All Activity

My parents have an aquarium, so I don't know if this will help, but still want to leave a suggestion. They also liked the idea of installing a light strip in it, so they started looking on amazon. I don't know what went wrong, but it broke on the fifth day of use. I think it was a cheap Chinese thing (although the website told me it was waterproof and durable). They asked me for help finding a better option, and I advised them of the smart LED multi-color light strips I used in my car. Being pretty skeptical, my dad still decided to try them. They have been working fine for a month now and don't even flicker. Mom says the fish are happy, lol. I hope my comment was helpful

It's not looking good. Quarantine any shrimp showing Necrosis, as it can be infectious. Tell us what your water parameters are, and do a heavy water change after that. Increase surface agitation to get more oxygen into the water. A bit of H2O2 (hydrogen peroxide) into the water to increase oxygen might also help the shrimps that have not yet contracted this.

Sorry to see you have a problem. Try reading the section on 'muscular necrosis' in the below section. You will need to scroll down through it until you see the bold red heading of that description (it is quite a large article covering many problems etc, it is about the 5th item on the first page); I don't have any personal experience of this but do ask any questions as someone may be able to help. A bit more general info may also help, your setup, number of shrimps, how long you have had the shrimps, any water parameters you may have etc?

Hello, I was wondering if anyone here had any first-hand information on these particular pictures. It describes exactly what a few of my shrimp have. The second picture is spot on and most accurate. Thanks

Hi! I can't wait to be a member of this forum! I've just recently packed all of my things in a truck and went all across the states. I used to think that I was the only one going through this stressful situation, but, after reading a few forums and entering some group chats, I realized I'm not as alone as I thought. Thanks to this community, I found https://sekamoving.com/moving/long-distance-movers/, which helped me incredibly much during my whole moving process. I had to move from the west coast to the east coast, which is a pretty long way to go, so I don't know what I would've done without them.

#4 looks almost like a juvenile female to me, just looking at the abdomen in the top left image, but definitely looks more male in the other two images. The colour suggests it is an adult though, and it’s lacking a clear so Simon is probably right in thinking it is male, that top left image is just confusing me a bit. If you’re going to get a female, to be sure, make sure it’s got an obvious yellow saddle. That’ll help you know it’s mature as well.

#1 and #2 were raised under my captivity for 4 MO when they were juveniles. #3 and #4 were acquired from my LFS, although I don't think they know the approximate age. I'll be sure to pick up an actual female the next time I post, I swear by it.

If it is an adult then I think that's another male! The important thing at this stage though is 'ARE THEY ADULT (size/age) YET'?

Okay, I took everyone's advice - video was very helpful by the way. How's #4 looking?

Me too! I’ve never seen any in person so I’m very excited. The fish like low flow so I won’t be doing any fan shrimp (riffle shrimp in Aus). Thanks for the opinion on other shrimp, I guess I won’t do any for now.

You may also find this video helpful, https://skfaquatics.com/forum/forums/topic/14104-telling-male-from-female-shrimp/

Yeah, they look like males to me too.

Depending on how old these shrimp are, they do all look like males to me. If they are still juveniles then it is impossible to tell. You may need to go and buy some more, females (when adult) have a rounder undercarriage where the eggs will grow and a patch behind the head that is usually shapped (and thus called) a saddle so look for one of these distinguishing features!

Hello, I'm trying to start a colony, but I want to make sure that I didn't accidentally get all males or all females. Could anyone identify the genders for 3 shrimp? Shrimp #1 Shrimp #2 Shrimp #3 Thank you!

Looking forward to those pics @Crabby

I had to do a google search to see what those fish look like, they are quite different! That all sounds very interesting and I look forward to hearing how it all goes (and hopefully some pictures), fingers crossed it all works out well. I imagine most shrimp would eat the eggs if they come across them, unless you go for fan shrimp, if they are available where you are? If you are removing the eggs (mops) regularly enough though it should be worth trying other small shrimps.

Hey all! I’ve been super busy so I haven’t been active on the forum, just lurking for a while, but I’ve got the time (and a great reason) for a post now. Against all odds, I’ve managed to snag myself a group of 4 captive bred honey blue eyes (pseudomugil mellis), an endangered and very rare blue eye endemic to Australia (for those unaware). I’m picking them up locally once I get back from an overseas trip, so I’ll have another post once that’s all done, but I thought I’d set up this thread so I can ask questions, share findings (particularly for other breeders and aspiring breeders) and simply document my experiences with this fish. The group is 2m2f so I’ll start them off in a cycled 5 gallon, which at the moment is just scaped with sand and some inert natural rocks collected from a river bed, so I’ll be chucking in a bunch of plants and maybe an Indian almond leaf or two in order to give them a cosy little breeding environment. In terms of the actual breeding, I think I’ll be using a couple small mops on one side of the tank (one floating, one sitting), and pulling daily for a week or so, perhaps even just a few days the first time so I can work with a smaller group. I’ll be getting some brine shrimp eggs (what are your recommendations for cheapish eggs that are good quality and have a good hatching rate?) for both the parents and the fry, once the fry are large enough. What are your recommendations for a first food for the fry? So far I’ve still not succeeded once with an infusoria culture, despite following a variety of different methods. Obviously, I’ve been wondering about shrimp as well. Would they eat the eggs? If not, which species would be found in a similar region and would be compatible? It’d be fun to have a little bit of a biotype for these little fellas. If I get shrimp perhaps I could order from Dave at aquagreen and get some cool native plants while I’m at it. The main thing I’m debating is whether to breed them in a tank or give them a go outdoors. Outdoors seems riskier but potentially more fruitful and a tad easier (because it’s natural), whereas the tank seems much much safer but I’m just not sure how easy it’ll be to get them breeding. Anyways, I’ll see how they go in the tank and reassess later on. I’ll be asking plenty of questions when I pick them up as well, so I think it’ll all work out. I’m very excited to be joining the captive breeding conservation effort for this beautiful fish, it’s honestly been a bit of a dream of mine ever since I heard of the species, and I’ll be pulling out all the stops to make sure this opportunity doesn’t go to waste. I look forward to sharing many exciting posts with these cute little honeys. Cheers, Crabs.

