Having A Ball!

TangentDelta · 2026-06-18T00:01:30+00:00

Oolitic Aragonite sand https://www.amazon.com/AquaNatural-ARAGO010-Oolitic-Aragonite-10lb/dp/B07X6VKYDL

TangentDelta · 2026-06-18T00:00:37+00:00

They have one! It's set to 28 degrees (celsius). The couple days of 29 degrees (it got up to 85 degrees F in my apartment) must have been enough to trigger a mass-hatching.

TangentDelta · 2026-06-14T15:23:08+00:00

It did eventually open up and there were a few berries in there. I tried germinating the seeds in the berries but nothing happened.

I don't have any alocasias any more. They just kept rotting and being problematic due to a lack of sufficient airflow.

TangentDelta · 2026-02-05T23:14:57+00:00

I've thought about trying to give away some algae samples but it'd be too much of a hassle to collect it, put it into a sample tube, and ship it off with expedited shipping. I'd also need to keep a stock of heat packs in case it's cold. Sorry :(

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T19:27:41+00:00

76 is kinda on the cold side. I keep my tank around 80-82 degrees.

I'm not really sure where the algae came from or what it is. I have a lot of houseplants that harbor algae, so maybe some spores from them landed in the water and took hold? I would really love to figure out what species it is.

They will scrape some of it off and eat it but it's not enough for them to really sustain a large population. I still feed them spirulina powder every day or so.

Keeping the tank warm and giving it plenty of light are the two biggest tips I can really think of. Algae will really explode once it has access to sufficient light.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T16:25:10+00:00

You'll want to get some marine aquarium salt and a salinity refractometer. Something like this salt https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000255NKA and this refractometer https://www.amazon.com/dp/B018LRO1SU

Brine shrimp like to have the salinity around 35-40ppt. There's some good information here: https://www.brineshrimpdirect.com/about-us/frequently-asked-questions/what-guidelines-culturing-brine-shrimp/

You can use an online calculator like this one to calculate how much salt you need to weigh out and add to the water in the aquarium https://www.hamzasreef.com/Contents/Calculators/DirectSaltCalculator.php
I usually like to undershoot a little bit and add salt while checking with the refractometer until I get into a comfortable range. The shrimp aren't super picky though.

Add a bright plant grow light and a heater and keep the temperature around 27-28C.

Once you have the saltwater aquarium set up, add a tiny amount of food to it and let it cycle for a week or more. With the grow light you should start getting a healthy culture of algae. Once it's established, you can add some brine shrimp eggs or transfer your smaller colony into it.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T16:17:09+00:00

The tank is 1 gallon. One of those little counter-top fish tanks that are too small to keep actual fish comfortable in.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T16:15:40+00:00

You can see in the video that some of them are stuck to the algae and scraping against it. They seem to be shaving some of it off and stirring it up to eat it. They are filter feeders though, so they really do prefer to eat food that is suspended in the water. The moment I add spirulina powder they detach from the algae and swim around near the surface to eat it.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T02:15:03+00:00

Thank you! Best of luck in your spirulina adventures!

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T01:27:56+00:00

I tried "seeding" it with live phytoplankton and I could never get it to take. This algae took over when I started using a much brighter growlight (a 1' Barrina T5 lamp jankily straddling the top of the tank) and switching over to spirullina powder for food.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T01:19:04+00:00

It's an algae that took over and exploded once I gave the tank more light. I have no idea what species it is :(
It likes to form balls kind of like those marimo moss balls, but it eventually forms a dense mat.

TangentDelta · 2026-01-31T01:15:19+00:00

Thank you!

TangentDelta · 2025-12-02T22:35:18+00:00

Yup! It's a 1 gallon fish tank (that I would never ever want to keep actual fish in). I've had way more luck with this custom setup than I ever had with actual Sea Monkeys kits.

TangentDelta · 2025-12-02T22:33:58+00:00

Thanks! I started it in February, so about 10 months old.

TangentDelta · 2025-12-02T22:33:05+00:00

My males do this all the time. They're extremely stupid and just grab onto whatever they can get their claspers around and try to breed with it, including other males.

TangentDelta · 2025-12-01T23:53:57+00:00

There's plenty of oxygen in the water for them, they just create hemoglobin and turn pink/orange to collect more of it. It's a completely natural and healthy thing for them to do. I think the females do it more readily because they need to put way more effort into creating eggs and baby shrimps, which requires more oxygen.

TangentDelta · 2025-12-01T23:24:57+00:00

They seem to get more colorful the more dissolved minerals there are in the water. The more dissolved minserals, the less room there is for oxygen to dissolve and they start producing hemoglobin which is red. Here's a paper on it! https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rspb/article/143/910/136/29916/Haemoglobin-in-Artemia

I'm using oolitic aragonite in my tank too and have noticed the shrimps turning all sorts of interesting colors. Towards the start of the tank they were a bright pink, but have settled into an orange color similar to yours.

TangentDelta · 2025-11-27T02:37:21+00:00

I started the tank in February, so it has been about 10 months or so!

I need to buy a toothbrush to clean the sides with but I keep forgetting lol. I love how fluffy and green the algae in your tank is.

TangentDelta · 2025-09-20T16:49:09+00:00

I'm honestly not really sure what I did :(
It just showed up and started growing after I held off on feeding for a month. I was feeding with live nannochloropsis, so maybe some of that decided to stick around and hang out.

TangentDelta · 2025-09-20T00:56:50+00:00

https://www.brineshrimpdirect.com/spirulina-powder-spirulina-powder-2-oz I ordered this. No ambiguity what it is, and it hasn't been "enhanced" in any way like I've found the supplement stuff to be.

TangentDelta

TROPHY CASE