Larvae problems...

[heather]

Death- is it normal for alot to die? or am i doing something horribly wrong? so many have died and i feel like a really bad mother. I started with forty-five and now i only have tweny-four!!!

im a murderer!

Cannibalism-Before I even knew it five were missing without a trace. And two of them were growing at alarming rates...with big bulges in their tummies. They hunt and kill together.

Food-So far I've been trying them on alot of things; Brine shrimp, Tetra-delca daphnia, Tetra-fauna blood worms, and a commercial tadpole diet.
they like the shrimp and the tetra delca daphnia.
are those nutritious enough?
and how about the tadpole food?

 

[cynthia]

Heather - Perhaps I was just lucky but when I had larvae I didn't lose very many of them.

Most of them that were lost were by what I called "the big heads". Just as you described the larger larvae with the largest heads (biggest mouths) started snacking on siblings. So I always sorted mine by the body size then by head width. Even a small stubby larvae can eat its siblings if it has a wide head and mouth. Once the larvae were 1 inch long I tried to keep no more than 1 larvae to a 6" x 6" square area in each container. The containers were big plastic sweater box size closet storage containers.

Once mine were past the newly hatched brine shrimp eating size they went to frozen blood worms. Once a week (Disclaimer: heart was a recommended food back then.) I would cut up beef/venison/elk/lamb heart into tiny tiny pieces and feed it to them.

I fed 2 times a day. An hour or so after each feeding I changed 50 to 100% (depending on how dirty it was) of the water. Some tubs of larvae needed cleaned more often if they were pooing a lot.

Every 3rd day their container was washed with a light bleach solution, and rinsed really well. I had extra containers so I could just net up the larvae using a soft brine shrimp net and put them directly in to new clean containers of water.

I only fed my larvae live brine shrimp, blood worms and heart (note disclaimer above).
Out of 100 I would lose perhaps 20 to 25 usually with in a few days of hatching or in a few weeks at the jaws of their siblings.

I don't think you are a murderer. You are doing your best. We really don't know why they are dieing, it could be a variety of things. Hang in there.

 

[heather]

Thank you for your support Cynthia.
i feel a little better now.

 

[claire]

my 1st ever batch hasn't been as successful as i wished. i have around 30-40 left now and some are dying around every 2-3days.im trying to keep the ones i have left alive but i dont think they will all survive. im trying my best but i dont think its going to work. i have more eggs which are beginning to hatch now so maybe ill have more luck next time.

could anyone give possible reasons why they are dying apart from the cannibalism because ive kept the numbers down.

thanks in advance.

 

[jennifer]

The most common reasons for little ones to die are water quality or lack of suitable food. Ingestion of unhatched brine shrimp eggs can kill. Poor nutrition for the adults can result in weak eggs/larvae that tend to die off. Infections can occur, but those usually wipe out all of them in short time.

I'd recommend major water changes and a clean container every few days, like Cynthia describes. Uneaten non-live food and the slime that builds on the inside of the container can be deadly, in my opinion. Hope you have better luck with the next batch.

Heather - skip the tadpole food. Tadpoles are vegetarians, so even if the axies ate it, it's not what they need. Brine shrimp and daphnia are nutritionally good enough, but if they are non-live, it's difficult to get little ones to eat enough.

 

[claire]

Thanks Jennifer. Im going to do full water changes every other day and see how that goes. i feed daphnia so can't be brineshrimp eggs. i also dont think it is any type of infection because not all in one tub are dying. its normally just a random one or two. like i said ill try full water changes and see how it goes. wish me luck and ill report back with what happens.

thanks again.

 

[heather]

right then, the brine are live so no problem there, and no problem with the daphnia either, they looooove it!
thanks for the advice!

 

[elisheba]

we had trouble with our first couple of clutches because, despite our best efforts, the wee ones did not have enough to eat. we've switched our brine shrimp brand and changed our harvest method so feeding is easy and the food is plentiful, and our mortality rates are way down. hope this helps.