Amano spawn

zax · Post by **zax** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 1:38 am

Just to update things, I had one zoe morph into the adult form from the whole of the previous spawn

which I then killed by reducing the salinity to fast

But on a better note, today is the 26 th day of my 3 rd spawn of which I have remaining 150 zoes aproximately. I decided to check if any had morphed by lowering the water level in the tank to just 1 inch. To my suprise

and delight

I found 15 zoes had morphed and were darting around the tank at lightning speed. I caught them with a pipette

(which was murder to do as they move so fast) and transfered them to another container...

I will now commence to reduce the salinity over a number of days very slowly by dripping the water in through an airline.

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 1:57 pm

Big time congrats! Please go back & write up an article on how you did this. I'm sure Mustafa would like to add this to his articles section.

Neonshrimp · Post by **Neonshrimp** » Tue Aug 22, 2006 6:07 pm

Great job!

take good care of them and keep us updated.

Thanks!

zax · Post by **zax** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 1:41 am

I'd like to increase the yields before I attempt to write an article but in the meantime I will just post updates.

Today I lowered the water level again to see if any zoes had morphed and I managed to find five adults amongst all these...

When the zoes get close to morphing they start to swim more like an adult instead of floating vertically in the water. I only manage to identify the adults amongst this lot when they move as they loose their redish colour upon morphing and appear very translucent except for their eyes. Here is an 8 mb film of the zoes swimming, if you look carefully towards the bottom right at the end of the clip you will see something dart at lightning speed... thats an adult

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1n3tBM9OjU

I am gradually reducing the salinity by half each day with the young adults...

The freshwater is dripped in gradually by means of air lines which have venturi caps on the end. My improvised water tank for reducing salinity and water changes...

This is a pic of my Amano shrimp project...

The top two tanks on the right contain full strength sea water in the making ready for water changes. The top two tanks on the left are my 4th batch. The bottom right tank is the hatching tank...

The bottom middle tank is my 3rd batch whcih was pictured close up above and the other two tanks are empty. Once the minature adults have made the transition to freshwater I will move them to a suspended tank inside my planted tank where the main colony of Amano adults are...

zax · Post by **zax** » Sun Aug 27, 2006 11:49 pm

Day 32 with my 3rd spawn and I have caught another 52 adults, this makes the total so far from this spawn 123 adults.

Neonshrimp · Post by **Neonshrimp** » Sun Aug 27, 2006 11:59 pm

Way to go! Be sure to record your steps because you are so successful with this project. Keep it up, happy for you

Shrimp&Snails · Post by **Shrimp&Snails** » Mon Aug 28, 2006 5:45 am

Congrats.

zax · Post by **zax** » Tue Aug 29, 2006 10:22 pm

Thanks guys. Update on things; caught another 30 young adults today, bringing the total number of adults to 154, I found 3 in my freshwater nano planted tank yesterday. I had released 13 in there and assumed they had died, so there could still be others in there. Here is a 13.2 mb film of them in a small dish before being moved to brackish water. This film has not been speeded up;

http://www.asfs71.dsl.pipex.com/morphedadults.AVI

Newjohn · Post by **Newjohn** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 9:44 am

HI zax

Thank You
for the information and photo's

Are you keeping the Adults in Hard or Soft water ?

Keep The Updates Coming
John

Shrimp&Snails · Post by **Shrimp&Snails** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 10:00 am

Zax are you Andrew-Amano from the fishkeeping forum? That tank pic looks very familliar.

zax · Post by **zax** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 11:30 am

NewJohn; My adults are kept in regular dechlorinated tap water.

Shrimp&snails; Nah I'm not Andrew.

Newjohn · Post by **Newjohn** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 11:46 am

Zax
Thank You
For the information.

I have had 12 Adults for around 4 months.
And I have never seen any eggs.

I know they are wild caught, that might be the problem.
There are not liking there new home, but , they are nicely colored.
Well, as colored , as a see through Shrimp can be.

I will just keep trying.
Or, Go out and buy some more.

John

Shrimp&Snails · Post by **Shrimp&Snails** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 12:12 pm

Oops sorry your tank looked just like Andrews. I love the shoal of fish on the right of it by the way.

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 2:03 pm

Newjohn wrote: I have had 12 Adults for around 4 months.
And I have never seen any eggs.

I know they are wild caught, that might be the problem.
There are not liking there new home, but , they are nicely colored.
Well, as colored , as a see through Shrimp can be.

All (until now) available amano are wild caught. My guess is you may have high phosphate levels. Few people test for it, but at level about around 5 ppm it prevents amano egg production. Ihad mine for 6 months and never saw any eggs. Once I got the phosphates and nitrates down the eggs started comming non-stop.

My issue is now getting a good hatch. Again I suspect water quality issues. I got two very good hatches, then they went down to just a few zoes, now the eggs don't hatch.

I'm going to re-do my tank and see if that helps.

Shrimp&Snails · Post by **Shrimp&Snails** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 3:06 pm

My female amano is always full of eggs but sadly I haven't the space to set up the breeding tank.