Breeding Journal, Species: Oregonia gracilis (Decorator crab)

General
Species:  Oregonia gracilis
Social Structure:  Four individuals
Size of Individuals:  ~1.5-2 inches carapace width
Age of Individuals:  Unknown
Date added to Tank:  Mid December 2013

Broodstock Tank Details
Size of Tank:  40 gallon breeder plumbed into ~200 gallon system
Substrate Details:  sand, crushed gravel
Filtration Details:  live sand, live rock, protein skimmer, bioballs, etc
Water Changes:  As needed
Water Temperature:  ~80F
Lighting:  Fluorescent strip light
Lighting Cycle:  6AM to 8PM
Other Tank Inhabitants:  Scarlet hermit crabs, Alpheus armatus pair

Broodstock Feeding Details
Food Types:  Pellets, frozen mash, mysis
Feeding Schedule:  At least 2x a day

Spawning Details
Date of First Spawn:  Unknown
Spawn Time of Day:  Unknown
Dates of Consecutive Spawns: 
Courtship Details:  None noted
Egg Size: Unknown
Egg Color:  Orange
Egg Count:  A large clutch is probably more than 1000

Hatch Details
Hatch Date:  12-29-2013; 1-12-2014, 1-13-2014 
Hatch Time of Day:  After lights out
# Days after Spawn:  ~14 days.  The hatches are 15 nights apart and I assume that the spawn does not occur the night of the hatch but rather the night after.
Larvae Description:  Look like small silvery balls to the eye


Larval Tank Details
Temperature:  ~80F
Size of Larval Tank: 3L water bottle             
Substrate Details:  None
Other Tank Decor:  Rigid airline
Filtration Details:  Live phyto
Lighting:  Fluorescent strip light
Lighting Cycle:  6AM to 9PM
Water Changes:  Every other day

Larval Feeding Details
Food Types:  nhbbs
Feeding Schedule:  constant

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



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I bought these guys early to mid December (the exact date escapes me at the moment, but I can look it up) and photographed each of the four individually in a specimen container.  One I noted to definitely be female (I saw her open the egg pouch, but did not note any eggs), another looked to possibly be female, one looked like a male, and the other I couldn't tell.  I'm not great at doing this sex-determination-in-crabs thing yet, but that was my best guess at the time. I did not see any eggs at that time, but it definitely possible that one of them had some.
 
The adults were all quite large at purchase (ordered online) and one even arrived in its punctured bag, out of water for who knows how long...and recovered just fine! Tough little buggers. They were fantastically decorated with different sponges--one was practically completely covered in a white sponge and another had a lot of a neat blue sponge and were relatively easy to tell apart.  Now they've added crushed coral and decorations from the tank and they are a bit more difficult to tell apart.
 




 
This morning, much to my surprise, I found quite a few crab larvae!  I also found some hermit crab larvae in there as well, and I'm not sure yet if I am going to try to separate them out yet.  I probably should, and probably will...but ugh, it will be time consuming.  I didn't have a lot of time this morning so I wasn't able to immediately pull some for pics.  I just quickly set them up in an inverted 3L water bottle, put that in a heated water bath, added some rotifers and some nhbbs.  Tonight I will try to take a few pics of the larvae.

Last night I dumped out the 3L bottle and did not see a single Oregonia larva!  There was a bunch of stuff all gummed up in one spot and I wonder if they just got all mangled in there and died.  I went and found a couple still alive and swimming in the snagger, though, so I pulled one and took a couple pics (which turned out terrible!  The little bugger just wouldn't stop moving!)



