The Dark History of Sea Monkeys

[@journeytomicro]

Small correction about something said in this video: Artemia nauplii is not actually a species name, the word nauplii indicates the larval stage of the Artemia.

[@rosekay5031]

Scientists have done the obvious thing ... and launched them into space. 🙀 Not really what I was expecting. Not sure what I was expecting. Not space travel...

[@nagydoesstuff]

please play bionix its a protist game and do a real life and bionix diferences

[@SeaJay_Oceans]

Cute ! make a Brine Shrimp T-Shirt, with the funny face eyes, ''No step on Shrimp !'' :-D

[@MisterHeroman]

So... what IS the species name? Or was calling it a species the mistake?

[@themarlboromandalorian]

Sea monkeys are boring and thus, suck as pets for kids. Get instead, triops. Way more fun.

[@shooby9496]

All I remember as a kid was these being bought for me and me being really disappointed that what I was looking at didn't look like actual monkeys in the water.

[@StaringCompetition]

Misleading marketing or what

[@hippopajamas]

COMPLETELY fair.

[@VincentGonzalezVeg]

If it was told they were actually shrimp I'd have liked them better

[@JamesChessman]

Really because I had ones that looked exactly like the comic book drawings, just smaller. The little creatures would smile and wave at me, as they swam around in little nuclear families of mother, father, + kids swimming behind them. Are you sure yours were different?!

[@Fr33zeBurn]

Yeah I think you got a fake Chinese knock off mine are in the process of developing more efficient steam power.

[@patrickturner6878]

I had a colony of sea monkeys that lived in a mason jar and lived for about a decade on the algae. The jar sat on the window sill and we never had to do a thing. They lived and reproduced entirely on their own. My parents tossed them out when I went to college. I think the key to their longevity was sitting on the window sill which allowed plenty of light to allow algae to grow quickly and prolifically. I remember being mad at my parents when I came home in the summer and the jar was gone.

[@bella_ciao4608]

I mean yeah throwing away a jar with live animals in it (which were your pets) is pretty shitty of them

[@patrickturner6878]

@@bella_ciao4608 Well in their defense they said there weren't any animals in it at the time. But they didn't know that the jar went through boom and bust cycles where sometimes it was chock full of them and others where there were none for a while until the eggs for the next generation hatched. There was an amazing amount of diversity in there though. Some had red eyes and some black and some grew HUGE and others stayed small.

[@BlueSky-kh8ue]

@@patrickturner6878 so did the next generation eat the previous generation or was there just a lot of dead carcasses floating around?

[@patrickturner6878]

@@BlueSky-kh8ueNo carcasses. The only thing left behind when they die is a tiny exoskeleton and I assume they fell to the bottom of the jar and eventually dissolved. The bottom was green with algae.

[@ashleysmith9516]

@@patrickturner6878 they should've asked first, it isn't their place

[@anemoneyas]

I had those as a kid as well. They seemed pretty easy to take care of and were doing fine until we left them with the neighbors during a vacation and they fed them about 100x what we told them to and they all died from the resulting ammonia. Since then I have graduated to keeping real shrimp as pets.

[@frogmonkeymoo]

Fab! Shrimp are surprisingly entertaining to watch. I’m planning a tank for neocaradina but would love to keep Pinocchio shrimp one day. For now I have asellus aquaticus, basically the underwater cousin of the pill bug, and they are quite clownish and always busy, but not as pretty as shrimp. Which do you keep?

[@mo_town]

@1990skelly red cherry shrimp are amazing little pets to keep. Very entertaining to watch swim around the tank and they breed quite quickly :)

[@lucashernandez877]

Hey almost the same thing happened to me

[@NovaGirl8]

@@mo_town how do you keep populations at a reasonable level?

[@youtube.commentator]

@@NovaGirl8 I make tacos out of mine

[@nadapenny8592]

My bff gave me sea monkeys when I was little and I remember I was disappointed until she, and we were only like 7 or 8, explained to me how they were tiny, essentially microscopic ANIMALS that could have been living in dried eggs basically hibernating for years waiting to hatch when they knew conditions were right. She was always ahead of the curve on science things like that and I think I owe a lot of my interest in science to her. We're 27 now and I haven't talked to her in a few years but I know she's a marine biologist working on orca migration stuff

[@Thaligamathor]

That's boss!

[@bd8413]

Is that Tracey Jones? Think I might know her!

[@justpassingthrough7990]

Holy shit that's amazing! I love this

[@crypticzealot7055]

Go talk to her

[@sneakyybeaan]

🥲 i love this

[@johndunne3609]

As a kid I accidentally drank the sea monkeys confusing it with a cup of water. My mother called the Dr fearing potential poisoning 😂. The Dr was like ma’am it’s just brine shrimp he’ll be fine 😊

[@AbbiZika]

😂😂

[@gunsmokeandghouls]

So, you were impregnated by sea monkeys

[@filiptrajkovski2198]

Hey it killed miss chokeseondik so you never know

[@tyciendawarren2445]

Lmao 🤣 Dope story ! ✌🏾

[@STOCK_FISH110]

​@@tyciendawarren2445 he got extra protien

[@nyxh.7567]

When I had them as a kid mine were so easy to take care of when I forgot about it (or I may have thought they were dying out) they became a closed ecosystem. Algae and dead brine shrimp became their diet after a while and it freaked me out, they were huge and many generations lived and died. Retrospectively it was a very cool science experiment, seeing how there would be great booms of population then most would die, but at the time there was this horror of truly witnessing the circle of life for the first time.

