4. Discussion
Bacterial enumeration of VHB and TCBSB population shows that Artemia cysts harbor a high number of bacteria in spite of their age. The inverse correlation of TCBSB with cysts age do not represent any practical advantage to eliminate Vibrio spp., because sometimes aged cysts present lower hatching percentages. The concentration of TCBSB corresponds to those reported by different authors. Different bacterial genus has been associated with. Artemia franciscana cysts. Nevertheless, on those studies, TCBS agar media were not utilized as a primary isolation media. Austin and Allen have found bacteria belonging to the genus Bacillus, Micrococcus, Staphylococcus, Erwinia and Vibrio; they also indicate the presence of Gram-positive, oxidase-negative rods growing on TCBS agar, but they were not assigned to any genus. Furthermore, these authors indicate that pigmented bacteria have an increased capacity to survive in adverse conditions; in this study, almost 97% of the isolates has shown pigmented colonies. Igarashi et al. Ž1989. report the presence of Gram-positive rods identified as Corynebacterium spp. In this study, only one strain corresponded to Bacillus spp., a genus that has been reported before in Artemia cysts by other authors.