm I remember reading was bad to handle. Black worms?

Heady what do you feed the brine shrimp?

80gjoe, I think you are right I read that the brine shrimp freshly hatched have a yolk sack full of rich food stuff, very good for fry, but it gets eaten by the shrimp after a short while. So I was thinking maybe adult brine shrimp would be ok to feed adult fish?

[Heady]

Let's see. This was a long time ago so bear with me.

This was at a time I was raising a lot of baby bettas. I remember hardboiling eggs, placing a yolk in cheesecloth, and wringing a small amount out into the water. However I am not sure if that was just for the brand new baby fish or for the brine shrimp as well. I believe the instructions for feeding the brine shrimp were on the package of eggs. I just bought a vial of San Franscico Bay brine shrimp and followed their directions. I also had a small black box with a clear tube that you could attach to the top, the brine shrimp would swim out into that tube. I also aerated their saltwater. I remember it was really really easy taking care of them, and that was at the beginning of my fishkeeping hobby.

[wetmanNY]

There are lots of links to culturing techniques in the "Live Food" pages at www.skepticalaquarist.com

I think the "worms" that can be troubling to handle are bloodworms, the larvae of a gnat. Some people are dangerously allergic to them. You'll soon know if you're one of them.

Alergic reactions aren't something I've heard about in connection with California blackworms.