[@quitlife9279]

Waiting for most humans to die any time now.

[@kingaha3657]

​@@quitlife9279 That's worse than white supremacy

[@okamireborn1406]

@@kingaha3657 Is it? Odd comparison to make.

[@kingaha3657]

@@okamireborn1406 Most humans dying is worse than a hateful subculture yes

[@okamireborn1406]

@@kingaha3657 Most humans dying would be a lot better for the planet as a whole. Vs. White supremacy which is just evil and has no benefactors.

[@miboogaroo]

Had some a couple years ago. Noticed one was dragging something on its tail so I gently removed it so it could swim better. From then on whenever I went over this one would swim to the side closest to me and just swim in circles and look at me then keep "perfoming" and followed my finger if I traced the side. Was utterly amazed..

[@mindamindaminda]

he loved you

[@miboogaroo]

Definitely felt like it, like I was important to him.

[@athomenotavailable]

I hoped it lived a happy life and went over the rainbow bridge

[@glw5166]

You were its friend.

[@miboogaroo]

@@glw5166 I like to think that. 😊

[@robertkees6048]

What most people don't know is that Sea Monkeys grow to the size of their tank. When I was a kid I threw my Sea Monkeys in the pool and three months later they attacked the neighbors with a tire iron. We still don't know how they got a tire iron but they did. Be warned.

[@JaySon-m4o]

😅😅🤣

[@a.y.t.a.s.494]

Lol

[@regularguyknifechannel5753]

I got a “Sea Monkey” kit for my 9th birthday, mine came with a little catalog for various accessories. I went crazy and spent all of my birthday money on sea monkey junk from the catalog……all before I hatched my first batch. Of course shortly after hatching them, I knocked over their little tank and they became “Rug Monkeys”. A week later a package was delivered containing all of the “banana treat” and a sea monkey “race track”.

[@SirenaSpades]

I was obsessed with that catalog. I eventually had almost everything in it. If you look on Ebay, the stuff is going for a fortune.

[@lacewinglml]

I remember as a kid I found an unopened box of these guys. I decided to try it to see if any hatched from the pretty sure 30 year old packaging. My mom had no hope, I was curious as to what they actually where. So while waiting between one package to the next I did research, found out what they really where. Talked my dad into driving me to a fish shop so I could get better food for them if any did hatch. And surprise, they hatched. Not many, but there were little shrimp in the tank. So I went out again to get a better tank and set up, transfered them and have adored aquarium critters since.

[@ariannasv22]

I heard their eggs can last for many years, if not hundreds, and that's part of the reason they've been around for 100 million years. I once watched a series about this guy who had a very old box of them, decades old, and they hatched and lasted for about a month before they died.

[@bigsmall246]

30yrs is pretty short to be honest. Also it also depends on the storage conditions, but these guys are basically designed to survive the apocalypse.

[@AdamOwenBrowning]

anabiosis/cryptobiosis is utterly fascinating, like how tree seeds from thousands of years ago - kept in the right conditions, can live and grow after very very long periods of nothing.

[@jellysquiddles3194]

I remember my paleontology professor doing experiments with really old eggs. He managed to hatch several species of brine shrimp from 30 000 year old eggs. Yeah... 30 millenia. Under the perfect conditions these little buggers eggs last LOOONG! It's really important that theres no moisture / air though.

[@American-Plague]

​@@ariannasv22"Decades old" like the decades in the OP's comment?

[@Azzarinne]

My mom had sea monkeys as a kid. Before adding the 2nd packet, though, she noticed tiny movement, and realized there was something alive in there already. She thought these were the food, and so, not having the heart to unleash assumed predators on them, she just kept the "food" as pets.

[@megamushroom]

Azzarinne wow thats so whole some omg :')

[@kyovvaii]

The 1st packed is actually the sea monkey eggs and 2nd packet is blue dye the blue dye makes it easier to see the sea monkeys the sea monkeys were already hatched before you put 2nd packet in how cool is that?

[@megamushroom]

@@kyovvaii yes

[@megamushroom]

@@kyovvaii very cool!!!

[@kyovvaii]

Oh Noo I didn't finish the video so I just say that 😅

[@rgibson7305]

Hank has the *best* "I can't believe I'm reading this" voice.

[@b34k8]

There is 69 likes and it's perfect.

[@mikeyme90]

1

[@MumrikDK]

Zefrank!

[@EmilyXiong1999]

I've watched this for a while and never realized it was Hank. His voice is much more mellow in this series.

[@DravenXaves]

i was watching and i was like fuck me that sounds like hank

[@luvlols4462]

My dad bought a giant salt water aquarium and dumped my little plastic water castle of sea monkeys in there. I was mad because I couldn't see them anymore but he told me I was being selfish. That they had more room this way and were happier. A few days later he added the damsel fish.

[@kawaiigoomy3487]

That’s… cruel. 😢

[@PlayerTenji95]

🫤

[@KlausMueller]

Oh dear, that was a journey back in time almost 50 years. As a child, I was fascinated by the sea monkeys. The ads in the comic book made it seem like they were actually shaped like monkeys or almost like humans. It was really exciting for me as a kid

[@greasylimpet3323]

Yes, they had crowns and everything! I was so disappointed to find what they really were!

