Hawaiian Reds

[Mustafa]

Ok...here's my update. I just saw a berried female in my tank today! I saw her for only about 20 seconds before she disappeared into a crevice again. The eggs were very large and dark brownish in color. She only had about 10-15 of them.

So...hopefully that means that I'll be seeing some huge floating larvae and benthic postlarvae soon! It woudl really be great if they started breeding finally.

Mustafa

[amber2461]

Yaaaaayyyy ... congrats and remember to post some pictures though.

[chlorophyll]

Congrats, Mustafa. I was under the impression your population was already breeding. How long has it been since you set up your breeding tank?

I'm in the process of setting mine up now.

[Mustafa]

Congrats, Mustafa. I was under the impression your population was already breeding. How long has it been since you set up your breeding tank?

I'm in the process of setting mine up now.

Thanks, but the congrats might come a little early. It's still a long way from a berried female to benthic postlarvae (and there will be free floating larvae in between, too). So, let's wait and see. I've had the shrimp since last summer, but I was keeping them under fully marine conditions with quite a bit of water circulation until about November of last year. They did not like that at all and were almost white most of the time. I don't know if they did not like the salinity or the heavy water movement or both. I'll have to test that in the future once I have a larger population (after successful breeding). Right now (i.e. since November) they are in about 1.010-1.014 SG. It varies since I let the water evaporate quite a bit and top off with tap water.

The reason why they might have taken so long to even start producing eggs might be because I believe they are seasonal breeders in Hawaii (correct me if I am wrong). At least they seem to show up in great numbers at only certain times of the year. Of course they could be breeding in the lava rock crevices all year long and then decide to aggregate at certain times of the year, so the jury is still out on the seasonal breeding.

I'll keep you guys up to date with further observations.

Good luck with your breeding efforts!

Mustafa

[Mustafa]

Yaaaaayyyy ... congrats and remember to post some pictures though.

I'd love to post pictures, but these guys are hard to photograph! For example, I saw the female for only a few seconds yesterday before she disappeared. Way too little time to take out the camera. Plus..I have them in a semi dark tank.

I'll try, though.

Mustafa

[chlorophyll]

I'd be interested in pictures of your tank setup if you didn't mind posting.

Yeah, I think likely your shrimp suffered from the high circulation, considering the enclosures where they thrive in the wild, their relatively soft bodies, and reportedly fragile nervous system.
It seems they can tolerate super-saline waters, so seawater strength salinity shouldn't be too much stress.. But probably isn't optimal either.

As for seasonal breeding, probably, but I'm not sure either. My tank will be in an air conditioned room, so climate-wise things will be pretty constant throughout the months. I wonder if they will spawn in this circumstance..

But in any case, the berried female is still great. So I still congratulate you and hope it works out from here.

[51Cornell]

From what I gather from some guys in Hawaii I have talked to about opae, they are seasonal breeders--although someone had a shrimp that hatched eggs in mid-winter (but there was no scientific collaboration on that nor was there any surety that the shrimp was an actual opae ula since opae are often found living in the same pools as another smallish red shrimp) with most reproduction happening in spring and summer. The berried females usually stay well hidden (Mustafa's sighting is only the 3rd I've ever heard of). They don't carry lots of eggs either (15 sounds like a lot). Good luck Mustafa, hopefully you'll have little red opae showing up all over your tank. How warm are you keeping your tank?

[Mustafa]

Alright...here is another update....unfortunately, the two females dropped most of their eggs after I overdosed on a dechlorinator and had to do an impromtu water change. So...I'll wait for the next ovigerous females to pop up.

My setup is pretty simple. First my shrimp (about 30-35) were in a 10 gallon, but for months they have been in a 2.5 gallon with an air driven box filter set to produce only a bubble every second or so. After I fed way too much in the beginning and algae covered the whole tank, I stopped feeding altogether. So...for 3-4 months or more until the ovigerous females showed up the shrimp were living only off of the algae in the tank and they still are.

There is a light propped up against the side of the tank (instead of top lighting) and one half of the tank stays permanently shaded since the light reaches only half of the tank. The shrimp like hanging out there most of the time.

Other than that...there is nothing special I do. I did not do any water changes either....I just replaced the evaporated water with normal tap water once a week or once every two weeks. That's really all.

