Artemia cysts from the Great Salt Lake.
We have been having considerable trouble with our Artemia. We are barely getting any hatchout at 24 hours and are forced to wait until 48 hours to harvest the hatched Artemia to feed to our fish. We have heard that there is a considerable shortage of Artemia around and many different labs are having difficulty as well. We are trying the decysting protocol with bleach to try and increase our hatch rate, but the results aren't encouraging. We have received bad cysts from: Argent, That Fish PLace, Aquatic Ecosystems, and many others. We were wondering if anyone in the Zebrafish community has found a repeatedly successful source of Artemia.
Stephen Pratt
HHMI
Children's Hospital
300 Longwood Ave
Boston, MA 02115
Pratt@rascal.med.harvard.edu
Stephen:
NEPTUNE INDUSTRIES
P.O. Box 2728
Salt Lake City, UT 84110
Phone: (801)328-9195.
Hatching rate is reasonably high (>90%, estimated). We harvest them after 48 h. The nauplii are probably larger than those from Argent (which we didn't try, but were told so), but they are better than nothing!
Hatching problems can be caused by contaminants in the water and low pH. Did you check that? Also, the cysts need to be stored at a dry, cool place.
I hope this helps. Good luck!
--Herwig
(Herwig Baier; baier@jeeves.ucsd.edu)