Breeding Journal: Lysmata amboinensis (Skunk Cleaner Shrimp)

General
Species: Lysmata amboinensis (Skunk Cleaner Shrimp)
Social Structure:
Size of Individuals: 2.5in, 1.5in    
Age of Individuals: Unknown
Date added to Tank: Larger shrimp was added into the tank around Janurary, the smaller was added  4/28/10

Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank: 135 gallons
Substrate Details: 2in sandbed with 150 pounds of live rock
Filtration Details: Grape Caulerpa, Wire Algae
Water Changes: 1, 10% every other week
Water Temperature: 78-81 degrees 
Lighting: Outer Orbit 6ft lighting fixture
Lighting Cycle: 14hours 8:00 A.M.-10:00 P.M.
Other Tank Inhabitants: Royal Gramma, bubble tip anemone, green mandrin, sailfin tang, powder brown tang, 1 damsel, flame angel, 1 pepperment shrimp, 2 gold stripe maroon clownfish, 1 arrow crab, pistol shrimp, pistol goby, orchid dottyback, many corals, other cleaning inverts


Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types: Mysis, flake, many other foods are probably consumed by these shrimp but I am not sure which    
Feeding Schedule: Mysis fed once every two days, flake fed three times per day 

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn: 5/2/10
Spawn Time of Day: Sometime during the night
Dates of Consecutive Spawns: every 13 days
Courtship Details: Unknown
Egg Size: .5mm by .5mm    
Egg Color: Lime green
Egg Count: 300-400

Hatch Details
Hatch Date: 5/28/10
Hatch Time of Day: Between 10:15 P.M. and 11:30 P.M.
# Days after Spawn: 13
Larvae Description: They have eight visible legs refer to pictures below


Larval Tank Details
Temperature: 80 degrees
Size of Larval Tank: 1/4 gallon
Substrate Details: none
Other Tank Decor: airstone
Filtration Details: airstone
Lighting: 100W flourcent
Lighting Cycle: 6:00 A.M. - 10:00 P.M.
Water Changes: None done yet

Larval Feeding Details
Food Types: Brine shrimp artemia (12 hours old)    
Feeding Schedule: once per day

Metamorphosis/Settlement
Date of Settlement Start:
Days after Hatch:
Date of Settlement End:
Description of Fry:

Grow-Out Tank Details
Temperature:
Size of Grow-Out Tank:
Substrate Details:
Other Tank Decor:
Filtration Details:
Lighting:
Lighting Cycle:
Water Changes:
Size at Transfer:
Age at Transfer

Grow-Out Feeding Details
Food Types:
Feeding Schedule:

Additional Information
Miscellaneous Information:



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These are the toughest ornamental shrimp to raise.  Larva take somewhere around 120 days to mature.  Take a look at this:
http://www.reefcentral.co...ad.php?threadid=846955

Thanks, I just happened upon the idea of breeding them and figured that I could give it a try.  If I can get anything out of it I would feel great if not oh well I had something to do with my time .

Never hurts to try you never know when someone will just happen upon the magic bullet.

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

Thanks Chad, I figure if nothing else works out I will at least get some points for trying.  My goal is to breed them by the time I'm out of high-school.

If you can breed these to the sellable age, you'll truly be the master.

LOL, I'll have to go for it .  I'll post once I notice any eggs in one of the shrimp, it probably will not happen for a week or two so I'll keep everyone posted.

Looks like I had a  spawn , at least I think.

You DID!

I don't mean to rain on the parade but my (single) cleaner shrimp has eggs like that all the time. They need to be fertilized (I think) to be a real spawn.

If I recall they should change color after a certain amount of time or just before hatch which should signal if they are fertile.

But the only way to know for sure will be to catch them hatching and being released into the water column.

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

Today the eggs were beginning to get an even lighter green color.  From what I have read the eggs will turn silver before they hatch just like clowns.  I'll take some picts tomorrow.