I am planning on transferring them back into a 10 gallon though since I think that keeping the water quality high enough for the larvae to survive is easier in a larger volume of water. Larvae are always more sensitive to adverse water conditions than adults.

Take care,
Mustafa
PS: If I get to take a picture of the setup I will post it.

I'd be interested in pictures of your tank setup if you didn't mind posting.

Yeah, I think likely your shrimp suffered from the high circulation, considering the enclosures where they thrive in the wild, their relatively soft bodies, and reportedly fragile nervous system.
It seems they can tolerate super-saline waters, so seawater strength salinity shouldn't be too much stress.. But probably isn't optimal either.

As for seasonal breeding, probably, but I'm not sure either. My tank will be in an air conditioned room, so climate-wise things will be pretty constant throughout the months. I wonder if they will spawn in this circumstance..

But in any case, the berried female is still great. So I still congratulate you and hope it works out from here.

[Mustafa]

Hi Frank,

My females were hidden all day long and I never saw them during the day. I could only see them when the lights were off and the shrimp would come out foraging all over the tank. But even then you would see them only for a couple of seconds.

Seasonal breeders or not...we'll see about that this year. If they keep producing eggs all year long then that would answer the question about their breeding seasonality. I can't see any way they could actually distinguish the seasons in my apartment anyway.

The temperature in my tank fluctuates since I do not have a heater but is usually always in the 70s. Right now it's about 78 degrees Fahrenheit.

Take care,
Mustafa

From what I gather from some guys in Hawaii I have talked to about opae, they are seasonal breeders--although someone had a shrimp that hatched eggs in mid-winter (but there was no scientific collaboration on that nor was there any surety that the shrimp was an actual opae ula since opae are often found living in the same pools as another smallish red shrimp) with most reproduction happening in spring and summer. The berried females usually stay well hidden (Mustafa's sighting is only the 3rd I've ever heard of). They don't carry lots of eggs either (15 sounds like a lot). Good luck Mustafa, hopefully you'll have little red opae showing up all over your tank. How warm are you keeping your tank?

[chlorophyll]

Aww, sorry to hear about those eggs!
It's rough having to dechlorinate your water... lucky our water supply here is not chorinated..

I'm interested in how the "crevices" for your shrimp are set up, as I believe this is the main key to having them breed. Well, beside not having poor water quality.

Your lighting is interesting... Mine is more or less top-lit for all but 8 hours of the day. But the quality of the lighting doesn't seem to be producing as much algae as I'd like.

Currently I'm raising the salinity in preparation of adding the shrimp in about 1-2 weeks. There are no shrimp in the tank now, but I decided to plant the tank a little, so gradual salinity increase is still necessary. They will be in just 10 ppt salinity. The plants will serve no purpose really... they just make the tank more interesting ... though may actually hurt good algae growth.

I'll probably start with about 20 shrimp in the 8 liters. Maybe I'll post pics too.

By the way, took a trip yesterday to try to find some A. bisulcata with no luck was a site I heard they could be found as late as last January.
Will be trying a more remote site when I have the time. Maybe I will have to find them on a neighbor island after all.

[Mustafa]

I actually do not have all that many crevices. My shrimp hide behind the box filter and also under the box filter...also...they squeeze themselves under some algae mats that are growing on the gravel. That's really all they have. My salinity fluctuates, too, somewhere between 14-18ppt.

As for A. bisulcata...I would look very high upstream since their lower stream habitats have been taken over by Neocaridina denticulata sinensis.

Mustafa
PS: Have you ever seen any Metabetaeus lohena where you live? I would love to breed some of those guys if I could get my hands on them....

[chlorophyll]

I was at a nice little mountain stream looking for A. bisulcata. So narrow, shallow, and fast-flowing, covered in vegetation. If I could get my camera to download (not sure what's wrong.. It's worked before) I'd post a picture. I'm afraid people may have found out the shrimp were there and raided the area ... or I'm just lousy at spotting them. I spent my time there blindly scraping the rocks with my net in fast-flowing areas, as it was nearing dusk in the shadow of the forest and I could barely see through the flowing surface. But, I could come up with nothing... not even a guppy or a snail!

