Help with an ID, please?

[Invader_Xan]

Hello.

I'm looking at buying a couple of ghost shrimp (palaemonetes sp) from my LFS. I've heard though that there are some macro species often mislabelled as "ghost shrimp" -- particularly macrobrachium lanchesteri.

To make sure I don't buy a shrimp that'll attack my amanos, I thought this would be the best place to ask -- what's the best way to tell the difference? I know palaemonetes carry fewer, larger eggs, but none of the shrimp on sale have any eggs.

For that matter, if they are lanchesteri, is there any chance they'd be ok to keep with smaller caridina and neocaridina shrimp?

EDIT -- I bought a couple. See below...

[TKD]

If you do get macros and you do put them in with dwarf shrimp, you eventually have no dwarfs . Same could be said for the ghosts as they tend to go after young shrimp.

TKD

[badflash]

Many adult ghost shrimp Palaemonetes paludosus have red "bracelets" around their pincher arms. These are also not as developed as the true "long armed" shrimp.

The females only have 30-40 large eggs. If you see a bunch of (100's) small eggs, it isn't Palaemonetes paludosus.

If you get lanchesteri, I don't think they will hurt adult amanos. I'm sure they would do a number on baby cherries though.

[Invader_Xan]

Can anyone help me determine what kind of shrimp this is?



At first, I thought he looked a little like Palaemonetes Ivonicus, but his eyes are the wrong colour, and he has a near complete absence of markings. A little territorial. Likes to hide under a large piece of mopani. Doesn't bother my amanos. Has had a couple of minor skirmishes with my Lanchesteri, but only to defend his mopani territory (you can tell when two animals don't actually intend to kill each other).


After reading posts like this one, I think one of them is almost definitely M. Lanchesteri. He's about an inch and a half long. No harm done. He's much too slow to catch any of my amanos (who are much faster and better swimmers). Actually, I've heard of them being aggressive, but mine's actually quite placid. Timid, even.

Badflash, if you're right, he should make quite a nice addition to the tank. Plus, if I do get cherries, it'll be nice to have a way of controlling the population, TBH.

[Invader_Xan]

(bump)

[badflash]

Do you know if this is an adult or a juvenile?

BTW- Don't BUMP. If there is no answer, it is because no one knows,

[Invader_Xan]

To be honest, I'm not sure. I'm having difficulty finding any adult shrimp who look like him, so there's always the possibility he's still a juvenile. He's moulted once in the three weeks I've had him. Still no markings though.

The bump is just because I added the picture as an edit (first good picture I've been able to get of him), not a new posting, leaving the thread where it was. I wanted at least some means of letting people know it had been updated.

[badflash]

I had some amazon prawns (M. Amazonica). It is possible you have a juvenile version of this:

[Invader_Xan]

Actually, that looks like a possibility! How large do they get? Similar species to the rice prawn (M. Lanchesteri)?

[badflash]

Mine got to be around 4".

[Mustafa]

The shrimp on the picture looks like any juvenile Macro. It will be very hard, if not impossible, to tell what species it is at this point. It's definitely not a M. lanchesteri, though.

[Invader_Xan]

Hmmm... I guess I'll have to wait a while and see what he grows into. Thanks.

Though that's not the one I believe to be a Lanchesteri. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think these pictures definitely show a different species. It looks remarkably like a Lanchesteri, judging by other photos identified in this forum. Admittedly, I could be wrong. I'm most familiar with caridina and neocaridina species...


A pretty good side shot.


He was preening, so I managed to get a fairly good shot of his pleopods. They look feathered, if that's any help to his identification.


A front shot, showing some detail on his claws. They look more developed than a palaemonetes, but seemingly aren't as pronounced as in most larger macro species I've seen.

This guy's about an inch long (smaller than the other). Behaviour very similar to the other, though not as shy. Also, the first shrimp is seemingly the dominant one.

[Cactus Bastard]

I'm sorry if digging up old posts is frowned upon, but wanted to at least confirm the ID of the M. Lanchesteri in last set of photos here. I don't know anything about the shrimp in the first picture though...

As far as the feathered swimmerettes, I think most, if not all shrimp have feathered pleopods.
Also, here is a thread with some excellent pictures of an M. Lanchesteri including an amazing close up of it's pleopods:
viewtopic.php?t=969