So the cleaner shrimp hatched last night, unfortunately I didn't recover any of the napulii since I didn't know they were hatching. -note to self the cleaner shrimp eggs hatch on day 12.  I needed the extra tank for maroon larvae anyway .

Ok, well four days ago I noticed that the shrimp had more eggs in its abdomen.  Looks like I'm going to have another chance at getting the napualii.  Now it's time to wait until 5/28/10 .

So I thought that there would be a hatch today, I was right!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Here are some pictures of the napualii .

Very cool Kevin, congrats!

Thanks Brett

Just wondering, how old are you?
Good luck with raising the larvae! tagging along

I'm 14 and turning 15 July 26, at 7:23 P.M.

Cool, I'm 15...

Here are some better pictures of ~10 hours post hatch.

Pretty freaky looking, but cool!

http://www.fishtalpropagations.com/#!home/mainPage
"Making captive breeding easier."

They are about the size of a clownfish larva so they are pretty big.  They remind me of little aliens .

Well I was looking in the tank today, and my cleaner shrimp has more eggs inside of it .  Looks like 13 days until more eggs .

So I lost about 50 over the past day, but that is out of 600 napualii.  (Maybe these "dead" were sheddings).  I'm guessing that these "died" because of the transfer, today I looked at one under the microscope and they are beginning to get a little bit of color.  I'll post pictures of them later.

Cool pictures, what kind of microscope do you use?

Just this microscope me and my brother got it for Christmas a few years ago and I now I have claimed it to be a possession of the fish room .http://shop.lwscientific.com/s.nl/it.A/id.1137/.f?sc=9&category=1317 (Mine is an older version of this)


 

 

Here are some pictures of ~59 hours post hatch:












As you can see the nauplii are beginning to develop their first colors, I believe that this is from the brine shrimp artemia they are eating.  
 
Note: today when I went to remove the dead from yesterday I could not find any, I believe that these shrimp may be consuming the dead nauplii

So now both of my cleaner shrimp are holding eggs, looks like I'm going to be having hatches on 6/10/10 and 6/13/10.

Looks like I had a molt .
 
This is ~70 post hatch, looks like I'm at Zoea 2
 


 
 

Yeah mine breeds singly too, but i'm pretty sure if they are a pair and one has eggs they are not not going to fertilize them. 
 

They may have been fertilized before you bought the shrimp, they can store sperm for up to 6 clutches of eggs by themselves.  The only reason why I thought mine was weird was because I had no eggs until I added a second shrimp.  Funny thing is that now both of my shrimp have eggs in them.

Here are some pictures of the development:
 
~80 hours post hatch



 
~87hours post hatch
 
 


 
~94hours post hatch

 
~112hours post hatch



 
And pictures of the rearing vessel:

 
A nauplii in the water:

 
I hope that you enjoy these pictures, today I still have several hundred shrimp left and I'm on day 5 .

~138 hours post hatch
I'm now at Zoea 3

Hey im 13 seems a lot of us want to be helping this hobby!
I'm waiting for Amazon STing to reopen to get my cleaner shrimp broodstock. Pat ordered  a big one for me! Thanks Pat!
Anyway, good luck kevin, i would like to base my methods on yours to breed mine.

You probably don't want to raise your nauplii the same way as mine, I don't even know if mine will even make it to metamorphosis.  Sometimes the greatest things are discovered by accidents .

Yeah, today I'm at one week post hatch. 

Well I'm now 12 hours to day 9 .  I'm going to get some pictures of the shrimp later and an accurate count of nauplii.  They should be at Zoea 4 today.

Drat, I'm down to 2 nauplii I'm ok though because getting anything to day 9 on your first time is pretty good .

So I lost the last 2 nauplii yesterday, I'm not dissapointed I got them to day 9.  I switched food sources on them on day 6 I moved them from brine shrimp nauplii to copepods and their numbers dropped massively.