One of the gifts that children most often ask for is a pet. Having a pet is a great way to teach responsibility and encourages a child’s autonomy by having to take care of a living being. On the other hand, the demands of the animal itself, the time, the care, or even the expenses derived from food and veterinarians are also important considerations. That is why many children, despite asking for a pet, never get one of their own. This is a demonstration of responsible parenting on the part of parents who sometimes opt for smaller, more manageable pets. If you are not even among those who want to have a little fish or a turtle, you can still opt for a much more reasonable option. It is a species that has been among us for millions of years, a prehistoric pet that also comes from space. We are referring to the Aqua Dragons.
What are Aqua Dragons?
The real name of these critters is Artemia salina and they are one of the most common crustacean species found in saline aquifers on the planet. The eggs have the ability to remain suspended for long periods of time, even up to 10 years, and as soon as they come back in contact with water in the period of 12-24 hours if conditions are favorable, they hatch again. This way, if you keep the sediments of your first artemia cycle and dry them, you will be able to make these little critters hatch again.
When they hatch they are microscopic, in fact you can observe the eggs that are like little black dots in the solution of the envelope. The white bits are salt grains which are necessary for the life of the animals. So if you decide to change the water you can simply remove the animals and refill with a ratio of 10 grams of salt per liter. As they grow they develop legs and eyes until they become visible to the naked eye. They reach a centimeter in their adult stage.
Why are they “spatial”?
This time we are talking about a special edition called Aqua Dragons Space. You can find three packs of this model, a deluxe version with a pipette, thermometer strip, fish tank with lights, eggs, and food. Another simpler version with the fish tank, eggs, and food (the one you can see in this post) and a third option that only includes eggs and food for those who already have a container for the Aqua Dragons. All of them come with a numbered certificate of authenticity demonstrating that they made a space trip.
These kits have an app to be able to see the trip they made to the stratosphere at more than 30 kilometers of altitude. Called the Alpha Mission, the eggs were taken on an unmanned flight in a balloon that left Aragon. The Alpha Mission took place on April 17, 2017 where 2 kilos of Aqua Dragons flew to space and fell back to Earth. They were retrieved to become your pets. Incredible!
The Process
The process is basic and easy to follow. Pour the bag of eggs in 400 milliliters of water and wait, leaving your fish tank near a light source and at a temperature between 20 and 25 degrees celsius. Within 48 hours you will be able to see tiny dots moving using the magnifying glass. Within a week you will be able to distinguish their body parts.
Don't forget to feed the Aqua Dragons every two days, don't overfeed them because the water will spoil and the Aqua Dragons may die. There will be a feeding spoon provided with your tank that you should use to feed the Aqua Dragons. If the water becomes very murky you can change it if you’re able to fish the Aqua Dragons out using a pipette. We do not recommend doing this before they become adults, which takes about a month. This is because you can’t see the younger ones properly which can lead to discarding them unintentionally. Be careful with sediments. The eggs of the species will be in the lower part of the tank so if you can separate them and dry them then you can refill the tank in the future since the eggs can be dormant for up to 10 years. For the eggs to hatch they must be dehydrated, so no new specimens will hatch in the tank if you don’t dry them.
Interesting activities with your Aqua Dragons
For the little ones, the experience of caring for animals is already an achievement, but you can also use the opportunity to talk about the life cycle of the Aqua Dragons. If you have a microscope you can observe the eggs and small larvae. You can see how they change their shape throughout the various days of their life cycle. It’s quite interesting and enriching. In addition, as the artemia grow, they shed their skin, so you can take some remains from the bottom and discover their eggs, the hatched eggs, their skins and even the new eggs.
