Making a better blog...

As you can see if you look at the time stamps on my recent posts I stayed up all night Saturday night working on this blog. I wasn't just putting up posts either, I was coding! And as we all know the best coding happens in the middle of the night.

What I learned about Blogging and Image Storage

Some of the posts made to this blog back when it was hosted at Blog.com were recently found and a valuable lesson was learned.
Consistently store posted images on an external image storage site! Postimg.org was and is the blog's external image host site.The only problem? It was never consistently used! In other words, sometimes images were posted using the blog's local image storage and other times postimg.org was used.

Home tank: aeration and feeding

To clean, or not to clean?:

As your Sea-Monkeys age, sediment will begin to gather in the bottom of your tank -- a combination of food, algae, waste and un-hatched eggs. This is a natural part of the process and is not necessarily harmful to your pets. In fact, the Sea-Monkeys seem to enjoy routing around the murky basin. I choose not to clean my tanks -- rather let the process in their ecosystem continue naturally.

Come on in, the water's fine:

To help keep your Sea-Monkeys water at a cozy 70+ degrees, pick up an aquarium thermometer from your local pet store (Wal-Mart...). These inexpensive units are a thin, smallish piece of plastic that will stick right on the OUTSIDE of your Ocean-Zoo tank and help you chart the comfort-zone within.

The Carbonic Plague

The first seven days of a Sea-Monkey's life are critical. I highly recommend aerating the tank EVERY DAY for the FIRST WEEK. One of the greatest enemies for Sea-Monkeys is carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide is a gas which all animals naturally produce but is more important to underwater animals than to land animals. In water, some of the carbon dioxide forms a compound called carbonic acid. This is a very weak acid but it is strong enough to kill Brine Shrimp. If there is too much carbonic acid present in your tank, Sea-Monkeys cannot make use of the oxygen that is available to them. As a result, they suffocate. So for the best results (and as a precautionary measure), aerate on a daily basis the first week. And if your Sea-Monkeys begin swimming in a sluggish manner, START AERATING again immediately to supply them with oxygen and help fight off the toxic carbonic acid.

Water Temperature

Water temperature is pretty important. According to the hatching guide optimal hatching temperature is between 75°F and 80°F.

Plasma III

I always use Plasma III with my experiments. I have noticed that kits being made these days aren't including it like they used to... I have a good supply from Transcience, So I always have a packet to add to any new experiment I begin. On the tenth day I add three large scoops of plasma and one large scoop every 10 days afterwards until it is all gone. It it adds a few extra eggs to water so you might see a few newborns a couple of days later.

How do you begin your experiments?

When I start new experiments, I don't wait 24 hours any longer before adding packet 2. I just mix packet 1 and 2 at the same time. I feed every 5 to 7 days and add 3 large scoops of plasma III on the tenth day and one large scoop every 10 days thereafter until the packet is gone. If the first hatching dies off, the experiment doesn't end. More will likely hatch later. If at least one female survives she will usually have more babies after a few days. An experiment can go on indefinitely as there will always be a new hatching every few weeks.