Breeding Journal, Species: Thor amboinensis

General
Species:  Thor amboinensis
Social Structure:  protandric hermaphrodite
Size of Individuals:  ~ 2 cm
Age of Individuals:  unknown
Date added to Tank:  11/11/2010
Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank:  3 gallon picotope
Substrate Details:  5 pounds of sand
Filtration Details:  AC 70, chemi-pure and chaeto
Water Changes:  15-20% daily
Water Temperature:  80-81
Lighting:  36 watt Dual satellite pc fixture
Lighting Cycle:  12 hours
Other Tank Inhabitants:  Several corals, neon goby, sponges. 

Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types:  Hikari L Pellets, Min F, mysis
Feeding Schedule:  Several times a day

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn:  02/09/2011
Spawn Time of Day:  10 am
Dates of Consecutive Spawns: 
Courtship Details:  Male mates and guards female immediately after female spawns the next day.
Egg Size:  1 mm
Egg Color:  Yellow
Egg Count:  >200

Hatch Details
Hatch Date:  02/22/2011
Hatch Time of Day:  10 pm
# Days after Spawn:  12 days
Larvae Description:  Tiny, thin and slender, about 2 mm in size. Are attracted to light.


Larval Tank Details
Temperature:  80-81
Size of Larval Tank:  ~2.5 gallon cylinder
Substrate Details:  None
Other Tank Decor:  Handful of chaeto
Filtration Details:  None
Lighting:  9 watt picotope fixture
Lighting Cycle:  12 hours
Water Changes:  5% every day

Larval Feeding Details
Food Types:  Newly hatched artemia
Feeding Schedule:  2 times a day and as needed

Metamorphosis/Settlement
Date of Settlement Start:  03/18/2011
Days after Hatch:  26 Days
Date of Settlement End: 
Description of Fry:  Exactly like the parents, just in a much smaller scale.

Grow-Out Tank Details
Temperature:  78-79
Size of Grow-Out Tank:  2.5 gallon
Substrate Details:  Bare bottom
Other Tank Decor:  Live rock, GSP and Xenia.
Filtration Details:  AC70 with Chemipute elite and Chaeto
Lighting:  18 watt pc satellite
Lighting Cycle:  8am-9pm
Water Changes:  Every 3-4 weeks
Size at Transfer:  about 8mm
Age at Transfer:  60 days

Grow-Out Feeding Details
Food Types:  Pellets and mysis
Feeding Schedule:  Every morning

Additional Information
(No Pictures or Videos in the Section Please)
Miscellaneous Information: 



You will be required to provide photographic evidence in this thread of each event submitted for the MBI Program.
If your thread does not contain these photos the MBI Committee will not be able to approve your reports.

Broodstock tank
 

A few days after spawning, eggs were visable
 

1 day old larva
 
Videos
 
A day old larva (this batch was not successful)

 
Current batch 6 day old larva in the current setup

 
Current setup

 
Post mating behavior (a minute after mating)

 
 

Hi pj,
Are you doing water changes, or just relying on the aqualifters for top-off?  I can't tell precisely what the various elements of your system do...

Hey jayelblock glad to see you in MBI. Ignore all the mess behind the setup, most of those wires and aqualifters are for my picotope.
The setup is a real simple one. It is a cylinder that contains a heater, an aqualifter that acts as an air pump, and a  thermometer. Also, I have a handful of chaeto. So far I haven't done a single water change, because none of the shrimp and very few of the artemia have died (quite a few get eaten by the shrimp). Instead I started my setup by filling the cylinder halfway with newly made saltwater. For the past week I have been adding about a quart of water from my main tank to the cylinder.  And that is pretty much the basis of my setup. Today will be day 7 for the shrimp, they already look considerably different and larger. I will try to post photos soon.

So tonight marks day 10, and here is a pic

Here is a video,
 

Everything still going well?  I'm looking forward to your two-week update.  You're half way to having them settled.

jayelblock, yep everything is going well. So far I haven't seen any of the larva die after checking water changes and at the bottom of the vase. They do look quite different now and clearly are developing antennae. Also, they are no longer attracted to light as much, so they are more evenly spread out in the water. One more week and hopefully they will settle. I will post a video tomorrow. 

14 DAYS OLD, you can see the stalks for the eyes are beginning to be visible.

Very cool.  This is right where I lost mine, so I can't wait to see more pics of their development.  Sounds like you'll make it to settlement easily.

Hi pj,
what's the latest?

jayelblock, I lost quite a few these past few days they just started disappearing. I still have a good 30-40. I took out the chaeto and noticed there were a few large isopods, so I cleaned the chaeto and made sure there weren't any possible predators. The larva are pretty much almost there, only thing missing seems to be the mature legs that will allow them to settle. Settlement should occur in 2-3 days according to other breeding threads. I will post photos tomorrow.

Although disappointing, I think that's pretty typical.  I believe 15% survival rate is considered a success.  I'm not sure why they tend to crash after two weeks, but they often do.
 
Anyway, I still think congratulations are in order. Can't wait to see your settled shrimp.

So, it is 23 days after hatching. I must say that I haven't been 100% consistent with certain aspects of the maintenance of the tank. I have about 20 larva still remaining and are larger and are beginning to show the red coloration of the parents. Some pointers. 
Things that I think were beneficial
- Start with fresh saltwater mix, and try to move the pregnant female to the rearing tank
- For the first few days, add main tank water, rather than removing water from the rearing tank.
- Have some chaeto for stability
- Feed only artemia that has been born less than 6 hours
Things that I think were harmful
- Do not decrease the number of water changes, the more frequent the better 
- Always use main tank water for the water changes, it seems to induce morphing
- Make sure the chaeto has no predators
 
So here is a updated video 22 days old

 
 

Excellent!!!  I especially like your rundown on the good and the bad points.  Using tank water definately makes sense in the regards of settlement cue's though it may also be a source of predator contamination.  I'll definately roll this one around in my noodle for thoughts!

