Breeding Red Cherry Shrimp

I've had a tank of Red Cherry Shrimp (and about 3 other shrimp, not sure what type they are but they are clear rather than red and bigger) which has been set up for about 3/4 months now

I started off with about 10 shrimp then added another 5 from a different supplier to keep the genes sweet, I am not sure but I don't think that they are breeding, maybe the babies are hiding somewhere but I have had a good root around and haven't seen any

I thought by now there would of been a visable growth in the population?!

I keep the temp at 75 and have a sponge filter, feed them every other day and have plenty of live plants for them! Are they just too busy enjoying the plants to make sweet shrimpin love or am I doing something wrong?!

No, you aren't doing anything wrong, I also started with 2 different batches of 10 red cherry shrimps I bought off ebay; it took about 3-4 months before the population started to explode. My aquarium is on the cooler side at 69F. Get lots of java moss; it grows quickly and the shrimp use it as a nursery for the babies. Now, after starting with out with 20 shrimp I easily have over 100 and have started to take them out a few at a time to colonize my other caudate tanks. Once you get some large size adult shrimp (about 2cm) they will constantly be reproducing and you will have all the shrimp you and your newts can handle Also, they love to eat blood worms and sinking algae pellets for bottom feeders...hope this helps!

Thanks for that! It's good to hear that it just takes time, now to learn to be patient!

I have just ordered some Java Moss to put in with them, and I have about 3 large females (I think, mainly because they are bigger and have more red to them) which sort of flip their rear end underneath them and play around with themselves, is this them moving their eggs?

Thanks for the help!

Oli

Adult females tend to be more red and you should be able to see the eggs in the adult females (yellowy colour towards the back of their underside). It may take a while to start breeding when you buy them off of places like ebay, because they are most likely to send you juveniles.

Hi my boyfriend also is beginner cherry shrimp breeder they all seem to be saddling and becoming berried alright. but i have a question are you feeding them to your newts? would a fire bellied newt eat shrimp??

I have never seen one of my newts eat a shrimp....red cherry shrimp are fast when they want to get away; not to say that it has never happened though, I wouldn't put it past any newt to eat the juvenile shrimp if given the chance. I pretty much use them to add some color and be my aquarium janitors, they are excellent at cleaning algae covered plants and eating any food the newts don't eat. I have my doubts that they could be used a food staple however because even my largest, fastest, most vicious newts (My pleurodeles watl:lol have not bothered the shrimp in their tank. These newts go absolutely bonkers when it's feeding time; biting each other and swimming around frantically as if they were starving! They don't seem interested in shrimp however at all even when they crawl right up to them. I think they make a better tank mate or a good replacement for snails/plecostomus cleanup crew than a food source.

I have used afew red cherry shrimps as food for my axolotls, they seem to enjoy trying to catch them (very active and alert) the shrimp are fast but they seem to eventually disapear so I imagine their luck just runs out, also an added bonus they do a bit of cleaning while they are alive - they seem to last around a week in with them

Thanks for your help about the breeding, I would imagine they probably are juviniles and will just take a bit of time - does anyone know what age they start breeding from?

Mine have some yellow bits behind their heads (which are there ovaries I think) and some clearish (I wouldn't say yellow) bits under their tail, they form a U shape from time to time and swirl them about so I am hoping that they are eggs!

My T. dobrogicus ate all my red cherries in a heavily planted 20g long tank.

Me and my girlfriend just went down to the pet store today and bought a cherry shrimp. We have hade about 8 ghost shrimp in the tank with our axie (Chancey) and there always swimming around noticeable. But our cherry shrimp we have not seen since the day after we bought him. Hopefully chancey didnt gobble him up . Is this normal for the cherry shrimp to act alot more allusive than the ghost shrimp? hiding in our plants all day most likely?

They can hide a lot, especially after they've shed because they are more vulnerable for a while after that. It may have been eaten...that's also a possibility.

Mine are very active, unless they shed their shell, then they tend to get some shelter for a bit - other than that I am impressed with how interesting they are to watch, I thought that they would be pretty dull and mainly be a food source but they have turned into more than that and I feel bad when I put them in with my axolotl

I've been trying get a closer look at the shrimps I thought may have eggs, and I am pretty much sure that they do! So I have two of them with yellow balls under them, the move them around from time to time to clean them I think. Only one of them constantly has the yellow balls outside its body, it looks like they might of fallen out?! It still moves them around but they are not inside her, I watched for an hour or so hoping that they might be hatching but nothing much seemed to happen

The other one is as I thought it would be, eggs inside and moving them around occasionally