[@waxwinged_hound]

"Scientists, of course, have done the obvious thing and sent these cysts into space." I was not expecting to burst out laughing from an episode of Journey to the Microcosmos but here we are.

[@bridgitmuskaangomes7272]

I was looking for exactly this comment 🤣🤣

[@hi.moriarty]

🤣🤣🤣

[@thecasualatvguy617]

I mean what's more scientific than shooting random shit into space?? I'm pretty sure there's some floating chimps and dogs up there now too.

[@TheRogueWolf]

1:16- "That's not a name that suggests a particularly exciting pet...." _Artemia:_ "Aw, c'mon! Look at this awesome dance I'm putting on here!"

[@krankarvolund7771]

To be honest Artemia seems a lot more interesting than Sea monkeys or Brine Shrimps to me.... But maybe it's just because I'm fond of Greek mythology XD

[@ЕкатеринаКатюша-х4к]

Don't you mean 0:41? At 1:16 he's talking about a show

[@bridgitmuskaangomes7272]

😂😂

[@danielm.1441]

Hank: Welcome to the first episode of our fifth season. Me: Journey to the Microcosmos has seasons?!

[@saragates1337]

As much as I love unexpectedly hearing Hank's voice, what happened to the dude who *was* doing the narration? I was literally saying to my SO as I opened this vid that the OG narrator's voice is like butter and he can talk at me all day....then I opened the video to find Hank. I'm not disappointed, but curious - what happened to OG Microcosmos??

[@gondolajesus4864]

@@saragates1337 Hank has always been the narrator

[@GoldInforcer]

oh my god your'e right, I NEVER REALIZED

[@saragates1337]

@@gondolajesus4864 WAT That...is news to me. I'm sorry; evidently I'm just an idiot

[@MatthewSmith-sz1yq]

The season 3 finale plot twist was crazy!

[@gurtsmunta1]

In the 1970s I saw an ad for sea monkeys in a comic and desperately wanted them but in the UK I couldn’t get them ,unknown to me we were feeding them to my fathers salt water aquarium fish and it was my job to top up the little dish with eggs and pour the little shrimps in to feed the fish ,I was gutted years later as a father who bought them for my daughter and seeing them brought all those memories of desperately wanting them as a child and watching them being eaten.

[@fuzzy_wuzzy45]

Well, that escalated quickly 😅

[@gurtsmunta1]

@@fuzzy_wuzzy45 😂

[@4FYTfa8EjYHNXjChe8xs7xmC5pNEtz]

I lived in the UK in the early 70s myself (we were Americans), and ordered them from an American comic book. Unfortunately, none of the eggs hatched for some reason. I was incredibly excited, and then incredibly disappointed.

[@Thunnini_Tom]

Imagine existing for 100mil years then being packaged as a toy

[@wendychavez5348]

I had a friend in high school who actually had a 30-gallon tank of sea monkeys that he had started maybe 10 years before we ever met. It was pretty awesome. Only sea monkey farm I've ever known to survive more than a couple of months, and it really was a beautiful setup.

[@annamolitoris2012]

I remember looking at these in my grade school biology class! I didn't see anything in the microscope at first so I stared really hard only to have its giant face swim into view and freak me out 😆

[@CosmicShieldMaiden]

When I was supposed to be looking at blood cells In bio class I was just looking at all the floaters in my eyes for like 10 minutes until the teacher came over and checked my scope. I looked back in and actually saw what I was supposed to look at. I was so embarrassed.

[@caspianchan2371]

Wow this reminds me with my own goof. At our classroom I caught a stray fruit fly and wedged it between two specimen glass to keep it still, crushing it. When I looked at it through the microscope I saw something still blurry but I was already horrified that I didn't bother looking again. Like seeing an eldritch horror, kids version.

[@Cec9e13]

*swim swim swim swim swim* Hellooooo.... Why you scream?

[@annamolitoris2012]

@@caspianchan2371 I remember from genetics class...trying to phenotype the critters but accidentally decapitating them. And you saw the evidence in the viewing field. Scary, sad, and gross.

[@raymondrocha797]

@@annamolitoris2012 You murderer!

[@murielvaillancourt3855]

When young in France, 60 years ago, we had Artemia in a « scientific comic book », not very popular but that i loved so much! Each month, i received something new. I had Jumping Peas from Mexico, false ink stain, sprouting weird beans, herbarium notebook, tiny fossils like ammonites, even a metal nail to put in a window sill with a thread and a map to observe each night the movement of stars and many interesting things! It was the source of my passion for cosmos, wildlife, scientific facts and my current curiosity for life!

[@Dj3xilM4n]

j'ai déjà entendu parler de ce journal !! quel était le nom de cette revue ?

[@Ugly_German_Truths]

Sounds similar to the german YPS comicbook, whose most famous "extras" were a solar blimp (basically a black garbage bag that you could fill with air and tie closed, the sunlight then would heat up the bag and turn it into a hot air balloon that might with luck carry 100-150 grams of something as payload) and the sea monkeys, but they had lots of stuff, from serious studyguides like your herbarium notebook to plastic dinosaur skeletons or "detective" kits like you'd also get in Micky Mouse comics.

[@hobosorcerer]

What was this comic book called? Seems very interesting, honestly.

