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That tank is absolutely amazing ? Loving the windelov Java. Shrimp look great. Such a classic scape. No wonder you kept that tank.

When I closed my shrimp room I gave away most of my shrimp apart from a few old ones that I felt it was unfair to move on both for the receivers and for the shrimp themselves and my outdoor shrimp . I kept a 60 litre tank for the shrimp and changed my big tank over to a fish tank. Hubby likes looking at fish so I kept them for a year or so but we both missed the shrimp. So I can understand what you are saying. I eventually gave away the fish and grabbed the best shrimp from the pond plus what I had left in the 60 litre tank and started over. I also bought and was given some very nice “culls” from Marcus. That’s what I’m playing with now. I’m looking forward to seeing what I end up with once they start breeding. My last giant gene female is berried at the moment, she is a very pale red , hopefully she lasts long enough to hatch her eggs . She would be close to 2 now so won’t be around much longer. She probably mated with one of the black boys but is now in the red tank. If she does carry the eggs to term - another week or so - it will be interesting plus I get a few more of the larger shrimp. If she dies before the eggs hatch I will try to rescue them. If I see her tomorrow I will get a picture of her with another shrimp for comparison to show the size difference. If she wasn’t berried I would catch her out but I don’t want to chase her around.

She is very pretty and unusual! The thing I liked about my mixed Taiwan bee tank was that you never knew what you would get for the offspring, I ended up with so many different colours and patterns it was beautiful, I got a few skunk(?) or wishbone as well before the disaster! Your photos almost inspire me to try again, but I have fish in the tank at the moment (with wild cherry shrimp culls) and they are doing well, but when they start dying off I may get friends round to re-try Taiwan bee again, I have the substrate already??? Simon

It will be lovely once the shrimp numbers build up again. I caught all the red Taitibees and black, blue and chocolate Neos out for some easier selective breeding.Having a large tank is great but trying to catch individual shrimp is so hard. By splitting the colony it will be easier, I can leave the black Taitibees and the BlueBolts - they are Taitibees as well- to breed and then the reds can be picked over . I will take out any Red males I don’t particularly think will help improve the quality and keep all the females to build up their numbers . Once I have a reasonable number of females I will buy some males that are more like what I’m after - galaxy types- then the fun can begin. I know I could just buy an existing colony but what’s the fun in that. I’ve played with hybrids from when the first Tibees were introduced by Ninja back in 2013/14 and just love not knowing what you might ge. Nearly all the TB in the picture with the Yellow Neos are Taitibees. It took several years to build up and it was enthralling watching the colony grow. We didn’t have access to the type of shrimp you can get now . Hopefully by the end of the year the numbers will be better and the big tank will be worth looking at again. This picture is one of my very first Tibee, she gave me lots of lovely babies. She also was a “giant”Tibee and for many years people were very surprised by the size of some of my shrimp , they were quite big. The downside to the giant gene was they bred later in their life - if they weren’t sterile- and might only have 2 or 3 clutches of eggs at around 18 months and then promptly died.

Thanks JayC. The pictures are from the time i had my room the video is current. It’s good for new shrimp keepers to see mixed tanks can work but its best to use water parameters for the Caridina species the Neos adapt very well to the lower ph and TDS. In fact you need to watch they don’t outbreed the Caridinas , they can also bully the Caridinas at feeding times being somewhat more aggressive but on the whole I've never had issues mixing them.