Breeding Ghost Shrimp?

[greenspottedlover]

I have a few ghost shrimp in a snail tank and one is carrying eggs. I heard baby Ghost Shrimp need brackish water to grow up in. Is this true?

[Blaine]

Yep,...ghost shrimp have a larval stage which requires brackish water to survive. Now, understand that I am talking about the most commonly called ghost shrimp that are sold mostly as feeders in the aquatic community.

[greenspottedlover]

Yah thats what I got.

[greenspottedlover]

what should the salt grade be?

[Blaine]

not sure what the sg level should be....I had some in 1.003 with no success,...also had some in 1.010 but they got eaten before they could breed?!?

[greenspottedlover]

That sounds like a lot of salt cost. For there price of the shrimp, I think I'll just buy them.

[RTR]

There are ghost shrimp and then there are ghost shrimp. "Ghost" is descriptive, not nomenclature. Locally i get up to four species of ghosts routinely, plus the occasional Macrobrachium shrimp mixed into the pot. Locally for me, our "ghost" shrimp are all from the Gulf Coast

Of the fours types of ghosts I see often, only one will breed readily in FW. Of the species I see, it is the only one with large eggs, so you can tell it is the right one which has only hours as free-swimming larvae and the infusoria in any under-stocked heavily planted tank will have plenty of that. If you separate the gravid female out into a 10-15 gall0n heavily planted tank and keep her fed, she will not cannibalize all the fry, but she should be removed as soon as you see she has released the fry. The fry will eat some algae and the fines of powdered fish food they grow pretty well in my water which is moderately hard and moderately alkaline (GH and KH 7-9). You may have issues if your water is soft and acid. If shrimp in your care suffer moth death periodically, add a small amount of reef iodide (minimum dosage) with each water change.

FW shrimp are easy to breed, but most ghost shrimp are not pure FW. Amano shrimp, most Macrobrachium shrimp, wood/Singapore shrimp and vampire shrimp, and many but not all "ghost" require marine conditions for larval development. That is possible but difficult and expensive, not worth the effort. It is not the larvae alone which require the SW, it is the plankton they eat - you have to culture that separately - just as if you were breeding clownfish.

HTH

[greenspottedlover]

I don't know its just seems so complicated when I found a place where I can get them 5 for a buck.

[RTR]

It is not worth the costs. You will spend more on the tank and plants and their upkeep. But it is a challenge, and an easy introduction to breeding inverts.

[greenspottedlover]

Yah true, may be something I shall try in the future.

[RTR]

They were the first crustacean I had bred intentionally, quite a long time ago. Then I did it again, still some years back, to write up an article on it. If I have any unoccupied planted QT tank I still will move a female over sometimes just for the heck of it, although I normally have at least a couple of shrimp breeding tanks around these days. It help keep the tank cycled if nothing else.

But doing it once just for the learning process is cool enough. Too many hobbyist keep fish but never breed anything but live-bearer fish. Without challenges, i would definitely burn out on the hobby. I suspect that is why so many folks keep tanks a few months or years and then give it up. I've always suspected that boredom kills their interest. It would hit me also if I did not rty new things regularly and routinely - which has worked for me for a long, long time. We all need to be challenged.

[greenspottedlover]

A challenge is partially why I got my GSP. A few years back I thought about it and then found out they needed brackish or marine water so I didn't get one. Then some months back I finally decided to try.