Malawa Shrimp - Photo Gallery and Blog

[Mustafa]

Looks like your black substrate is bringing out a certain, more or less, uniform coloration in your shrimp...interesting. As for selectively breeding a certain coloration...even if the coloration is environmental, you could selectively breed that environmental reaction..i.e. the offspring of that particular shrimp *could* display the same or similar coloration given the same/similar environment.

[infopimp]

Text only update:

Tonight I transfered about 30 fresh Malawa juveniles into three different tanks I have running now, all with great filtration.

I am going for redundancy with this tactic, and also will be watching how the shrimp respond to slightly different environments.

Meanwhile, two more females are berried...

[infopimp]

Allright... photo update... getting kinda... proud (?) of my photos, considering I'm using a sub $200 point and shoot...

Links to high res provided... now in full original resolution.

malawa_3184.sized.jpg

Big: http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 184?full=1

malawa_close_3259.thumb.jpg

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... close_3259

malawa_headon_3238.sized.jpg

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 238?full=1

malawa_3218.sized.jpg

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 218?full=1

...

[infopimp]

See above ^^^

That little rainbow behind his eye in the shot above... its not a lens flare... there is iridescence up above the Malawa's saddle... viewed from the side there is a rainbow effect (!).

Now... photos of the juvies.

malawa_baby_3250.sized.jpg

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 250?full=1

malawa_shrimplet_3185.sized.jpg

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 185?full=1

-steve

[Neonshrimp]

Nice pictures as usualy, thanks for the updates and keep them coming

[infopimp]

Sad update, lost some adults. Flow was low on my mini canister filter, and I cleaned it and when I started it again, a huge amount of stuff shot out... I think this contributed to the death of a few. Moved some other adults into the same substrated, larger tank with Cherries, and they went immediately to eating so that looks good. Old tank is now highly suspect.

I can see how it is important to get a large enough "batch" that things like this don't set back the entire operation.

Lets end for now on an "up note": It is a good thing my juveniles are growing well (in several tanks).... they are WAY more aggresive than Cherries and CRS even with food - they just pick up a big piece and swim off... the cherries have no idea what just happened!

[Mustafa]

Sorry to read about your mishap. Did you maybe clean the filter too well? That would clean out the beneficial bacteria that keep the cycle going. I doubt it was the gunk that caused the deaths.

[infopimp]

I think you are right, I over-cleaned the filter and caused a mini-cycle.

Everything is stablized now and my Females are berried again... some updated photos:

[infopimp]

malawa_on_hc_3919.sized.jpg

High res on the above: http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/m ... 919?full=1

I have two berried females at this time, and a lot of juveniles.

Some rambling observations:

• They are much faster and more aggresive than the Cherry shrimp in this tank - whenever a piece of food is about 1/3 the size of a Malawa, it will just pick up that piece of food like a cargo helicopter and slowly swim/drag it over to a private area to eat.

• They do seem to prefer hard water. In this tank, I recently added some hardness back (brough GH to around 10, up from 4) and the Malawas almost overnight got more dark colorations and yet at the same time became more translucent again (if that makes sense) and also became IMO more active, especially the juveniles. This tank is at 78 degrees.

• Part of my theory on higher ph and hardness making them more healthy is also backed up when I comparing these (pictured) with the Malawa juvenlies I have in another tank that are from the same batch. That tank has ADA Amazonia Type 1 substrate, is at a 6.4 ph and the water has a hardness of 5 and temperature around 74 degrees. The juvenilies from the same batch are smaller, more "pink" and less active. Could it be the water? Ph? hardness? All of it? I don't know... I'm going to continue this experiment and see what happens in time.

• I'm doing a small experiment to see if using a small bit of crushed coral in my HOB will raise PH in my non-ADA tank. If it is doing it, it sure is slow - I see no change. If this is not advised, let me know - I'm a couple days in however and the shrimp all seem quite happy so far.

[Mustafa]

With crushed coral the ph and hardness will rise slowly over time as organic acids (produced by the metabolism of your shrimp and decay in the tank) react with the coral.

[infopimp]

I ditched the crushed coral.

After receiving dozens of concerned emails (not! just joking) I'm here to report that everything is going great with my shrimp collection. Just to prove my Malawas are "getting busy" here is a quick photo update....

[infopimp]

They seem to get along great with the Cherries.

Couple more photos. BTW, High-resolution images are at:

http://www.imageseek.com/sven/gallery/malawa

PS: I've been using Mosura BioPlus to feed the babies - the tiniest shrimplets and the biggest adults both seem to like this stuff.... the adults seem to get frustrated because the pieces are so small, so they run around picking up the sand-like particles... while the babies just grab one little grain and go to work.

-steve

[infopimp]

Here are current photos from my lower ph CRS tank - these guys are more transparent and seem less aggressive than their high PH counterparts in my cherry tank. Could be anything, but at least these guys are survivors.

Also: I moved some Malawa's to a new mini tank with a light substrate and they seem quite happy - albeit more clear now. They seem tough!

[infopimp]

Update.

[infopimp]

Part II