[@misanthropichumanist4782]

@@Ugly_German_Truths I remember watching Mr. Wizard as a kid. He demonstrated the "solar blimp," too. Worked (ok-ish) with typical dark garbage bags in the 90s, at least. Haven't tried it with modern ones.

[@YourCrazyOverlord]

I'm fascinated by a world where a sweet 65+ year old French woman is commenting on a KZbin video, on a channel started as a side project, about brine shrimp. Earth is crazy y'all.

[@rodchallis8031]

A million years ago, when I was a kid, a local naturalist turned us on to Fairy Shrimp. We thought them exotic, being that we were half a continent in any direction away from the sea, and they were shrimp. We caught them in vernal pools, as soon as the ice was off the smaller ponds that would dry up in late spring. So we had our "Sea Monkeys" without having to send away for them. Those of us with aquariums also found out they were a food favourite for the fish. On comic book ordering, I spent my allowance on Revolutionary War figures, which, shockingly, proved to be good value.

[@hunterflowerson4460]

And now you’re a Marxist

[@Dragrath1]

To be fair branchiopods the group fairy shrimp are part of aren't actually shrimp and are actually the sister group to hexapods and Xenocarida (remipedes + cephalocarida("horseshoe shrimp" which are also not shrimp)) basically they are crustaceans that avoided competition by colonizing ephemeral(vernal) pools and hypersaline lakes so they are far from shrimp because they aren't shrimp. ;)

[@hunterflowerson4460]

@@Dragrath1 nerd

[@Bacony_Cakes]

@@Dragrath1 ...What a ripoff. Not even shrimp. Smh.

[@hunterflowerson4460]

@@stereomachine Do you even know what that means lol

[@larch2329]

Never thought I would watch a lore video on brine shrimp, but here we are

[@JR-ho5qm]

Growing up in Saskatchewan these shrimp are found in most grassy slews. I spent hours catching them. They range in colour from orange to green. They are pretty cool!

[@Sigwaltherglock17]

Thank u for sharing this beautiful experience

[@theworldoflivvy3150]

Huh, I've only ever seen water fleas! (And water beetles and damselfly larva... and leeches.) Guess maybe I should go slough hunting before they freeze over. If nothing else I'm sure I'll see some fat snails.

[@JR-ho5qm]

@@theworldoflivvy3150 they only seem to live through May,June,and a bit of July before laying eggs and dying off. Also I only ever see them in shallow grassy slews not dugouts.

[@johnryanglean2430]

I'm a filipino and my brother right now is on Saskatchewan hahaha i'm gonna mention this to him

[@ellerenee4355]

For me, an important part of the fantasy and lore grew out of artists rendering of the brilliant anthropomorphic cute factor. Sad that there’s no mention or credit for the artists. Those pictures were everything. 😊

[@BoopSnoot]

And hugely misleading. Equally funny is that being a "white supremacist" ruined his career, whereas today you can openly say that you hate white people and still show up on mainstream TV, radio, magazines, and other entertainment to great applause. My how times have changed!

[@prof.scheere6933]

True. The south park episode is fun too

[@chestnut4860]

"anthropomorphic cute factor" The designs are creepy as shit

[@simonpark843]

Joe Orlando was the artist who drew those pictures.

[@leslieannvanhumbeck7630]

​@Chestnut nah they're adorable. 😅

[@sjoervanderploeg4340]

It is just amazing to see the fluid inside the atremia flow in a specific direction, you can also observe its middle tract contracting from back to front causing this wave!

[@heathermcnally7686]

yes I loved that! so incredible

[@AbrahamSamma]

I remember feeling so BAD when my seamonkeys died when I was still a child. The showmanship worked. The man sold and we bought in spades.

[@kimberlymoxley104]

I sell them in a bauble on a necklace with a salt packet and directions for a "home". As SEA DRAGONS and WATER FAIRIES.

[@KamenRaiden]

Dont feel bad about the brine shrimp. Feel bad about being a huge weeb.

[@la912]

@@kimberlymoxley104 Wow

[@user-ye9bc7nw2c]

@@KamenRaiden cry

[@KamenRaiden]

@@user-ye9bc7nw2c thanks for letting everyone know you're a weeb as well. Lol. Crying but only of laughter.

[@joshuarichards2421]

1:31 I THOUGHT I DREAMED THAT SHIT HOLY CRAP. Loved it as a kid, could never find mention of it or footage or ANYTHING when I tried to find it again years later. Never realized they were sea monkeys, I was 7 at the time. Just solved a childhood mystery for me, thanks.

[@frenchfries2148]

When I was like 13 I got a sea monkey kit. After three days I didn’t see anything growing , so I tucked it away in my bookcase. A few weeks later I came across it again and had hundreds of sea monkeys swimming around

[@buildtherobots]

I tried my hand at raising the monkeys of the sea when I was living in the dormitory in college. It was just as fraught with disaster as most people's experience. Sea Monkeys and their little tank/cup don't travel home for Thanksgiving well.

[@naturalnashuan]

I had land hermit crabs as my dorm room pets. They drove my roommate nuts with the clacking noises they made moving around in their enclosure. Totally worth it!

[@b1shybob]

I had a watch that could hold a couple Sea Monkeys and you could carry them around with you on your wrist. There was also a race track. They actually swim automatically against any current so you would pump water down the 'track' and see which one would reach the finish line first. I was pretty into them. I remember the plastic dropper you would get with the kits, in order to transfer them around, was called the aqua leash.

