Stickleback Care

(version 1.0; 01/27/04)

Water chemistry

Note: We raise a lot of hybrid sticklebackwith parents from both marine and freshwater envrionments. We, therefore, raise our fish in 0.35 % salt water. Our fish seem to do quite well in this water, however it may not be ideal for fish from all locations.

• Stickleback water (~pH 7)

140 g Instant Ocean (synthetic sea salt)

16 mL sodium bicarbonate solution

to 40 L with dH₂O

• Sodium bicarbonate solution

100 g NaHCO₃

700 mL dH₂O

stir and heat, very slowly adding 125 mL 2N HCl

add dH₂O to 1 L

sterilize using a 0.45 µm filter

• Waste management
• Test the water on a regular basis (see below).

Acceptable levels for waste products are as follows:

• Ammonia <0.002 ppm
• Nitrite <0.02 ppm
• Nitrate <0.25 ppm
• Exhange 10% of the water once or twice a week
• Treat new tanks with 10 mL Bioboost (Dolphin pharmaceuticals) once a week for the first month. If waste products begin to build up in an established tank, add Bioboost to help control the problem.

Food

• Stickleback are fed newly hatched brine shrimp twice daily.
• We have also found that feeding breeders frozen bloodworms encourages the males to maintain their color and improves the quality of eggs produced by the females as well as the speed with which she will produce a second clutch.

Lighting and Temperature

• The fish room is kept a constant 16-18 ∞C.
• We use full spectrum fluroescent lighting with a constant (year round) 16 hour light/ 8 hour dark schedule.

Monitoring Water Condtions

Because of the high density of fish living in our Zmod units, we test the water conditions in these tanks daily. For individual aquaria, we test the water on a montly basis.

To maintain compliance with animal care guidelines and for our own use, we maintain written records of all test results. For each tank or unit we use a standardized table similar to the one pictured below to record all of the information.

		Time fed	Room/water temperature	conductivity	ammonia	nitrite	nitrate	pH
Monday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Tuesday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Wednesday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Thursday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Friday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Saturday	AM
	PM		Notes:
Sunday	AM
	PM		Notes: