Petshrimp.com Discussion Forum

Hello people,

I have a 17 littre aquarium with 3 ghost shrimp for 3 weeks now, no other fish. It is planted with quite a lot of plants and I am now trying to grow Glossostigma in it. It will become heavily planted eventually. I have a pH of 6.5 and a kH of 6 and my 3 shrimp live hapilly in it. I have undergravel filter so nothing will suck the fry. I have noticed that one of my shrimp has green eggs under her belly. This was noticed yesterday 27/10/05 thus today has been the second day of her pregnancy. I want to breed these little shrimp but I don’t know how. I have read all the other posts but none gives vital information like:
1. How many days will the eggs be under her belly? When will she drop them?
2. What should I feed the fry? How many time?
3. Should I leave the pregnant shrimp in the tank? When she drops the eggs will the other shrimp eat the fry?
4. Should I place the pregnant shrimp in a small glass container and place the container to float in the tank?Then when she drops the eggs I just remove the mother shrimp and feed the fry?Change some of the water of the glass container with the fry every day?

Any suggestions? Can someone provide me with a step by step guide

First of all, we need to know what kind of shrimp species you have. "Ghost Shrimp" or "Glass Shrimp" refers to many different species depending on what continent you live in. In the US it's usually a Palaemonetes species. In Asia and Europe Macrobrachium lanchesteri are sold as "Glass Shrimp."

So, if you can, take a picture of your shrimp and post it so we can try to identify it. Then it would be possible to attempt to answer your questions.

I can't upload the pictures.....

I bought them in the UK.

http://www.theaquarium.0nyx.com/shrimp/shrimp.htm

These look just like my American Palaemonetes shrimp. If so they have panctonic fry. Make sure there are LOTS of places for the fry to hide and be sure of tiny food for them. Single cell agae, rotifers, and Copepods (cyclops) seem to be the food they need when small. I am also attempting to grow them and have no experience either. Just pasing on what I've read.

I'm using large volumes of Riccia as the adults will have a hard time penetrating such a thick growth to get at the fry.

These shrimp are Macrobrachium lanchesteri. They produce smaller eggs and larvae than the American Palaemonetes paludosus. Their larvae also do not morph into postlarvae (i.e. benthic shrimp) for several weeks. The larvae can grow up in complete freshwater.

The best thing would be to prepare a separate, aged tank with lots of plants and move the female into that tank once the green eggs start turning yellowish and see-through and you start seeing tiny eyes in the eggs. that might take about 2 1/2 to 4 weeks depending on temperature. Once the larvae hatch remove the female. Otherwise she will eat the larvae one by one. In an aged tank there is already a lot of planktonic food for the larvae to live on, but you can supplement their food by powdered or finely ground fish food or freshly hatched artemia nauplii. Depending on how much you feed every time you should also do small regular water changes. Feed at least once a day as much as the larvae can consume. Then you just have to wait until you see the first benthic shrimp running around.

What if a take a big glass jar and fill it with water and have nothing else in it. Then place it on my window for the sunlight to hit it directly and with some extra nutriends some algae should start growing on the jar. When the eggs are about to hatch then I could change the filthy water, place the shrimo in there, drop her eggs and the fry will live in a jar with new water and algae all over the place. Would that be ok?

No. A glass jar is way too small for raising 100-200 shrimp larvae. It will be impossible to control the water parameters in a tiny jar. This is about the equivalent of stuffing 100-200 (human) children into a normal sized apartment!

Then do u suggest getting another tank? How big whould it be? Will I need lights or are the room lights sufficient?

What about if a get a breeding net and place the pregnant shrimp in there and let the fry grow there, in the net in the original tank?

You need a separate tank with good lighting. The net is not going to work.

5 to 10 gallon tanks (approximately 20 to 40 liters) should be good enough. It's not as easy to raise shrimp as it may appear at first.

ok so how long approximately will the pregnant shrimp keep the eggs under her belly and then releasy them?

1. 20L tank.....
2. Good light...


what else?
an airstone is ok?
no gravel....
no plants....
just a tank a light and an airstone.....will it be ok? No heater since a live in a warm room that will keep the water warm....

Air stone is fine. As I have said above, lots of (fast growing) plants, in which case you do not even need an air stone. Gravel is better since it will harbor lots of beneficial bacteria and also some planktonic food. For the rest, just read my post above. There is really not much more to say about this. The rest is just you trying it out.

What do I feed them? Fry food from the pet store? Anything specific?

Green water would be good, I had used crushed flakes.

BlueEL wrote:Green water would be good, I had used crushed flakes.

So how do I create green water? Just keep a tank in the sun (which we don't have much in the UK) and add K-N-P to have inbalanced fertilizes for algae to grow? Keep the water still, no airpum?

I guess you have to tell be how to create green water

What do I do if I decide to keep the fry in my original 20L planted tank and just remove the 3 adult shrimp.What do I feed then?