Brine shrimp / Artemia - NatureHolic live food

Adult Artemia are an excellent live food not only for fish, but also for crayfish, shrimp, crabs and even snails. Leaf-footed crayfish of the genus Artemia originate from large inland waters with strongly alkaline salt water such as the Great Salt Lake in Utah / USA.

Artemia are specially bred as live food in facilities with saltwater, they are not taken from nature. The small crustaceans contain chitin, which is an important dietary fiber for fish for intestinal health and provides shrimp, crabs, shrimps and crustaceans in general with vital building materials for their own shell. In addition, artemia contain cholesterol and molting hormones, which is also very beneficial to crustaceans for their own molting. The ratio of fat, carbohydrates and protein that brine shrimp have is optimal for fish and freshwater invertebrates.

Since Artemia come from saltwater, they cannot be used to introduce parasites or nuisances that would survive in a freshwater aquarium. Thanks to the osmoregulation, Artemia do not contain a higher salt content inside the body than other live food from freshwater, which is why the brine shrimp should be rinsed briefly, but can then be fed to freshwater animals without any hesitation.

The Artemia themselves also survive only a short time in freshwater, so they can be used by shrimp and snails that would not actively hunt for live food. These invertebrates digest the dead brine shrimp. Crayfish and crabs, just like fish, actively go hunting for the little nutrient bombs.

Of course, you can also use these live Artemia to make a breeding stock.

Artemia isstored as live food either in a bag in the refrigerator (if the animals are fed quickly) or at room temperature in a container from 5 l with salt water (salt content 40-50 g/l, not with table salt, but either with sea salt from the pet store or with special Artemia salt - table salt contains a trickling agent, which prevents clumping, but gums up the gills of the crustaceans and kills them). For enhancement, you can feed the Artemia with a little spirulina powder or enrich them even more with nutrients and vitamins using enrichment agents from INVE or Tropic Marin.

Here you can buy adult live artemia in portions of 45, 90 or 180 ml, shrink-wrapped in a plastic bag for live food, in which you can also store the live food for a short time in the refrigerator.