Project

[Flynn002 8]

Hi, I am doing a project for my college course:

How does temperature affect the number of fry a cherry shrimp produces?

I have setup a small 18L nano tank and it’s currently cycling. When ready, I am planning on taking 1 male and 1 female cherry shrimp from my main shrimp tank and putting them in the new tank. and waiting until I see eggs. I will then remove the male and when the eggs have hatched, or when the babies are big enough to see, I will count them. 
I will then repeat this with different temperatures.

it seems like it will all work in theory and I have 1 year to do this so time is not an issue. The only issue I see is that I’m unsure how Will I accurately count the fry? 
This is vital for my project and if anybody has ideas I would greatly appreciate it. 
cheers :)

[jayc 2,760]

Keep the mama in a small breeder net or tank. 

Carefully transfer it when you see she has berried.

 

I don't think temps  effect number of shrimplets hatched.

But temps effects the sex. Cooler water produces more females, hotter water temps produces more males.

But it will take a while to wait until the shrimp grows up to confirm the numbers.

Edited September 22 by jayc

[Crabby 484]

I agree with jayc, I don’t believe you will see a difference in eggs when changing temperature. There will be a different amount of each sex, but I don’t think there will be significantly more or less eggs. 

If you were still wanting to attempt this, I think the use of a breeder box would be smart, as it would allow you to pretty much see everything. Although, if you have the resources, I would highly recommend the use of a ‘photo tank’. I’ve been seen a couple guys on the forum using them, I’m pretty sure they’re handmade, but they’re just very small tanks with black backgrounds that make it really easy and clear to see and photograph shrimp. I think it could be worth it for your project, because if you’re using just a regular tank, the shrimplets will all hide, and you’ll never know how many there were. If you’re using a small, bare bottom tank with no ornamentation, you can’t miss any. You just need to provide some Bacter AE to grow biofilm as a food.

Oh, and as this is a college project/report, I feel the need to tell you that shrimp babies are most commonly known as shrimplets, not fry. In case you weren’t aware. 

Edited September 22 by Crabby

[sdlTBfanUK 921]

My understanding isthat higher temperatures mean the shrimp breed more often, grow quicker, and don't live as long?

I imagine you can only relly do this sort of research in a breeder box as mentioned or a tank with nothing in it for the shrimplets to hide in/behind! I'm not sure either how you will count the eggs on the shrimp as it would be like counting grapes in a bunch and you won't be able to see them all I would think. The shrimplets will be so tiny when they hatch it will be difficult to count them?

I hope you have some fun with this and it wil be great to hear how it goes and what the results are.

Simon

[Flynn002 8]

Thank you so much everyone, 

I think I will alter my project plan to also see how the temperature affects the sex of the shrimplets. 

I’ll have a look for a photo tank as I think this could be very useful. 

will using a bare bottom tank with no ornaments or plants affect the breeding of the shrimp? I’ve always thought that the female hides somewhere and molts before breeding. Does this mean that I should just maybe have a couple of hides in the tank?

 

also, because if the size of the shrimplets, I’m happy to wait for them to grow a bit before counting them. And I could even have a few breeder tanks going at once to speed up the project.

 

thank you very much for all your replies :)

 

 

[jayc 2,760]

38 minutes ago, Flynn002 said:

will using a bare bottom tank with no ornaments or plants affect the breeding of the shrimp?

The shrimp will needs somewhere to hide when they moult, yes. A couple of log caves should be ok.

But the problem with bare bottom, plant-less tanks is that your control of water quality and parameters better be spot on. 

And with no plants to soak up the excess nitrates, you will need to be on top of water changes.

Bare bottom tanks only makes sense if you have a sump setup.

Otherwise, you have a main tank, and house the shrimp in breeder boxes, like we mentioned. That way, your main tank can have substrate, filtration and plants. The main priority for keeping any living creature is to provide them a suitable ecosystem - that means creating a tank that is properly cycled and has the proper beneficial bacteria that can process the waste produced by the shrimp.

[Crabby 484]

The reason I was suggesting against breeder boxes is that I use them a lot for my endler hybrid fry, and I honestly can't see too well through the netting. The big thing is, though, that you don't have anything for the shrimplets to hide in when you're counting them. You can have plants in there, you SHOULD have plants in there, otherwise the water (as per jayc) will go outta wack, but just pull them out when you decide to do your final count. So, pretty much just set up the tank(s) as you usually would (barebottom is actually unnecessary now that I think about it), with ornaments or driftwood, and some plants, and when the time comes to count, take everything out (except the substrate, and the shrimps of course). 

If you're running multiple tests at the same time, you'll either need like a little betta-rack-type thing (a long shallow tank, divided up with glass) or a few breeder boxes and space for them.  

Let us know if you need a hand working out how you're going to define males and females by sight (the criteria for a male or female basically). 

[Flynn002 8]

30 minutes ago, Crabby said:

The reason I was suggesting against breeder boxes is that I use them a lot for my endler hybrid fry, and I honestly can't see too well through the netting. The big thing is, though, that you don't have anything for the shrimplets to hide in when you're counting them. You can have plants in there, you SHOULD have plants in there, otherwise the water (as per jayc) will go outta wack, but just pull them out when you decide to do your final count. So, pretty much just set up the tank(s) as you usually would (barebottom is actually unnecessary now that I think about it), with ornaments or driftwood, and some plants, and when the time comes to count, take everything out (except the substrate, and the shrimps of course). 

If you're running multiple tests at the same time, you'll either need like a little betta-rack-type thing (a long shallow tank, divided up with glass) or a few breeder boxes and space for them.  

Let us know if you need a hand working out how you're going to define males and females by sight (the criteria for a male or female basically). 

Yeah I think I’ll try without the breeder boxes and see if it works. if not, I can give breeder boxes a go afterwards.

I’m no professional at sexing shrimp but I know that females are generally more colourful and have the saddle on their back. Is there any other way of seeing them?

also, I think I will black out the sides and back of the tank a use a black substrate (fluval stratum). I will use blue cherry shrimp or another colour that’s bright. So it will easier to see the shrimplets. And so that they stand out even when they’re on the plants or moss.

[Crabby 484]

I have blue dreams on a black substrate... big mistake lol. I’d honestly go for fire red cherries if you have them - they pop really nicely on black and green. But the black is a good idea!

Another way to tell sexes is by body shape - females have a more round shape, they’re a bit thicker, and sometimes a bit larger too. Males are skinner, and their bellies are much skinnier than the females. Unfortunately my brain is fried and I can’t think of the scientific work for ‘belly’.

 

[sdlTBfanUK 921]

Yellow should be easy to spot against black if you can get those!

Thislink should give you some useful hints on sexing your shrimps,

https://skfaquatics.com/forum/forums/topic/14104-telling-male-from-female-shrimp/

Simon