Glad to hear you've got more eggs! Sadly, I lost all the little ones from my hatch 2 weeks ago, but there's always next time. Hatching a bunch tonight, actually.
Yikes!! Rotifers at 83 is high -- try lowering that to 75. I have mine in the living room with no heater. They do well at ~70. I harvest every day or every other day. If I have no fry or brine shrimp to feed them to, I might dump them in my display tank for my corals or down the drain. If you don't, they get overpopulated, and they might go into hibernation if they don't die of their own toxicity (you do use Prime or AmQuel, I hope?). If they hibernate, you may be able to revive them if you pour off and strain the entire bucket and then use the filtrate as a starter. Sometimes it works wonders, sometimes not so much.
To count them, you take a glass full of rotifer water. They say to use real glass, but a disposable plastic cup works just fine. Put it someplace quiet in a well lit room and let it stand for a good 10 minutes. Make sure there's light from above or they will settle on the bottom. If you inspect closely, you'll see what looks like little specs of dust in the water column, and you will be able to see them move. Even though you can't see details, they are visible to the naked eye, and there is no doubt that animals are swimming. You should also be able to see many of them are carrying eggs. It helps to use a light background (paper?) and a magnifying glass, if you have one. I can't say I know for sure how many is "enough" but there should be a lot of them - mine are usually spaced less than 1/4 inch apart.
Your salinity is perfect! I think besides your temperature being high you may have ammonia. I dose 0.5mL of Prime every 2 days with an insulin syringe for accuracy. I also change some water twice a week -- maybe 3 quarts -- filling from the display tank so the tank gets extra water changes, too. I change their filter pad every 2 weeks or so - I use these flat square pads I found on the cheap that fit perfectly into the bottom of a cat litter bucket.
Always a good idea to put some aside or run 2 cultures, just in case, and take care about how much you feed them. Extra algae can rot and turn to ammonia fast. You can bottle some up and store them in the fridge in an open milk jug for 2 weeks (no more) and use them to start a new culture if you have to. Then, restock the jug when you have a thriving culture.
Found this at the UN's Fisheries and Aquaculture Organization website (
http://www.fao.org) Lucky us - a whole chapter:
http://www.fao.org/docrep/003/w3732e/w3732e0h.htm. There's a bit in there about raising rotifers on yeast, which I may try some day.
Lots longer than I thought this would be. Wish you luck with these guys. Re-post or send me a PM if you have any other questions.
by UNIXMan » Thu Jan 13, 2011 6:17 pm 