Stop Overcomplicating Sea-Monkeys
I have fond memories of Sea-Monkeys as a kid. I had them, but I don't remember any success with them. Maybe it was a bad batch, maybe I over fed them, who freakin' knows at this point.
Fast forward to last year, I decided that I wanted to try my hand at Sea-Monkeys again. Much to my family's dismay, I bought a couple of kits off Amazon, and I gave it a go.
Sea-Monkeys are as hard as you want them to be
In doing my research, I found that people take Sea-Monkeying seriously. Like, really fucking serious (looking at you Reddit), to the point of investing in pumps and heaters. There's some folks monitoring salinity and pH, they made it seem like this was the only path to success.
Don't get me wrong, I definitely considered going full tilt on the situation. Then I remembered that unbranded brine shrimp somehow can exist in the wild, in quite unfavorable conditions.
Also, these kits are designed for kids.
Sea-Monkey kits have everything you need
The kits themselves pretty much have everything you need, sans the water. I purchased two kits, one with a castle, and one of the traditional models. Both came with three packets, and one of them came with a pipette for aeration.
If aeration was so important, you'd think every kit would come with one, right?
Do I need to aerate my Sea-Monkeys?
I did aerate in the beginning. It started as an every day thing, but then I accidentally sucked up and murdered one of my little guys.
He deserved a Viking funeral.
More cautious than ever, I continued to aerate. Frequency started to drop down from daily to every other day. Eventually, all parties lost interest, completely.
The Sea-Monkeys were fine.
Setting up a Sea-Monkey tank
I'm sure at this point you're sold, and ready to start a tank of your own. Here's my no-frills guide to doing that:
- Buy a kit
- Fill it with water, distilled is my go-to
- Dump in packets #1 and #2 and mix it up (yes, both)
- Check the tank hourly until you see hatchings (takes a few days)
- Once hatched, wait a week. They won't starve, I swear
- Feed 1 scoop, and repeat feeding every 4-5 days
- Top off with water when it needs it (less frequent with the domed tanks)
That's it. That's how I Sea-Monkey.
Turns out Sea-Monkeys are easy
I'm actually shocked that my laissez faire Sea-Monkeying has worked out as long as it has. At any given moment I'll have 6-12 decent size shrimp doing their thing. Not big enough for shrimp tacos, but big enough to see without the magnifier.
There's a decent amount of NSFW happening. New babies showing up on the regular.
Outside of the aerator incident of 2024 (RIP Steve), the shrimp do die off regularly. I don't bother to fish out their carcasses. My thought is, who's cleaning up the carcasses in the wild? Oh that's right, shrimp.
Because of the regular turn over, I named the tank's collective, rather than individual shrimp. When one Steve dies, another steps up to take their place.
I don't put the tank in the oven or the freezer, so the temperature in the house has been sufficient. Having kept the tanks through all four seasons, I think I'm an expert on Sea-Monkey thermals now.
Over the course of a year, a single packet of food was able to feed 2 tanks for Sea-Monkeys. One packet is effectively two years of food, if you follow my [patent pending] feeding schedule.