lost my way

[ineke]

Nogi's cherry grading has made me realise with all the excitement of getting new and different shrimp I've lost my way a bit. I started out with a few Red Cherries -the females were of good colour but the males were all clear. I sort of lost interest in them, however this weekend I thought I would do a semi cull- I caught a heap of lighter coloured cherries of all sizes and was quite surprised that a lot of the boys were getting quite a good colour on them. I have put all the culls into another tank to see how they develop because my last culls ended up having quite a good colour after a couple of months so this tank will be my holding tank for a while. Nogi's chart came at a good time making me realise that I'm gradually getting better stock so my enthusiasm for my reds has come back somewhat. So it shows that only a few generations can make a heap of difference to improving the stock you have. My hardest part is catching the the little ones in a planted 100 litre tank.

[Squiggle]

Awesome work Ineke, very well done & you never know, in a few generations you may be the one leading they way for Painted Fire Red Cherries :victorious:

[ineke]

There are a lot of people on facebook especially here in Adelaide that are saying they have Painted Fire Red's and some of the pictures look good so may have already been pipped at the post! I was so close to giving them away this weekend but now will keep them for a couple more generations and see how they go. Just have to thin them out a bit more!

[Squiggle]

I wouldn't put too much into a pic of one shrimp they have, it's probably their best one & they don't breed true painted fire for every shrimp. C'mon Ineke, you can do it! :victorious:

[ineke]

Oh this has given me a boost to keep going it was actually Alan who said you can't give them away!!!! But I am happy to see the improvement in the boys. Haven't seen a great deal of improvement in the girls but then they were pretty good to start with

[Gbang]

Agree with squiggle. Look for two things when pll claim they have painted fire

1- a male!!!!

2- way more than 10 shrimp to prove it. One in 100 does not qualify a painted fire. It's the genetics and blood that qualifies a true painted fire not a rarity

[KiwiBigD]

If we can see a Painted Male and more importantly if you can buy one I'd take it. Shesh, I'll happily offer $50 for a real Painted RCS male, right now, show

me a photo and I'll be all over it. Most people are only showing Fire Red Females, and as well all know females are always stronger. I've got a male right

now coming along that is looking close to Fire Red, but he needs another couple of weeks and we'll see how he is. Anybody see a picture of these Painted

Males?

[ineke]

Cookster has some very good cherries and pretty sure they are male. I being me have done a complete turn around and am definitely giving away my Reds. 2OFUS will take all my good ones so that what I have managed to get won't be wasted but I have just lost the luv for them. I keep procrastinating and now I have made up my mind. So this weekend will be catching up all the best I have and shipping them off on Monday. Not sure what to do with the rest- will depend on the quality as to whether I offer them for free to any member starting out. If there is anyone interest in them just pm me and I will let you know what is left but they will be juvies so no guarantee of final colour or sex. Should be quite a few left.

[BlueBolts]

It's great we're having dicussions on improving the quality and selective breeding the colour variants. Culling use to be a difficult (actually it still is) proposition....they're are still shrimps after all..... I use to givethem a second chance, and try using them, hoping they produce something great, BUT they never do...once a cull, always a cull IMHO.

With limited tanks, we just need to be very strong willed with our culling and decide what our end goal is, and head towards it.

[ineke]

Thanks BB. That is my only dilemma now. What to do with the culls I will end up with, I would be very happy to give them to someone else but in a way thats passing the buck. If they are not good enough for me or in this case 2OFUS should I be passing them on. They were a great learning curve for me and probably would be for another noob but although they come from some nice females and carry the genes they are still culls. I will come to that problem on Sunday I just feel relieved that I have made the decision now and will move on to the next phase of learning how to keep higher quality shrimp alive and breeding. This also gives me 2 free tanks to play around with so it's a win for me.

[torface]

I recently saw someone advertising looking for shrimp for their 6 year old child. Maybe you could look around and see if you can find a similar home for your culls. Children arent fussy :P

I am thinking that my big tank will become a community tank as my boyfriend wants some fish. If it happens, i reckon my culls will go in there....

[ineke]

Oh I will be offering them to any one that wants them but yes the community tank seems the way to go. It's just that they won't exactly have a stress free life!!!!