[@skussy69]

Oh my god I had the same watch. Totally forgot about it until now

[@wannabewyvern]

kinda gross how they’re treating live animals as toys imo

[@CrescentUmbreon]

@@wannabewyvern Yeah, live animal trinkets are probably still a big thing in some countries, but it's an awful, slow, nauseating death for the poor creatures who are stuck in a bubble of limited resources until they starve, suffocate, or succumb to illness in their own waste Edit: for the uninformed, I'm referring to trinkets carrying all manner of creatures, not just sea monkeys

[@zedmeister8832]

I had the little globe necklace, about the size of a shooter marble. Fun stuff.

[@joelscott7351]

@@CrescentUmbreon Lmao its brain is so small i don't think they are conscious dude,

[@esgonofroide]

I’ve watched it when I was a child in Brazil. I just had some short flash backs, you have reactivated my child memories and I went to look for it and is soo cool to remember something you don’t for years.

[@SeriviusR]

Dad bought me sea monkeys as a gift, probably because I wouldn't stop talking about them. I remember how excited I was, carefully following all the instructions; having set it up and gone to school. Not telling Mum what was in there becoming the fatal flaw, as she tipped them down the drain before hatching... RIP Sea bro's, I'll never forget you 😆

[@daniel_dumile]

Hmm I was hoping they bought the brand and described more about how hard it was to keep alive. That’s all I remember was them dying really fast and blaming my brother for killing them

[@krankarvolund7771]

Yeah a little disappointed, I was expecting more 😅

[@tabithamotta8753]

Alright, I can't hold it in, I've tried. Brine shrimp are CUTE! They're fascinating, they look pretty when swimming, and I love watching videos of them. I think they're under appreciated

[@insertrandomname2303]

Ikr!!

[@Mar13579]

Buy a sea monkey kit ♥️ they are only $20 in Canada, and can be bought at toy stores. Mastermind toys, ect

[@shadowsun5704]

I would have started sooner if the cartoons didn’t freak me out as a kid. If the advertised cool underwater fluffy fairy shrimps I’d buy it.

[@-TheBugLord]

They are great fish food too

[@De_Klapperkoning]

my scarlet badis really like them as well. like they don't want anything that is not moving on its own xD..

[@GaasubaMeskhenet]

I'm so ashamed of my attempt at sea monkeys. we do not treat pet keeping with the gravity that it deserves

[@valley_robot]

Well said my friend

[@GaasubaMeskhenet]

@Ghost i feel like that's the best outcome most of us could have hoped for with how little good care info there was for them. Yours never died or suffered because they never lived to begin with

[@srobeck77]

I treated mine well, u animal abuser

[@SasquatchAngry]

So ashamed? fucks sake you're a bit dramatic lmao

[@pianoartist8830]

Probably the most real comment here. I remember as a kid they were marketed as aquatic aliens and had this cheap small gimmicky plastic environment that came with them lol.

[@musicinthewildwood]

Hey, Hank! I bought those from an Archie comic about 10 years before you did (maybe a little more, ugh) and just wanted to remark that what you showed as the packaging was considerably more honest than what I saw! You know the Howie Mandell show? Yeah, well, the drawing accompanying the ad *I* answered looked a lot more like THOSE "sea-monkeys" than like actual brine shrimp! A cute family - a mom, a dad, a brother and a sister, all with heads whose tops took a crown-like form. I'll bet there's an image of that old ad somewhere online. I don't remember the dye, though - I remember sitting up with a flashlight until it was dark (it was summer, of course) and as instructed, I held it up to the side of the fish bowl when I'd poured in the second packet. The light shone through tiny swimming critters! I'll always remember that moment, also when they finally went down the toilet, dead and smelling like, you know, dead shrimp. Ugh. When they matured I can only say I was a bit nonplussed at their appearance. I did my best with them, though. I'd say that altogether they lasted about 2 weeks. I know I wasn't more than 10 at the time.

[@MateusStock]

Too bad we can't post photos here... bought an Archie comic at a used book shop, from 1973. That's what lead me to this video! The sea monkey ad! Exactly like you described.

[@leslieannvanhumbeck7630]

I liked the careful placement of Papa Sea Monkeys tail in the artwork. 😂

[@johnwalters1341]

I'm pretty sure "Artemia nauplii" isn't a proper binomial name. The first larval stage of most crustaceans is called a "nauplius"--plural "nauplii."

[@journeytomicro]

You are correct. We're going to post a pinned comment so we can highlight that correction.

[@ignasias]

I remember learning about sea monkeys as a small child from the show Rugrats. At Tommy’s house, in the living room, Chuckie is showing Tommy his new pet Sea Monkeys (mispronounced by both Tommy and Chuckie as Sea “Moneys”) that his father, Chaz recently got for him. Tommy comments that they only look like a bunch of specks to him, and Chuckie replies that he’d also look like a speck of he were that small. Chaz and Stu walk into the living room from the kitchen and Chaz points out to Stu out that he thinks it’s wonderful to see the babies interested in the Sea Monkeys, and he also mentions that Sea Monkeys were also his first pet; Stu skeptically states that he doesn’t think “freeze dried brine shrimp” falls in the pets category, and Chaz replies: “What do you mean Stu? They’re the perfect pet; you don’t have to walk them, you barely have to feed them, and they don’t leave any nasty surprises in your slippers.”