Pelagically yours,
~J      

I know it's not not exactly the same situation but I only use water from my display for doing my WC's for the Banggers. In fast what I do is just a simple swaping of water. Siphon out 50% of the water from teh rearing tank to the sump of the display and then siphon water from the display back into the rearing tank to refill it.  So far I've had no issues.
 

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

cmpenney, I do agree with the water changes from the main tank. But I had a very high initial survival rate with freshly made water as the initial water used for the rearing. All the other water additions are made with the the main tanks water.
So, I have about 15-20 left, 3 have made it to settlement but are having difficulty completely morphing and seem to be struggling. The 3 don't seem like they are going to make it. I wonder how the other 15 or so will do. I'm starting to get frustrated that they are so close yet they are having trouble taking the last step.

With the fish that I have raised I've started with water from the broodstock system in the hatch tanks. This reduces any trauma to the eggs and newly hatched larvae. For water changes I've used freshly made saltwater during water changes.
 
It's my understanding that using new water lowers the risk of adding potential pathogens that might be found in water from an existing system and cause problems with water quality and larval development. Feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken.

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

I don't have much experience with rearing yet. I can see both ways working though. I did it reverse because my broodstock water has an extremely high nutrient content. I did notice though with this batch of sexy shrimps that the addition of main tank water induced immediate morphing <5 minutes after addition, and did not morph when fresh saltwater was used. Next time I rear a new batch I will separate some larva and use freshwater as the control and see the differences between each method.

That sounds like a really good experiment! FWIW, I was only speaking from my experience with fish... I'm not sure how, or if, things might be different with inverts.

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

I _know_ that I have hydroids in my display tank, so I would never use that water in a larval system. If you take the time to cycle the larval tank it really helps. Unfortunately, that means either a flow-through system or keeping a bunch of tanks running all the time so one is ready when you need it.

--Andy, the bucket man.
"Not to know the mandolin is to argue oneself unknown...." --Clara Lanza, 1886

Settlement has occurred on some of them, 2 of them so far look successful. There are about 15 more to go. Here is a short video. The first half shows the settled sexy shrimp, while the second half shows an unsettled sexy shrimp versus the settled shrimp.
 

Very cool pj.  You shall be my guide.
 
I'm currently building a kreisel for sexy-shrimp.  PM me if you want the link.  I won't post it here unless you give express permission. 

Congratulations!

Whys Alives, sure thing, the more info in this thread, more people can benefit from it. 
Thanks mPedersen.
A quick update, I have counted a total of ~6 settled shrimp and 3 more larval shrimp. There might be a few hiding in the chaeto. Also the older settled shrimp are already showing some white coloration. Photos will be posted soon. 

Was able to capture some great pics with my crappy camera, here they are,
 

 

Them's be Sexy shrimp!

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

Nice! Congratulations!

--Andy, the bucket man.
"Not to know the mandolin is to argue oneself unknown...." --Clara Lanza, 1886

Awesome! Keep up the great work!

Chad Penney - MBI Council
Agis quod Adis

You must feel really jazzed.  I know I do just looking at them.  Can't wait to reproduce your results. :]
 
cmpenney has been kind enough to allow me to duplicate my thread here as well.  I'm also attempting to duplicate it elsewhere, but haven't gotten permission from anyone else except myself so far.  I have multiple agendas with this project, which you can read about on my site: www.4everb.net
 
It would seem that while there are those who are very happy to benefit from my efforts, it is either my insistence on freedom of information, my off color personality, or my enormous talent for pushing people's buttons, that has since gotten me chased out of more than one thread.
 
I'm going to be a very good boy here.
 
edit: As to my copyright sig, any text of mine posted to this thread of yours is yours to use as community property.  And no, it's nothing great, it just needed to be said.

©2013 Ryan F. Mercer -All Rights Reserved.
          === TREASURE HUNT ===

Thanks y'all for the congratulations. The settled shrimp are doing great and have grown quite rapidly. Videos and photos will be uploaded soon.

A quick video. I haven't cleaned the bottom of the tank, but will tonight. This is 62 days after larva release. Best shot I could get showing 9 of the 11 sexy shrimp that I was able to raise. SEXY SHRIMP ARMY!
 

You do indeed have a little army there.

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

that is awesome!
 
Are you going to keep trying with these?
 
How long does it take for the parents to spawn?

I might keep some, not sure yet. I heard ~90 days for sexual maturity from another thread.

Some updates. The original female passed away about 2 months ago, she was probably about 1.5 - 2 years old. 
The 11 sexy shrimp that I had settled were transferred to another tank, after the transfer only 4 remained. Those 4 have been growing strong and it appears as if one became a female and the other 3 remained males. I had hoped that more would become female but it might be like that in nature were more become male than females. Also, the good news is that the female, I believe, is carrying eggs. That was about 90-120 days to maturity after settlement. Maybe I will try to breed these babies also. Here are some photos.
 

 
 

Nice job!

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

Second generation mating video. This time you can clearly see the male defending the female against other males.
 

Wow... just read this entire thread.
 
Very cool!!

-Adam

Hey Pj, congrates on your continued success!
 
My own shrimp aren't feeling very sexy.  Think I'll try a few new recruits sometimes in the next couple weeks.  I want to be where you are! :/
 
Maybe you can let me in on what mood music you're using?

©2013 Ryan F. Mercer -All Rights Reserved.
          === TREASURE HUNT ===