raising ghost shrimp questions

[salttess]

I'm not sure if this is the place to be for this question, but its about breeding sort of. I want to raise ghost shrimp for my seahorses. The ones at the store are too big for them to eat. Does anyone know of a place to tell me about this sort of thing or anyone that can give me some info? TIA Tina

[FMarini]

Hi:
okay....first.... besides ghost shrimp I would go to http://www.oceanrider.com, this is a website which sell scaptive bred seahorses, and live seahorse foods, like mysis, and small shrimp.
After this ghost shrimp bred in heavily planted aquariums, they eat lots of plant material, and meaty foods as well. The only time I have been successsful breeding ghost shrimp was when a few dozen were placed into my tetra tank, and left alone, they produced hundreds. AS you know females carry the eggs in their abdomen and release the larvae when they hatch. I guess you could setup a smallish(over10gal) aquarium just for these inverts, and fill it with plants and great areation.
I have to say thou; here in TX these shrimp are grown as by products in crawfish ponds, and in small aquarium tend to die off due to starvation, low oxygen, and heat. They appears to be totally intolerant of heat, and need to be kept quite cool. If you do get them to breed, you'll need to feed them w/ food high in marine HUFAS, as ghost shrimp are fresh/brackish waster inverts (and lack these marine HUFAS). Along the gulf coast you can easily get saltwater adapted ghost shrimp
If i were you I would fill my seahorse tank w/ calurpea, and other marine plants and attempt to raise mysis, and copepods.
good luck
frank

[Biosystems]

One thing to add about the oceanrider products-their copepods can be propagated (all of their products are large number wise and worth ordering and some quite interesting in themselves). As for their shrimp-do not even waste your time trying to breed these. First the salinities that these shrimp must be kept at are quite low relative to reef aquaria (s.g.1.006-1.014). Second, the fecundity of these shrimp are so low it is not worth your time-spawns 4 times per year with only producing approx. 7 offspring per spawn. ANd thirdly-these are not tropical water shrimp-much like the ghost shrimp they require cooler temps (approx. 65-75F). They are however a good food source and for the cost can be ordered in very large quantities and maintained until you need them. The regular shrimp are juvenile versions of normal shrimp.


Tim

[salttess]

Thanks! I have been to ocean rider and will go back. Their board was under construction when I visited. I guess I will burn the idea of raising these shrimp. I live right on the coast, I wonder if I could catch some myself in the back bay? again thanks for your help Tina