I have babies!

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 06:45 PM

So, I noticed that both of my cleaner shrimp were carrying eggs about a month ago. I would watch them daily, and one day the eggs would be gone and a day or two later the shrimp would be carrying eggs again. I just assumed that they were going to be fish food and none would survive..... I was wrong. I have a ton of the little baby shrimpies in my sump. They are about the size of a copepod, they are white, but you can tell that they are baby shrimp...... I'm so excited.

gumbii · 07/31/2008, 06:52 PM

damn... that's dope... pics...???

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 07:00 PM

I tried, but the babies are too small. Soon. I'll try to get some pic's of the preggers shrimps when I feed the tank.

tcmfish · 07/31/2008, 07:25 PM

Not to be debbie downer but the larval phase of cleaner shrimp is 141 days and they go through many stages. If you were to raise them might need to put some vacations on hold, but good luck. Check out mofib or marinebreeder.org for some more info.

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 07:34 PM

This is the best pic I could get of the shrimp for now.

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 07:35 PM

that was going to be my next question.... What to do next? I guess they made it this far without my interference. The sump has low flow. What do I need to do.

snorvich · 07/31/2008, 08:21 PM

Nothing you can do except watch.

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 09:04 PM

here is another pic of the shrimp with eggs. Both shrimp are carrying eggs right now, one of them has bright green eggs and the other has tan eggs. So, I'm about to have more eggs floating around the tank.

Slakker · 07/31/2008, 09:06 PM

Good fish/coral food

Putawaywet · 07/31/2008, 09:21 PM

When you say that you have them in your sump are they crawling or scurrying about? or just passively tumbling around like a speck of dust?

As already stated Lysmata amboinensis have a relatively long larval stage and during that time they are completely planktonic (free swimming). They are also incredibly fragile and just bouncing off the side of your tank can do them irrepairable damage. A trip down your overflow into the sump would surely be more than they could handle.

What I'm guessing you are seeing are mysids, which are many times mistaken for baby cleaner shrimp. The tell-tail sign that they are mysids is if they are racing about the bottom of your sump and tank in helter skelter type of movements. Generally, they can be best observed at night in your rockwork using a flashlight. Their eyes will reflect the light allowing you to see litle dots of silver racing around in the nooks and crannies like the energizer bunny on meth.

Otherwise, Lysmata amboinensis will indeed take turns impregnating each other and whether you have two, three or four, makes no difference. For your pair you will quickly find that one's breeding schedule will be the opposite of the other so you will always have at least one pregnant shrimp.

Hatching will usually occur within an hour or so after lights off. The shrimp will climb atop a high point in the aquarium and release the frye into the current. You will be able to tell when the time is coming close because you will start seeing little eyes within the egg sacs.

Brett

gumbii · 07/31/2008, 09:26 PM

that's a tough call then... i personaly wouldn't do anything...

it seems like alot of effort... but rearing those bad babies would be pretty cool...

dones20 · 07/31/2008, 09:40 PM

my cleaner shrimp pair lay eggs often as well they genearly hatch at nigght and become a natural food source

BuddhaKiss · 07/31/2008, 10:19 PM

I'm tending to agree with putawaywet, you may be seeing mysis shrimp instead. I've seen them in my sump and briefly in my display before the fish gobblesthem up. Having said that, I used to have some peps that would breed in my display. I've seen little larvae shrimp swim around at nite when I viewed my tank with a flashlight. They looked completely differnt than mysis. A clear pic would definitely help in IDing them.

mander · 07/31/2008, 10:38 PM

I mistook mysis for cleaner babies too, I later realized they were mysis and though for sure all that time they were cleaners. I also just figure the cleaner babies are a great food source for everyone. Though it was seriously disturbing to see the cleaner 'mama' picking the live larvae out of 'her' flipper flapper doohickeys and eating them. Talk about convenience foods...

nirrad · 07/31/2008, 10:44 PM

bummer. I think you may be right. I was looking forward to having a ton of cleaner shrimp. So, how do I get baby mysid shrimp in my tank anyway? There are too many of them to be hitchikers from rock.