[@SniperJade71]

I can hear this in my head lmao

[@warped_rider]

Then grandpa drank them by accident

[@QQ-yi6yg]

@@warped_rider WHAT'DIDYA SAY THERE SCOUT? I HAD MY AID TURNED DOWN

[@kR-qj7rw]

jesus this is a throwback

[@heathermcnally7686]

I hear their voices saying sea money lol I forgot this episode

[@Rubrickety]

The real trick is to keep them alive long enough for them to turn into crabs.

[@speemus6223]

💀💀💀

[@zoe20176]

what really?

[@Liezuli]

@@zoe20176 No. It's a joke about Carcinisation

[@rickwrites2612]

everythung is crabs! (crabs evolved many times )

[@YerMate]

I had a friend as a kid who had one sea monkey that just kept going, it was bloody huge! All the rest died after a few months to a year but that one big bastard, a bit over a cm - 1.5cms kept going for about 4 years!

[@cassiemaayzombiesceks2256]

I’m genuinely surprised at how many different channels I click on and then hear Hank 🤣 he’s everywhere.

[@daftmi9hty327]

My sea monkeys lasted about 6 years when I threw in some plants and other small creatures (can't quite remember what ones) in an enclosed ecosystem and lightly cleaned up every so often it was mad how long they lasted I was expecting a cool little thing to have on my shelf but they just... kept going

[@outistynnanyt5153]

I got one of these kits as a kid. Prepped the water, waited 24 hours, did everything right. Then my 2yo brother decided he wanted to open the eggs packet and dump them all over the floor. Im still not over it, and I still don't have my sea monkeys

[@uadible5902]

I just prepped the water and have to wait 19 more hours and I hope my brother doesn't do this, it's something he just does

[@schizophrenic_rambler]

You could've filtered them, either way some dirt won't harm them

[@roku3216]

I had these as a kid and then discovered they were a lot cheaper when bought as fish food eggs, so I was thrilled and so were my fish.

[@southernsight2943]

I grew sea monkeys - from a "toy pack" in the 70s...admittedly I swapped out the water using new pkts of water conditioner every year...and they lived/thrived for over 5 years! They grew and, I think, lived happily. No idea why they eventually died.

[@riivus7291]

Was not expecting that twist at 7:20 it caught me off guard.

[@racookster]

The video at 8:41 made me wonder if they have three eyes, so I looked it up. Yeah, they do. The third eye (the naupliar eye) isn't functional in the adult stage, though. The "sea monkey" cartoons in the old comic book ads didn't show that, although they did show three knobbed spikes on their heads, which I suppose were intended to represent them.

[@wandatidwell3792]

Did the ones you bought have a Sea Monkey family and the Dad holding a triton on the package?

[@jaz1551]

I remember the comic book ads! Sea monkeys looked like friendly creatures from the black lagoon. I begged my mom for these, but she always said no.

[@darrellcook8253]

Speaking of which my mom played a dirty trick on me when I was five and I showed her the sea monkey ad. She said that these could grow up into the creature from the black lagoon and I never saw the movie until this point. Then she showed me the movie when it came on. AAAHHH! She could have just said no. Ruined my faith in sea monkeys and comic book advertising.

[@FutureNow]

that sea monkeys show is nightmare fuel

[@hansakkerman2611]

I remember it well.

[@MommaH1419]

I’m thankful for my parents and how they explained what Sea Monkeys are to me. We started our tank 2 days ago. So far so good!

[@ryuzakilawlight]

Can't believe I'll say this but it's an honor to be with you since the very first episode and seeing how this has grown. ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

[@Diarmuhnd]

That dude who sold Sea Monkeys from the backs of comic books (edit: decades ago) was one crazy s.o.b. *Thanks for the interesting science stuff, stay safe.*

[@namelessnocebo]

Chaos Magick!

[@HaventheDemoness-vy9lx]

At first I thought he did some unethical things to the sea monkeys or some environmental issue related thing. But then I found out "oh....the guy ,who introduced the sea monkeys to kids, is a white supremacist". Why do people who introduce wholesomeness to the world turned out to be jerks?

[@mr.scottpowell]

The comic book ads, as I recall as a kid in early 70s, looked like you would get these half-human creatures that did acrobats and stuff.

[@awds121]

I play with these in the lab every day. Great images as always. Although, Artemia nauplii is not a species as you mentioned in the video. Nauplii are the first life stage of brine shrimp. Same with copepods. So, what you call a species is actually a name of first of many life stages. I can help with your questions about Artemia if needed.

[@Mitchdvetter]

Boys life magazine, in the back next to the the hovercraft plans and x-ray glasses was the ad for Sea Monkeys lol

[@vamprealla]

The last time I had Sea Monkeys, I had multiple generations going for quite a while. Even ordered a few accessories for them.❤

[@plsmoviemaker]

I had these as a kid, and I think they were alive for over a year until my mom accidentally knocked the tank over while she was cleaning. She tried to save them, but unfortunately the remaining ones died not long after. Up until then though, it was still thriving.

[@0810mommy]

“Accidentally” 😂

[@poochiew.9302]

Same thing happened with mine except it was my sister that knocked the tank over.