 
So...that was a short run! Hopefully I will get some more relatively soon to work with 
 

Okay...so mystery solved as to why I didn't find a single oregonia larvae in the 3L bottle, and the answer turns out that I was a bit of a dolt 
 
So, the evening after I collected I dumped out the water bottle and searched and searched and only found hermit crab larvae.  I went and found another Oregonia in the snagger, so I was able to get pics, but I was quite confused.  I put the single Oregonia back in with the hermit crab larvae (which I assumed were the scarlet hermit larvae) and shrugged my shoulders.  Yesterday I did water changes on all the 3L bottles with larvae.  I started with the "scarlet hermits" and found lots of hermit larvae and the single Oregonia was still hanging in there (surprising, since it went nearly the entire first day with no food).  Then I moved on to the blue leg hermit crab larvae bottle and low and behold, there were boatloads of crab and hermit crab larvae.  I was looking in the wrong container! Eeesh.  It was quite exciting to find lots of Oregonia larvae still alive, AND they looked to be Z2 already!  They have the extra pointy things on the abdomen segments (somites?? I can't remember the term) and they also have two spikes/protrusions from the head region thing that none of my mithrax crabs have had, so I know I'm not mixing them up with that somehow



Those pics were taken at day 3.
 

Day 4 they got another 100% water change, and look to all be in Z2.  Still lots of them and they are quite active.  I didn't find another one with two spikes, which makes me think that the one I got pics of yesterday was actually mid molt.  Looking closely at the top spike, it does look too clear and I think that part of the shell was coming off and I was just lucky enough to catch a pic of it  They are so active that it is difficult to get decent pics of them because they never stop moving.
 
I also got a pic of my favorite adult crab

I will be sad when it molts.  Unless it takes some of the blue sponge off the old shell and puts it on the new one...

Found some megalopas! Just a few that I spotted, the rest are Z2 yet. Can't post pics yet.

All are megalopae now  They are hard to image because they are so dark.  They are also really reflective which makes them easy to spot during water changes.
 

good luck!

Thanks!
 
Here they are after a water change yesterday...There are about 40 or so

 
They are really dark and easy to see with the naked eye I am hoping that they will settle in the next couple days.  Last night instead of going back into the inverted 3L bottle, I put them into a flat bottom water pitcher with two rigid airlines bubbling.

Horrible news!  It would appear that moving them to the flat bottom pitcher was no good  I found most of them all grouped together on the bottom and most of those looked dead.  There were a few that were still swimming, and any of them that looked possibly alive were pulled out and moved back into the inverted bottle set-up.  UGH!  I have no idea if they died from getting glommed up on the bottom, or if they would have died anyway...
 
Tonight I will check for any survivors....

Dead. Dead. Dead.  Now I wait for the next hatch...

Had a hatch last night!  They are in a 3L inverted bottle like my usual.  I think I decapped my last batch of artemia cysts too long because I've been having terrible hatch rates so I don't have much bbs to offer.  They got a few of those and then I added some Apocyclops and Euterpina as well.  I also put in some Iso.

I thought the last hatch I got was a pretty big one...then I saw what was in the snagger this morning....

 
Makes sense that a larger crab would have more eggs...but wow!  The problem is that I don't have a lot of brine shrimp to offer at the moment and likely won't until later tonight...I ended up giving them a small amount of nhbbs and then added some golden pearls 100-200uM.  I'm not sure if the hatch two nights ago was sort of an early release of this larger hatch from last night, or if they were from separate crabs.  

I don't think it would be crazy to say there are probably more than 1000...

I caught a glimpse of one of the females fanning the eggs/cleaning the pouch.


It looks like the eggs are orange. She was picking in the pouch and eating some of the eggs...perhaps the bad ones.

I have the last hatches going; they are about a week old at this point and mainly megalopas. They get a 100% water change every other day and are still in the inverted 3L bottles.

I got some slightly better pics of the megalopas.  I like the pointy nose that starts to show, similar to what the adults have


 
Also, I bought these as "Oregonia gracilis" but I am not 100% on the ID.  Does anyone have any input?

 
So many eggs she can't even get her pouch closed!  Oh boy!  I think when those hatch out I may try them in a BRT.  This last run I had been using Prime for ammonia control and I have had terrible survival (even with the smaller batch) than when I wasn't using Prime at all.  I only have three left!

I got a video of a female picking at and aerating the eggs:

 
There was a hatch Sunday night/Monday morning from this female and I decided to put them in a BRT.  By that evening all were dead on the bottom.  It would appear that a cone shaped tank is better  Next time!
 
I saw a female aerating eggs and it looked to be a different one than the female in the video.  I may actually have three females and one male...