tcmfish · 07/31/2008, 11:12 PM

dude you can do a lot raise em up cmon more people need to put some effort into this stuff

i haven't been around too long but think back when or just pick up an old book and look how hard it was to keep corals and now we have REEFcentral pretty much dedicated to it with people from all over the world keeping propagating and spawning and settling coral so try collecting the larvae and raise em up

so many people with reef tanks have these ideal conditions that the inhabitants are spawning in and are just like hey thats cool and don't do anything think of how rewarding it would be to raise something up

BuddhaKiss · 07/31/2008, 11:50 PM

I'm tending to agree with putawaywet, you may be seeing mysis shrimp instead. I've seen them in my sump and briefly in my display before the fish gobblesthem up. Having said that, I used to have some peps that would breed in my display. I've seen little larvae shrimp swim around at nite when I viewed my tank with a flashlight. They looked completely differnt than mysis. A clear pic would definitely help in IDing them.

Putawaywet · 08/01/2008, 09:56 AM

Mysis reproduce about as prolifically as copepods. You can easily go from a small handful to a relatively large amount in a pretty short time.

Brett

07/31/2008, 06:45 PM	#1
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	I have babies! So, I noticed that both of my cleaner shrimp were carrying eggs about a month ago. I would watch them daily, and one day the eggs would be gone and a day or two later the shrimp would be carrying eggs again. I just assumed that they were going to be fish food and none would survive..... I was wrong. I have a ton of the little baby shrimpies in my sump. They are about the size of a copepod, they are white, but you can tell that they are baby shrimp...... I'm so excited.

07/31/2008, 08:21 PM	#7
snorvich Team RC member Join Date: Aug 2005 Location: Outlander Posts: 40,953 Blog Entries: 46	Nothing you can do except watch. __________________ Warmest regards, ~Steve~

07/31/2008, 09:06 PM	#9
Slakker Premium Member Join Date: Dec 2006 Location: Southeastern Wisconsin Posts: 4,521	Good fish/coral food __________________ -Tyler Oceanic 58RR display/20H sump/fuge thread...follow the red house. Current Tank Info: Oceanic 58g, 20H sump, AquaC EV-150, 175w Hamilton 14k + 2x39w T5HO Actinics

07/31/2008, 09:21 PM	#10
Putawaywet 20 and over club Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Long Beach, CA. Posts: 2,720	When you say that you have them in your sump are they crawling or scurrying about? or just passively tumbling around like a speck of dust? As already stated Lysmata amboinensis have a relatively long larval stage and during that time they are completely planktonic (free swimming). They are also incredibly fragile and just bouncing off the side of your tank can do them irrepairable damage. A trip down your overflow into the sump would surely be more than they could handle. What I'm guessing you are seeing are mysids, which are many times mistaken for baby cleaner shrimp. The tell-tail sign that they are mysids is if they are racing about the bottom of your sump and tank in helter skelter type of movements. Generally, they can be best observed at night in your rockwork using a flashlight. Their eyes will reflect the light allowing you to see litle dots of silver racing around in the nooks and crannies like the energizer bunny on meth. Otherwise, Lysmata amboinensis will indeed take turns impregnating each other and whether you have two, three or four, makes no difference. For your pair you will quickly find that one's breeding schedule will be the opposite of the other so you will always have at least one pregnant shrimp. Hatching will usually occur within an hour or so after lights off. The shrimp will climb atop a high point in the aquarium and release the frye into the current. You will be able to tell when the time is coming close because you will start seeing little eyes within the egg sacs. Brett __________________ She ain't broke, but can we fix her more better? Current Tank Info: A big box of water with some stuff in it. Last edited by Putawaywet; 07/31/2008 at 09:31 PM.

08/01/2008, 09:56 AM	#18
Putawaywet 20 and over club Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Long Beach, CA. Posts: 2,720	Mysis reproduce about as prolifically as copepods. You can easily go from a small handful to a relatively large amount in a pretty short time. Brett __________________ She ain't broke, but can we fix her more better? Current Tank Info: A big box of water with some stuff in it.