[@smallandstressed2364]

2:25 - look at the frantic waving! It’s absolutely adorable

[@rfdebeaumont]

Years from now, I can say that this is the video that started my hugely successful "Land Fish" business.

[@liddz434]

As an Australian born in the desert in mid 80’s who watched plenty of American telly and movies I was always fascinated (and utterly clueless) about these things….and now I know 😊

[@seatbelttruck]

I wanted Sea Monkeys when I was little, but my parents wouldn't buy them. They ended up buying me a Triops kit from our local aquarium and from what I've seen, that was much better. They actually get large enough to easily observe, for one thing. The kit also came with an age-appropriate scientific explanation for what was going on instead of the smoke-and-mirrors described here. I ended up hatching them for a fifth-grade science fair. Unfortunately, the timing was a bit off, and they were already all dead by the time of the fair, but I was able to keep one of the corpses in a baby-food jar so that people could see what they looked like.

[@freshboy3968]

Triops are much cooler, so I'd say you got a good deal

[@TheTwick]

Where’s the King and Queen and court of my sea monkey kingdom? I was promised! Just brine shrimp…

[@Nothingreallytoseehere]

Amazing video. I remember asking my mum for some sea monkeys so she allowed me to have some. I was so confused when they hatched and didn't look like " sea monkeys." But I was happy until I came back from school one day and my mum had thrown them down the toilet.

[@YusufGinnah]

😆🤣 I had my Mom buy me sea monkeys from the back of a comic book, And was soo disappointed when they looked completely different to the smiling sea monkeys shown on the comic... But I loved them anyways... And they didn't last too long... 👍🏼

[@ipektanrica9029]

🤣🤣🤣🤣 rip they smell stink

[@fabiana7157]

I will never understand psycho parents like that. Thank goodness my mother was an animal lover, a bigger one than me actually

[@catscanhavelittleasalami]

You really gotta be demented to kill living creatures that your own kid was taking care of.

[@tobar1p]

Fantastic footage but you really skipped over the development of the proprietary hybrid breed that Sea-Monkeys actually are. The whole lawsuit with the widow centered around it.

[@quitlife9279]

pretty sure it's just a bs story that the guy made up, he's a salesman and made up a lot of lies for show, there are no difference in the animals, i'd love to see them bring up dna evidence to prove the difference.

[@super_morto]

One of the most amazing channels on YT. You will learn a lot about yourself watching the way the microcosmos works.

[@PapaPandasHasNoDad]

"You are you and that is much better to know" That's the sweetest sentiment I've ever heard and it's about brine shrimp. Hank is amazing.

[@AaronShenghao]

Some species good at surviving extreme conditions: *Exists* Humans: Let’s yeet it into space!

[@lisaschuster9187]

Yes, we are the oddest of many odd species. I think I’ll send away for a Homo sapiens farm.

[@CrimsonA1]

*YEET

[@AaronShenghao]

@@CrimsonA1 thanks, fixed.

[@l4ndst4nder]

Sea monkeys is one of the best designed novelties for kids. It costs practically nothing to manufacture and the presentation was very carefully considered. Both the first and second packets contained brine shrimp eggs with the second packet often including a dye to make the first batch more visible. The misdirection helped to create the illusion of instant life.

[@30-06Savage]

Yea that’s what he said in the video

[@rzrlight]

@@30-06Savage the creator was also a KKK member you know

[@30-06Savage]

@@rzrlight I see

[@Cat-yx7xc]

@@rzrlight As a Filipino i see that as a win 🥰

[@American-Plague]

I heard somewhere that with Sea Monkeys, both the first and second package contained eggs and the second package contained dye to make the first batch more visible, thus giving the illusion of instant life. If I can remember where I heard this I'll come back and leave a link.

[@Dragrath1]

Fun fact not mentioned here is that brine shrimp, aka a genus of fairy shrimp adapted to salty ephemeral waters, are actually part of the branchiopoda now recognized to be the sister group to hexapods and remipedes which makes them among the closest living relatives to springtails and insects at least along with their relatives like other fairy shrimp, water fleas, clam shrimp and shield shrimp. Their story of evolution is complicated with the branchopdia appearing back in the Cambrian m branching off from their relatives earlier on and later adapting to survive in hypersaline and or ephemeral bodies of water likely in response to the rise and radiation of the Gnathostomata or jawed fish

[@joebarnes3178]

As a teenager in the 70,s the ads for sea monkeys were in every comic book on the planet, lol. Seriously and I never seen any that hatched and lived when anyone bought them

[@janetbyrd1065]

I remember the Sea Monkeys being advertised. My brother had an aquarium, a brine shrimp hatchery to feed the baby live fish that resulted from a good environment.

[@angelstparker3776]

I got a pouch of sea monkeys when I was 11-12, from Hobby Lobby, there was only supposed to be about 20-30 eggs in it, turned out to be 300+ and when they hatched there was more monkey than water, needless to say they died out pretty quickly.

[@giygas9305]

Lmao

[@Pureignition58]

1:53 I watched with my kid brother-in-law, he knew if I was spending time with him, I wasn't with his sister and I respected that. You get insight were ever can get it.

[@echospaw899]

Yeah, me and my little Sis bought Sea Monkeys from one of our comic books back in the '60s. We were able to keep them alive for quite a while, but I remember being bummed because they looked nothing like the pictures in the ads. I also spent allowance money on mail-order X-ray glasses. Never received them... I was really looking forward to those. LOL! 😜

[@harrispinkham]

I like the pace that you read this in, Hank!