If you use the Fritz, do so in a separate tank, and not in the main tank. Best to set up a hospital tank/container for treatment.

I have 2 females, both about the same size. I want to guestimate they are about 2 inches. I had a third, a male, but I haven't seen it around. At least it hasn't left the thick anubias driftwood feature. I went ahead and took her out this morning and put a drop of melafix on the problem area for about a minute. She was in a hurry to get back into the tank. I also ordered some Fritz Expel-P, which is supposed to be Levamisole HCL. I never used it before but figured I better have it on hand, just in case. After getting reoriented in the tank, she made a quick hurry back to the anubias driftwood. They used to live in there, as it was thick and I wouldn't be surprised, full of tasty things. I would see them occasionally come out when the lights got really dim at night. I had a third, a male, and both these females were always berried. I haven't seen the male or it hasn't come out like these two. I am thinking maybe they are getting ready to molt but I'm not sure. They would hang around the floating breeder box or amazon leaves and constantly clean themselves. I haven't seen them eating or foraging. Their behavior has been different, that's for sure and starting to get me a little worried. My bamboo shrimp also lives in the anubias driftwood (the circulation pump blows over and through the anubias). My tank is co2 injected fully planted, long established, 12 years or so. My parameters: Ammonia 0 Nitrite 0 Nitrates 10-20 PH 6.9 after injection GH 7 KH 6 Temperature: 76F (during cooler months), 77-78F (during warmer months). Weekly water changes, about 30% to clean up organic debris and remove any excess fertilizers. I dry dose daily, a very light EI method.

Rust disease is usually more on the carapace. But this could spread to the body area if not treated. While it's still isolated at the tail, it is easier to treat with antibacterial meds. If this was my shrimp, I'd catch it and put a drop of Melafix (or some other similar antibac/antibiotic) directly on the tail. Leave it for a minute before putting the shrimp back into the tank. When you think of potential predators, you might be thinking of a fish that can outright swallow a whole shrimp. Fish don't predate on shrimp like that necessarily. When the fish are large enough, but still too small to swallow a shrimp whole, they take bites out of the shrimp. A Bolivian and Serpae are definitely going to be enough to take bites out of a shrimp, even one the size of an Amano. Your shrimp are probably hiding for that reason and only venturing out more because they are hungry. There are other reasons a shrimp hides, and that can be because of unsuitable water parameters. If you can test the water and share it here, we can advise if that is a problem.

Great photos! I don't think it is rust but just keep an eye on it for now, I suspect it caught it on something, or something took a nip at it maybe. It doesn't look like any Amano I have ever seen though? How big is it?

My amanos have been hiding ever since I got them, quite some time ago, but they recently started to come out into the open. I never really got to see them until recently. Even today is the first time I’ve seen the second female with this damage on her tail. I’m not sure if it’s rust disease or if something tried to take a bite out of her tail. There are not large enough predators in the tank to outright eat it, but I do have serpae tetras, a female betta and a Bolivian ram in this heavily planted community tank.

You are into experimental territory now. There are lots of meds for ich, lice, anchor worm, etc. This parasite might be internal (within the body), and any meds designed for external application might not work. An unfortunately, any meds designed for internal parasites are targeting worms, which might also be ineffective against this parasite. Be careful that these meds don't affect your shrimp as well.

Just to update: I checked some molt shells of some blue bolts and golden bee that don't have this short antenna problem - no bugs I check an old, adult RWP in the tank which currently has this problem. It's antenna are still long, but seems "unhappy" and not eating ever since this last molt - lots of bugs in shell, plus molt shell has a red tint to it. May be some sign of sickness, as usually my RWP molt shells are perfectly clear. I'm thinking I need some kind of anti-(internal?)parasite med to treat this. Any suggestions?

yes, it's the shed shells. now that I think about it, I also remember in the video the bugs were clear, and I have seen clear ones before too, a long time ago. But these recent ones were dark colored. So I have two tanks. In one of them, where I normally have this problem, I have been dosing antibiotics. The short version is that most of the shadow panda and RWP shrimp have got this disease, but they haven't died either. But they don't recover either. They just simply stop growing and stay at a small size with stumpy short antenna. The first shadow panda that got this problem is still alive maybe 2-3 months later. In my other tank which often doesn't have this problem also got it, but it seems to have hit harder, where both "almost adult" shadow panda suddenly got it and died within a few days. Antibiotics didn't save them. It's too weird - it seems like this problem comes on suddenly, with no trigger that I can think of. (besides "the weather was warm and I ran the air conditioned". This doesn't actually affect the water temperatures since I have a chiller, but maybe something blew into the tank?)