Need advice on getting started

[Syscrush]

So, now I have 1 group of tiny shrimp without their yolk sacks, one group of larvae, and one berried female. I was able to get a couple of pictures of the tiny shrimp, but nothing for scale.

[Syscrush]

The babies seem to have grown past the larval stage now - they've dropped their yolk sacks. The baby in this pic is about 4mm long.


That pink blur in the upper left is a baby shrimp. It's kinda wild how it looks dwarfed by 3 snails that are about 12mm long.


Best I could focus without a macro lens...


Cropped version of that same photo. Despite being much smaller than the adults, it seems to have basically the same proportions.

[Mustafa]

Thanks for sharing!

[Syscrush]

Thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the resource you provide here. I'm really taken with these shrimp, and always enjoy showing them to my guests and telling them about these remarkable little creatures.

[Mustafa]

They do grow on you. But the real addiction starts when you start seeing larvae floating around in the tank....

[Syscrush]

I have my 3rd or 4th batch of at least 6 larvae floating around the tank right now. It seems like we're into a groove now, the population of my little tank should be about double what I started with. Looking forward to seeing them grow and mature.

[Syscrush]

Well, I've lost count of how many batches of babies the little tank has seen now, and I'm excited about seeing them mature. I have a few friends who are interested, so I think that when the population gets up over 100, I'll start a new little tank with water, algae, snails, and shrimp from my main tank. At this rate, that should be before Christmas.

I'very noticed over the last 2-3 months that I see fewer shrimp out looking for food. Last month, I gave them only a single flake of food, rather tan the 3 I was doing before. Even so, they spent most of last month hidden, but when I went back to the regular amount today, I'm back to seeing something more like the frenzy of the first few feedings.

[Syscrush]

After the flurry of breeding activity of the last few months, things seem to have settled down. I haven't seen a berried female for a while, now, and I haven't had any larvae floating around for a while, either. The juvenile/adolescent shrimp seem to spend most of their time hiding - to look at the tank today, you wouldn't necessarily notice that it has more inhabitants than it did 3 months ago. I'm sticking with the same routine of care, and keep hoping to see the tank inhabitants getting more visible.

[Syscrush]

Wow, it's been over a year since I've posted an update!

Well, my shrimp kept bringing me happiness and more little shrimp, but then the glass on my 2.5 gallon tank became cracked, so I had to take some new action. I did the following:

1. Put duct tape over the crack as a temporary measure.
2. Prepared my 4 gallon plant tank for use as a shrimp tank (removed the plants and water, left the substrate, added some water from the supershrimp tank, and let it sit for a few days).
3. Ordered a replacement 2.5 gallon tank.
4. Transferred almost 100 supershrimp to the 4 gallon tank, along with the lava rock and some of the alge and a bunch of shrimp.
5. Transferred the remaining supershrimp (20-30 of them) and snails along with the rest of the water & the sand substrate to the new 2.5 gallon tank.
6. Topped up both tanks with brackish water.
7. Gave the smaller tank to my cousin who had previously expressed interest. They are now in his science classroom and are a big hit with the kids (I think he teaches grades 6-8 or something like that).

So far, both groups of shrimp appear to have managed the transition well. I'll post some pics of my new tank soon.

[Mustafa]

Thanks for the update! Yeah, definitely post more pics. Also, the pictures you posted before seem to have disappeared from the server they were on. If you remember which pics you posted, do you mind posting them again?

[Syscrush]

I finally bought some macro gear for my camera and I'm starting to experiment to see if I can get some decent shrimp pics. I'll also revisit the previously-posted pics from this thread and move them to a different host for sharing.

I haven't had any larvae in the new tank yet, but I do have 1 berried mama in there now, so it shouldn't be long. The new tank looks nice, but I'll feel a bit better about it once I see some breeding happen in there.

[Mustafa]

Did you have a chance to use your macro lens yet? Not seeing the promised pictures!

[Syscrush]

I've been very delinquent about sharing pics and progress here.

The short story is that my shrimp are doing great. I did buy a cheapie macro setup, but while it's good for some things, it's not good for subjects this small and fast-moving. I did my best to get some shots with it, this is typical of the results:



Then I rented a schmancy macro lens to play around with, and got some nicer shots:







Here's an overall view of the current state of the tank:



All photos can be found in this public album on Flickr.


My cousin reports that the tank in his classroom continues to do well and is popular with his students.

[KenCotigirl]

Thank you for the pictures. I enjoy seeing others success.

Ken

[Mustafa]

Nice pictures and beautiful tank. Thanks for the update!