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I was driving around to different fish shops looking for a male M. lanchesteri and I "accidentally" came home with these:


Any ideas for an ID? The largest is about 4 cm, so they might be too young to tell? Also, can they be kept with M. lanchesteri and/or small non-aggressive fish? From my very limited observations they seem to be more aggressive than my M. lanchesteri, but that could be because of their current close quarters.

It's a juvenile Macrobrachium sp. for sure, but which species is up in the air. Those claws will grow much more in the future (especially the males' ) and they will color out. Then we might try to identify them. And yes, they will definitely be more aggressive than the M. lanchesteri. M. lanchesteri are as peaceful a Macro as they come.

Thanks for trying, Mustafa. I'll keep them in bin on their own then (good thing I keep an extra cycled sponge filter around ). From the claws, it looks like I have two males and two females so I hope I can breed them. I'll update when they coloring up.

An update after a little bit of coloring up.

Male:


Top view, male and female:


Berried female! (This is a couple weeks after the above pictures.)

I think she got the idea that I wanted a look at her eggs
Lots of very small eggs, so I'm guessing I'm going to have more larvae?
Also, is it just me or do you see the slightest hint of eyes on the last picture?

Are they still too young to ID? Personally, I think they're starting to look a lot like Macrobrachium faustinum. I hope I'm wrong, since they require saltwater/brackish water.

Hi!

Guybrush wrote:Are they still too young to ID? Personally, I think they're starting to look a lot like Macrobrachium faustinum. I hope I'm wrong, since they require saltwater/brackish water.

Yes, it is not possible to determine them without any doubts because the male is not jet fully developed. But I can tell you it is a species with marine larval development.

Cheers
Werner