[@EKA201-j7f]

I always loved the interesting ads in the back of comic books and other magazines. We never bought any of these because we lived in an area with lots of interesting creek life - crawdads and minnows, and I asked my Mom about these and she explained what they were.

[@VideographerExperience]

*sending the cysts to space* this has to be the most difficult script to read in history, well done

[@RainebowEvee]

Finally! I've been wanting an episode on Sea Monkeys for a long time 😊

[@hellbreakfast1590]

Why did that ending shot almost make me cry? These things are written so poetically and it's kinda lovely.

[@SuperAdnan117]

0:38 Narrator: "But also..." Brine shrimp: *SHOOOOOM*

[@davidvento5481]

Virtually everyone who has ever kept tropical fish knows what brine shrimp (aka; sea monkeys) are. They sell them at pet shops in little plastic deli cups as fish food and keep longer in the fridge. My mom had no problem allowing me to keep brine “shrimp” in the refrigerator but tubifex “worms” were another story. She was especially horrified to learn these particular worms live and breed in raw sewage. lol

[@saulverde]

Do one on fairy shrimp! The way bigger freshwater sea monkey. Or triops. They aren't microscopic as adults but they start out tiny. I am absolutely fascinated by diapause.

[@tamara8908]

I had sea monkeys as a kid. Yes unfortunately they did not last long. In the late 90's I hiked to a 10,000 mountain peak in the Tetons. There were 3 small alpine lakes up there. One was a beautiful blue color so I jumped in and found myself surrounded by what looked like sea monkeys. Could it have been them?

[@RockModeNick]

They would be a similar looking freshwater species, this type need salt water to survive

[@judyh3707]

I know you're implying this was a cool experience, but I had a disgust reaction at the thought of them all swimming into the body and infesting it.

[@SirenaSpades]

@@judyh3707 I think you need therapy

[@vikrambalaji4126]

bro had the most beautiful experience of his life

[@KY_CPA]

The most interesting video I never knew I needed! Filled with a tremendous amount of quirky tidbits. I love this channel! 😍

[@falrexion7709]

Having stumbled across this a year late, I am both fascinated, and disappointed I missed out on a cool tardigrade shirt

[@Supersmile330]

This wasn't dark at all really, but aside the clickbait it was a really nice video, cool history, cool facts, really cool footage and nice sound and calm voice. Perfectly relaxing

[@jonsey3645]

I can't believe how much I missed you guys! Welcome back and much admiration all around.

[@artmakersworlds]

Oh wow, cool video. I worked in a pet shop back in the 70s. Actually bought sea monkeys before I got that job. Then I sold out of a large juice dispenser cooler, live brine shrimp as fish food. Figured out immediately what "sea monkeys" really were. Great marketing I must say. Oh we also sold pet rocks. Another marketing genius.

[@werewolfgirl1995]

I loved these things as a kid! I thought they were cute. Until my cat knocked over the tank and I remember scooping them up with my bare hands and rushing to put them in a bowl of water because I didn't want them to die

[@Mooshie500]

Did they survive

[@werewolfgirl1995]

@@Mooshie500 I was able to save about half of them

[@Mooshie500]

@@werewolfgirl1995 good enough

[@ewllen808]

i also had sea monkeys as a kid. one of my relatives was visiting and thought it was an old glass of water and tipped them down the damn drain. its been over 15 years and im honestly still a little mad about it. it was very distressing at the time. i still think about buying more every now and then but knowing what i now know... maybe not. well. not sea monkeys, anyway. but my own little brine shrimp? sure 😊

[@fullbatteries1335]

Didn't expect it to get that deep at the end. Be you Sea Monkies be you.

[@lexibyday9504]

by the time I discovered sea monkeys it was already well known that they're impossible to actually keep alive. This put me in the direction of craving arteficial tiny pets, just complex enough to apear alive as they wiggle around their plastic terarium between "food" sources and the nest. Someone will make them one day and then all the sea monkeys will be free.

[@julianaquascaped]

I'm actually going to order some brine shrimp soon to feed the fish i'm breeding. i hear about them a ton in the aquarium hobby, but didn't know this darker history. I actually just listened to a podcast with the man behind Instant Fish (or at least the fish breeder the company hired to make it happen). He's led a fascinating life and has stories about what it was like to be in the aquarium hobby back in the 1950s!

[@shaddonon]

Which podcast? You’ve intrigued me!

[@julianaquascaped]

@@shaddonon oh right that would have been helpful info to provide! It’s the Aquarist Podcast and the episode I’m referring to is 102/103 with Rosario LaCorte.

[@GuppyCzar]

@@julianaquascaped The Aquarist podcast is great! AND unlike this video you could learn something about the actual species.

[@TaBunnie]

Harold: "Today im going to sell pets to kids!" *buys firearms for the KKK*

[@HenriFaust]

I don't see the disconnect.

[@CigarMick]

Brine shrimp are an excellent food source for aquarium fish. I used to feed brine shrimp to my angels and the hatchling shrimp to my angel fish fry. They are good for most fish species and are relatively easy to grow so you have a readily available live food for your fish.

[@shade247]

Literally some of the BEST advertising ever.