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Short Creek is an interesting little spot. It is located near a tea farm on the tablelands above Cairns. Why is it named 'short creek' you ask? Well it might have something to do with a 'short' drop! We only sampled a short section but found a wide variety of organisms above these water falls including Caridina confusa, purple spot gudgeons and a species of freshwater crayfish (I forget the name, Bob will remind me when he remembers that I caught one for him, and he didn't catch any!). Water parameters (in May) were: pH: 6.8 TDS: 21 Temperature: 19*C GH: < 20 ppm KH: < 10 ppm the shrimp were mainly located in the back eddies associated with vegetation or branches ect. that were hanging into the water. Unfortunately it was drizzling with rain most of the time we were there so I wasn't able to get any nice shots of the shrimp fresh from the creek. I did get a nice shot of a purple spot. However I have pics of the confusa I brought home, currently housed in a temporary set-up alongside some snails (temp 20*C, TDS 60, GH and KH < 1, pH 7). I'm not sure why these are called the false zebra shrimp. For starters, these are massive compared to the zebras (4-5cm vs. 3cm for zebs). I've really fallen for these guys and can't wait to set up their new tank. I think they should be called fusa (The Fusa are coming - Madagascar, anyone?) or confusa. 'False zebra shrimp' (yawn) just undersells them so much. They aren't fussy at all, eating all of the normal aquaria shrimp fare. Likewise I haven't lost a single one through the travel and their housing. They can be a little rowdy at feeding time, crawling over each other and running off with bits of food away from the others - maybe not ideal for keeping with smaller shrimp like Malanda, chameleons or Zebs. But I find that adds to their appeal, rather than detracting. I will report on things like 'how good an algae eater' or 'ease of breeding' once their new tank is set-up, BUT breeding should be relatively straight forward as I believe they have large eggs and drop direct developing young, similar to zebs. Another cool thing with these guys is that can seem to have a golden glow and iridescence - at least under the LED lights over their temporary housing. hopefully I can get some better pictures of what that looks like with more time.
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