Anyway, I've never actually seen a M. lohena in person. As far as I know, we don't really have anchialine pools on Oahu, and I've never gone to them when visiting the Big Island. Even there I'm not sure how I would go about looking for them since they are so much less common than the opae ula. My only experience with even opae ula have been captive specimens. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if a zoology lab on campus (U of Hawaii) has a number of M. lohena captive -- actually I'd be surprised if they didn't -- but I haven't worked much in the zoology dpt. Maybe I should look more closely at the tank that I do have access to ... maybe there's one in there. I doubt it though!

[LiquidBee]

Today is the first day that I got my shrimps.

I had a 10 gallon tank with nothing but a fiddler crab in it for the longest time.

and today, I just received the Opae Shrimps that I ordered.

To my suprise, all had survive the transit =) (about 30 of them)

Anyways, after 10-15 minutes of making sure that the water temperature matched, I released them into my 10 gallon Brackish Tank.

Set Up
I have 2 lava rocks (with 2 holes) which I got from Petco,

a home made sponge filter (not sure if it is working, since I just added it 2 days ago).. made from sponge that was for car wash, plastic pvc pip. Turned off my power filter just today.

threw in some Java Moss that I got 2 days ago

Have my salinity level at 1.08 which was a little low, since I can see the water difference when I released the Opae Shrimps.

I will increase the salinity of the tank to about 1.10-1.12 during the next few water changes, but I was hoping to keep the Java Moss in the tank, since I can't seem to find any other brackish plants.


After releasing the shrimps, I crushed up a little spirulina and fed them, which they happly ate....well..some of it...as the Fiddle Crab rules the tank and takes what he can get first....

The Fiddler Crab keeps on trying to catch the shrimps when it's near but the shrimps are always too fast for the crab...the crab is mainly just forging around for more food in the sand bed, it never seems to get enough food. (Hopefully it won't catch any of the shrimps or I'll be forced to return that little sucker)..

Does anyone know if the Fiddler Crab is a threat to the Shrimps or is it fine ??...I don't want the shrimps to be stressed out.

Anyways, some of the Opae shrimps look a little on the pale side (probably from the shock)...will see in a few days.

The shrimps don't seem to be shy at all, as they are wimming around, either exploring, forging for food, or trying to escape (don't know which)

I thought they would gather or hide in the Java Moss, but it seems like they're not too interested in thee plant, besides nibbling on it a little. Most are swimming out in the open or on the sand bed.

Will try to update on the status of the shrimp in a day or two.

I'm just happy that I got them =)

[chlorophyll]

I was wondering myself if a fiddler crab can exist peacefully with these shrimp. I have a watermelon fiddler who seems like a very gentle thing, but suspected he would still try to catch these shrimp.

To have any kind of large predator in the tank will stress the shrimp out a bit. They don't really have this problem in the wild and have the lava tubes to escape to. If the crab just happens to be bumping into shrimp and they jump away, maybe it's not so bad.

And I suggest piling up some rocks to give the shrimp dark places to hide.


Incidentally, I was visitng the local aquarium for some volunteer work yesterday. Noticed a berried female in plain view in the opae ula exhibit tank. Interesting; never saw one in person before. The eggs appeared to be attached quite low on her pleopods; almost dangling. Not sure if that's just how they tend to carry their eggs or they were close to hatching, or being aborted. Looked closely to see if there are active larvae in the tank ... couldn't tell. There were little specks of things, but nothing I could conclude to be shrimp larvae.

[LiquidBee]

While observing the tank, I noticed that the fiddler crab isn't trying to catch the Opae on purpose, it would bump into them most of the time, or snap at them (missing 100%) when it the Opae gets in the way.

I can't figure out if the shrimps are stressed or not (how can you tell ?)

I also purchase some Opae food (as the seller claims), it came in a little plastic bag, and looks like green power. I suspect that it is dried Plankton, but can not be sure. I tried adding a little bit into the water, but it just dissapates so I can not tell if the Opae is actually eating it or not.

I will get more Lava Rocks in a few days to make more hiding spaces, but until then they'll have to survive on their wits..haha

Most of the Opae are reddish..only a few are pale now...so I'm guessing they have settled in.

I'll try to have some pictures, but I'll need instructions on how to post them on here..

I also will try to get some Kents Iodine....not sure if the little fellows needed or not...but I read its good for them.