Help With Fry Food!

[fishlover101]

so ive been breeding my bettas... unfortunately out of FOUR spawns only 36 have lived... I realize I messed up.. I did a TON of research on breeding the bettas, but none on raising the actual fry... so I was feeding frozen baby brine shrimp... ive now decided that I am going to hatch my own brine shrimp cultures... I bought the pump the air stone and the tubing.. as well as a tube of eggs and some aquarium salt... I followed the instructions.. how long until I can transfer the fish onto frozen foods?

 

[TwoTankAmin]

The nutritional value of BBS drops very very fast. within about 8 hours of hatching it is virtually 0 at about 82F. Therefore you need to have a continuous hatching system or you are wasting your time and money. The appeal of live foods are they move in the water on their own and the fish are hardwired to chase them. For most of my fry I will begin to mix frozen with live at about day 10 and start with maybe 20% or so frozen. I keep upping this each day or two and usually can ween them over to non live by about day 15 -16.
 
The is a super article on feeding brine and nutritional value which is slanted towards sw fish. However, the only difference between using BBS or brine for fw and sw fish is that sw fish need to have the shrimp fed with a supplement the fish need by putting in the food the bbs/brine will take in with their filter feeding.
 
http/www.advancedaquarist.com/2004/1/inverts
 
Here is a quote"

 
When Artemia nauplii first hatch (Instar I), they do not have a complete gut, and it is not until they develop to Instar II that the baby brine start to feed. The time of development to Instar II depends on a variety of factors (most importantly temperature, but also salinity), but occurs within 6 to 30 hours after hatching. At 28°C (roughly 82°F) it takes about 8 hours for the newly hatched nauplii to begin feeding, and as the temperature drops, that time becomes much longer. As soon as the nauplii hatch, they begin to digest their yolk and become less nutritious with time after hatching, however, once they reach the second instar, they can begin to feed, and you can enhance their nutritional value by feeding them

 

[Wildbetta]

Switching to non-live food for betta fry is best accomplished around 6-8 weeks of age.  Until that time they do best on a live diet.

 

[fishlover101]

Thankyou!