Which water for Triops and Tadpole Shrimp?

What water should I use for breeding?

In addition to temperature and light, the water is one of the three primary factors why so many Triops rearing attempts fail. The water is an essential component of any breeding and should not be neglected. The water should have a pH-value of 7 to 8. During their first three days Tadpole Shrimp do not have teeth which would allow them to crush their feed, so, instead, they filter their food from the water. This contains mostly bacteria and other microorganisms which the Triops need to survive. These are contained in the detritus, the breeding starter mix. In this mix, however, there is only a small amount included, which, depending on the amount of water you use, is often insufficient to secure the survival of the Tadpole Shrimps. Therefore, it is important that water is used, in which bacteria are found naturally, in order to ensure the survival of the tiny larvae.

Below, we analyze four different types of water

1. Tap water

2. Non-carbonated water from the supermarket

3. Distilled water

4. Creek and river water

Tap water:

Under no circumstances should you use tap water! Tap water passes through very long pipelines on which there are pollutants or there may be other harmful substances such as copper that dissolve and are very dangerous for the Tadpole Shrimp. Triops die from copper! Moreover, tap water often is very hard. When the Triops are approximately 2 – 3 weeks old, you can fill the aquarium with tap water, as long as you are sure that there are no contaminants such as copper in it. For rearing, tap water is absolutely unsuitable in most cases!

Non-carbonated water from the supermarket:

Many of our customers have made very positive experiences with non-carbonated water from the supermarket when it comes to breeding Triops. Of course, we have also tried it but have come to the conclusion that, although it often works well, the hatching rates are not as high, however, as with distilled water or creek water.

Distilled water:

On the Internet, it is often recommended to breed Triops with distilled water as here you can be certain that there are not pollutants in the water. Also, the slip rate with distilled water is often very good, because the ion pressure impacting the eggs is higher than in other types of water. However, distilled water is not cheap and you should use it together with a conditioner. Distilled water is sort of “dead water”, here there are no negative materials for the Tadpole Shrimp, but it also contains no positive bacteria. Thus, it is very common that the Triops that hatched so quickly and manifold, often die after a few hours or days already.

Creek or river water:

Our favourite is creek water or river water. We ourselves use creek water for our breeding. In creeks there are already animals such as fish, tadpoles, etc., as well as billions of microorganisms. The Triops nauplii need these bacteria in the water during their first 2 – 3 days, since they filter these from the water as initial feed. Thus, the chances of survival are very good. Of course, also here you cannot make generalisations because each stream is different and even stream water often runs through pipes at some points. Nevertheless, in our opinion, there is a great advantage in these natural waters which is that there are already animals living in it, through which in this water a biological balance has formed.

Whichever water you choose, it can be taken any blanket statement about whether it will work or not. Each Triops breeding is different. For some, distilled water works great, for others only creek water leads to the desired success. Often you have to start several attempts to single out individual sources of failure, following the trial and error principle.