Sexy Shrimp (Thor amboinensis) breeding method and refinement

[DaJMasta]

Right around the new year I had my first sexy shrimp larvae settle (one on the 31st, one on the first) and then I immediately went on vacation.  Came back a week and a half later and the two are going strong and are starting to fill out their coloration, so it's time to write it up!

 

I've made maybe a couple of dozen attempts and found that they didn't do great in small vessels and that the copepods I've been raising alone weren't sufficient for nutrition, so I've moved to external vessels, hatch artemia nauplii to supplement (maybe) be the majority of) food offerings, and have been trying to do regular near complete water changes.  In an effort to make my attempts more repeatable and iteration more continuous, I've also been documenting my attempts in simple logs, and I'll be sharing as much detail on my initial attempt and changes made for subsequent ones - it will just take a bit to gather everything.

So for starters, here are both of my little shrimplets from yesterday:

 

That ruler on the bottom is showing millimeters, but in an other format:

 

 

This is from the first of 2024, when the second started to settle

You can still see a mostly straight back on the newly settled shrimplet

 

And this was the first one to settle on the 31st

 

In a very abbreviated history that I hope to detail later, they started here (~1 hour post hatch, in these two's case, the night of November 26th):

 

And were raised in this glamorous setup on the floor:

 

I'll be sharing the 3d printed parts I used for the rearing vessel (a three gallon brute bucket spray painted black), as well as the little tool I made to do water changes (which works alright, but probably can be improved.)  The larvae were initially collected in this https://wamas.org/forums/topic/102446-3d-printed-pelagic-larva-and-egg-collector/ but I was also getting a bunch with a turkey baster and putting them in (some ambient room light and they aren't that phototactic.)

 

And finally, some details of this, my first successful run:

Larval Attempt Log - Sexy shrimp 11.27.23.pdf

Edited January 13 by DaJMasta

[howaboutme]

Amazing! Congrats and continue the good work. Looking forward to further updates!

[Squishie89]

That's so cool! I've had them breed before but I've never tried to raise them. 

[DaJMasta]

Small update for today:  The two seem to be going as normal two weeks post settlement.  They're somewhat less afraid of me than their parents, but similarly, they don't like bright light shined on them and they quickly scoot sideways to get out of the way.  The coloration or size doesn't seem to have changed much in the 4 days or so its been since I got back, but here's the smaller one of the two (lower left in the microscope picture with both.)

 

 

Also, this is the 3d models for the little additions to a Rubbermaid Brute 3 Gallon bucket that I used to raise the larvae.  You print two of the little crescent pieces to fill in the outer ridges and round the bottom, then you put in a central bubble anchor and glue them down.  I used aquarium silicone and it's not amazing as an adhesive, but it does the job.  I also painted the inside black (epoxy paint also doesn't stick great), and it's probably worth sanding the bucket with ~300 grit sandpaper or so to help adhesion at least somewhat.

 

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6436667

 

 

Then to finish the vessel, you add an airline with a valve to control airflow through the central anchor (drives a light toroidal flow pattern in the vessel, bubble rate = flow rate), and you put it on a water resistant seed warming mat for a little bit of heat (it's not very strong and not temperature controlled, so this only will work well in a temperature controlled space).  For a bit more heat and a little cleaner look, use a heat safe tape (I used Kapton) to make the warming mat a sort of blanket to wrap around the bucket.

[Coralreefer]

This is awesome! Thanks for sharing this info. 

[Origami]

Great job! Please keep us updated on your methods and progress!

[DaJMasta]

Thanks, I should have a good bit more to write up, but part of my goals are to share tools and methods.  I've learned most of what I know from various internet resources (logs, posts, papers, videos, etc.), so I'm trying to contribute to that knowledge now that I'm finding some success.

 

A couple days ago they started getting easier to notice in the tank - I think the color is filling in between the white spots so they are more contrasty against the bright background.  They're also a little easier to photograph (starting to get the phone to actually be able to focus on them....)

 

And today, I've uploaded the vessel I'm raising the juveniles in.  It's another 3d printed tool that uses a fine mesh base to allow for water circulation but no larger creatures (amphipods, fish, tiny sexy shrimp) can really get through.  I'm using a 200 micron mesh, so a good number of added copepods are still in the chamber too.  It prints in two pieces, then you glue in the mesh, held down by one part, and run a length of silicone airline tubing (the silverish looking stuff at the bottom of the last pic) which takes care of making a seal against the glass.  Once everything's assembled, it's held onto the side using aquarium magnets.  The models are available here: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6444788

 

 

 

 

[DaJMasta]

Three weeks post settlement and exactly three weeks post hatch, they've got a bit darker color and look a bit bigger.  Maybe another week to full coloration?

 

 

[lowsingle]

Awesome work!

 

Darren

 

[miggs76]

This is great.  Are you going to be selling some soon?

[DaJMasta]

Not soon, these two I plan on keeping as I want to have a little colony going (this should get me to 6, I think, but I may get another for a little more genetic variety and numbers), and if I can get some to settle and grow out a bit farther in the future (looking like maybe 2 months post settlement for reasonable size?), I certainly can.  Haven't seen a spawn in a couple of weeks, so haven't yet started another batch.

 

This is both of them this evening (four weeks post settlement), one eating a hikari mysis - still much smaller than it, but getting bigger and really clearly a sexy shrimp from color/shape/patterning.

[DaJMasta]

Just shrimps being shrimps

 

Here's also the siphon tool I made for changing water in these buckets.  It's basically just a wide expansion collar for the tubing, covered in mesh, and tall enough to reach almost to the bottom of the fill line on the Brute buckets I've been using (taller doesn't fit well in normal sized printers.)

 

 

 

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6467504

You print the interior part, 5 rings, and sandwich a sheet of aquarium safe mesh (250 micron nylon, in my case) around the interior part with the rings and a few drops of superglue.  Then you just siphon through it as normal into a bucket, though I occasionally baste the screen with some of the siphoned out water just to be sure no larvae get caught on the screen from the suction force.  It lets you change water with minimal attention paid while draining, and unless you use pretty coarse mesh, keeps all the larvae in.