Petshrimp.com Discussion Forum

Well I woke up this morning to find my two ghost shrimp tag-teaming my 1-1 1/2 inch long rubber nose pleco. They were basically trying to pick and eat him alive! He is completely find and is just resting on the rocks but they had death grips on him when he tried to wriggle himself away. Needless to say they have been removed. I was told by many different forums that they need to be watched as they will get ate very quickly but these things have terrorized my pleco! The good thing about them is that they did eat the dead fish but never have they attacked live healthy fish until now. Is this normal? Is there a good reason? They eat all the time so they arn't starving and they are shedding frequently too.

Nikki

Oooooh. I think I might know what these are.

Potentially, they could be baby prawn if they are exhibiting behavior that is very aggressive. Small prawn often are mixed in with ghost shrimp or mislabeled as them in the hobby. Many times they get quite large and they can literally take over an entire tank. The largest species can reach a body size of 12" alone.

Do you have any images of your ghost shrimp? How big are they? Where did you get them? I've noticed that pet stores in TX seem to have a lot of prawn. I'm not sure if they are contaminants in local areas from the prawn aquaculture operations down there or if there is another explanation.





In the pics above, you can see the most common prawn in the aquarium trade. Macrobrachium rosenbergii. In the second picture, they don't look much different than a ghost shrimp.

The giveaways are typically larger claws, a red horn, faint stripes on their sides and larger (disproportionate) eyes.

Here is a vid of my little guys when they were around 1" long. Cute when they are that size.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5jnWFPy0 ... ature=plcp

And this is a male from the same batch about 2 months later.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bdjLZamW ... ature=plcp

He is only 2.5" now and already getting quite aggressive. Note the huge claw. It will only get bigger.

More than you ever wanted to know. HTH

Hi! Sorry it took me so long to respond I kind of forgot about my shrimp problem since they are no longer in there. Those pictures you posted look exactly like mine did. Kinda hazey-clear but faded brownish strips. The grew like crazy too! It seemed every month I would see their shedded skin and they kept getting larger and larger. They were about 3 inches long. They are nasty little things if you ask me. And the fish they were trying to eat alive is doing great! I got them from a pet store called pet junction. It's generally a great store, so I'm surprised they had these prawn in there. How can you tell a diference between prawn and other shrimp?

It's not always easy to tell. If they are blue prawn (M. rosenbergii), the telltail signs are: typically larger claws, a red horn, faint stripes on their sides and larger eyes. (as said above)

There may be other species mixed in and those can have color, behavior and shape differences from the common blue prawn. However, the basic theme usually seems to be larger claws combined with more active/aggressive behavior from your average ghost shrimp.