My cherry shrimp adventures
Dec 8, 2016 20:40:37 GMT -5
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Andre, lesfromlakeshore, and 1 more like this
Post by Xander on Dec 8, 2016 20:40:37 GMT -5
If some of you remember, I picked up a batch of blue cherry shrimp culls earlier in the year - June, I think - which I brought home and housed in a little 2.5g for a while.
When I first got them, of the 13 in the bag, all but 3 seemed to be wild-colour, with the others being vaguely bluish in tint.
One shrimp had some babies while I was away on vacation, then there was another batch shortly after... And all of the babies appeared to be wild colour, none of them stood out from the others. Mother shrimp was one of the wild colours in both cases. Father shrimp, uncertain.
Then I moved them into the the 20 long kuhli tank, where any further breeding would be met with population control. The babies I'd raised were split up between myself and my two sisters once they were big enough to survive with their bettas.
But after the move to the 20, something odd started happening with their colours. Instead of 10 wilds and 3 bluish, I wound up with 3 jet blacks, 1 red, 1 clear black-striped, 1 clear green, and a smattering other odd and unexpected traits among the rest of the shrimp.
And as they got bigger, one or two of the babies became red, with the rest of them staying clear and colourless.
After sending the majority of the babies off to my sisters, I asked them to let me know if any of them start to show any colour... And so far, two have become jet black, with one being bright red.
I moved my 3 black shrimp over to the 33g for better chances of black babies, and a week later (a few days ago) one more jet black one showed up in my 20! Moved her over too, as soon as I found her. 3 females and 1 male in there, now.
But the most incredible thing to happen yet happened tonight... Checking out my 20, I was looking at a couple of the new babies who made it past the population control, when a much larger shrimplet crawled out of wherever - big enough to be from one of my first two batches, more likely the first.
And this guy was yellow. Yellow! Very unexpected! And I'm surprised it went so long without me seeing it, with so much dark in the tank. Black bg, black sand...
There he is, with another regular shrimp just behind him.
Anyway, there isn't really any point to this story, and maybe nothing I've said is all that incredible, but I've just found these little guys to be sooo fascinating ever since I got them. I had to share. Never go very long without a new surprise from them!
And here's one of the black ones, just to show just HOW black I'm talkin':
When I first got them, of the 13 in the bag, all but 3 seemed to be wild-colour, with the others being vaguely bluish in tint.
One shrimp had some babies while I was away on vacation, then there was another batch shortly after... And all of the babies appeared to be wild colour, none of them stood out from the others. Mother shrimp was one of the wild colours in both cases. Father shrimp, uncertain.
Then I moved them into the the 20 long kuhli tank, where any further breeding would be met with population control. The babies I'd raised were split up between myself and my two sisters once they were big enough to survive with their bettas.
But after the move to the 20, something odd started happening with their colours. Instead of 10 wilds and 3 bluish, I wound up with 3 jet blacks, 1 red, 1 clear black-striped, 1 clear green, and a smattering other odd and unexpected traits among the rest of the shrimp.
And as they got bigger, one or two of the babies became red, with the rest of them staying clear and colourless.
After sending the majority of the babies off to my sisters, I asked them to let me know if any of them start to show any colour... And so far, two have become jet black, with one being bright red.
I moved my 3 black shrimp over to the 33g for better chances of black babies, and a week later (a few days ago) one more jet black one showed up in my 20! Moved her over too, as soon as I found her. 3 females and 1 male in there, now.
But the most incredible thing to happen yet happened tonight... Checking out my 20, I was looking at a couple of the new babies who made it past the population control, when a much larger shrimplet crawled out of wherever - big enough to be from one of my first two batches, more likely the first.
And this guy was yellow. Yellow! Very unexpected! And I'm surprised it went so long without me seeing it, with so much dark in the tank. Black bg, black sand...
There he is, with another regular shrimp just behind him.
Anyway, there isn't really any point to this story, and maybe nothing I've said is all that incredible, but I've just found these little guys to be sooo fascinating ever since I got them. I had to share. Never go very long without a new surprise from them!
And here's one of the black ones, just to show just HOW black I'm talkin':
