Crs/black bee

[richiep]

My stock of shrimp have been the same strain for 2 1/2 years Question! How long can the same strain sustain a good line before I have to introduce new blood, or can I leave things carry on, if I have to introduce new blood should I quarantine them for a few days,weeks or months or not at all

[jayc]

4 hours ago, richiep said:

How long can the same strain sustain a good line before I have to introduce new blood

That's difficult to say. There is no set amount of time. 

You might start seeing poorer quality shrimp over a long time. Or worse, you start seeing deformities from too much inbreeding.

Always a good idea to add one or two new shrimp from different sellers occasionally.

Here in Oz, imports are banned, so the stock we have in the country is all we have. All our shrimp are related to the first few that got into the country many years ago before the ban. The quality of shrimp we have is no where near the ones we seen from other countries.

Quarantine shrimp is always a good idea especially from unknown sellers. A couple of weeks should be enough.

 

Edited October 31, 2018 by jayc

[richiep]

Thanks jayc  I think I'll introduce some new blood then. 

[ineke]

@richiep Hi I bred CRS for a very long time without adding new genes- as JayC mentioned we had limited genes here anyway. After about 3 years I wasn't seeing any great improvement in colour despite heavy culling so I introduced some high quality male CRS -on the premise that 2 or 3 really good males can breed with many females rather than slowly breeding with a few good females. obviously adding both males and females helps but a few good males is the way to go if money is an issue. Buy the best you can afford and continue to cull out any low grade males especially , once you have a reasonable colony then the lower grade females should also be culled.

Over the 3 years I bred them without new genes I didn't see any deformities -initially I bred for numbers to stock a large tank but then started heavy culling and adding the new males. It only took a few months to see a vast improvement. The first 2 pictures show numbers over quality as you can see the white is very poor, the next few pictures show the improvement of adding a few good males to a low grade colony - the white and the grade improved within months

[jayc]

Thanks Ineke.

Pictures speak a thousand words.

[richiep]

Thanks ineke that's very informative and seeing those pictures as made my mind up to go out today and get some male stock, mine are starting to colour as in your first pic, the last few photos are beautiful shrimp 

This was my last photo a few weeks ago

Many thanks for sharing

[jayc]

Yeah, some are starting to lose the solid whites. Mixing CBS and CRS  will lower the quality of each even faster. Do I see a CBS in the middle there with a red tail?

Might be nice for a casual tank. but not if you are trying to increase the quality of your shrimp.

Sell some of the lower grade males and make room for a new SSS+ grade male.

 

 

Also.... would love to see a picture of what you shrimp you get.

Edited November 1, 2018 by jayc

[richiep]

Your eagle eyes picked that one out with the red tail, I deliberately mixed them to try and get some different colours but as you say Iam loosing the white, i just sold 7doz to another lfs so I'll go see what my other lfs as had in, when I rang they said they were a good colour if that's the case I'll get 8 males and pick the best of my females and put them in a tank with sakura fire reds, I can lower the gh so both species will breed as I've done in my other tank