07/31/2008, 06:52 PM	#2
gumbii Registered Member. Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: bell gardens, ca Posts: 3,927	damn... that's dope... pics...???

07/31/2008, 07:00 PM	#3
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	I tried, but the babies are too small. Soon. I'll try to get some pic's of the preggers shrimps when I feed the tank.

07/31/2008, 07:25 PM	#4
tcmfish Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 3,658	Not to be debbie downer but the larval phase of cleaner shrimp is 141 days and they go through many stages. If you were to raise them might need to put some vacations on hold, but good luck. Check out mofib or marinebreeder.org for some more info.

07/31/2008, 07:34 PM	#5
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	This is the best pic I could get of the shrimp for now.

07/31/2008, 07:35 PM	#6
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	that was going to be my next question.... What to do next? I guess they made it this far without my interference. The sump has low flow. What do I need to do.

07/31/2008, 09:04 PM	#8
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	here is another pic of the shrimp with eggs. Both shrimp are carrying eggs right now, one of them has bright green eggs and the other has tan eggs. So, I'm about to have more eggs floating around the tank.

07/31/2008, 09:26 PM	#11
gumbii Registered Member. Join Date: Jul 2008 Location: bell gardens, ca Posts: 3,927	that's a tough call then... i personaly wouldn't do anything... it seems like alot of effort... but rearing those bad babies would be pretty cool...

07/31/2008, 09:40 PM	#12
dones20 Moved On Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: MIAMI FL !!!!!! Posts: 317	my cleaner shrimp pair lay eggs often as well they genearly hatch at nigght and become a natural food source

07/31/2008, 10:19 PM	#13
BuddhaKiss Registered Member Join Date: May 2008 Location: Northern Va Posts: 1,068	I'm tending to agree with putawaywet, you may be seeing mysis shrimp instead. I've seen them in my sump and briefly in my display before the fish gobblesthem up. Having said that, I used to have some peps that would breed in my display. I've seen little larvae shrimp swim around at nite when I viewed my tank with a flashlight. They looked completely differnt than mysis. A clear pic would definitely help in IDing them.

07/31/2008, 10:38 PM	#14
mander Premium Member Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: In The Triangle, NC Posts: 150	I mistook mysis for cleaner babies too, I later realized they were mysis and though for sure all that time they were cleaners. I also just figure the cleaner babies are a great food source for everyone. Though it was seriously disturbing to see the cleaner 'mama' picking the live larvae out of 'her' flipper flapper doohickeys and eating them. Talk about convenience foods...

07/31/2008, 10:44 PM	#15
nirrad Registered Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: St. Louis Posts: 112	bummer. I think you may be right. I was looking forward to having a ton of cleaner shrimp. So, how do I get baby mysid shrimp in my tank anyway? There are too many of them to be hitchikers from rock.

07/31/2008, 11:12 PM	#16
tcmfish Registered Member Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 3,658	dude you can do a lot raise em up cmon more people need to put some effort into this stuff i haven't been around too long but think back when or just pick up an old book and look how hard it was to keep corals and now we have REEFcentral pretty much dedicated to it with people from all over the world keeping propagating and spawning and settling coral so try collecting the larvae and raise em up so many people with reef tanks have these ideal conditions that the inhabitants are spawning in and are just like hey thats cool and don't do anything think of how rewarding it would be to raise something up

07/31/2008, 11:50 PM	#17
BuddhaKiss Registered Member Join Date: May 2008 Location: Northern Va Posts: 1,068	I'm tending to agree with putawaywet, you may be seeing mysis shrimp instead. I've seen them in my sump and briefly in my display before the fish gobblesthem up. Having said that, I used to have some peps that would breed in my display. I've seen little larvae shrimp swim around at nite when I viewed my tank with a flashlight. They looked completely differnt than mysis. A clear pic would definitely help in IDing them.