Cherry shrimp eggs

[babygeige]

One of my cherry shrimp laid eggs today!
Since I have my cherry shrimp in with fish, I'm going to go buy a little 5 gal tank to put the eggs in. Do you think it'd be safe to suck them up gently with a turkey baster to move them to the new tank?

Do the adult shrimp need to be in the tank with the babies or can I have them separate?

[IceH2O]

Cherry shrimp carry their eggs not lay them. If they are seperate from the mother they are either not fertilized or youe water parameters aren't to their liking and she aborted them.

[pixl8r]

Did the shrimp drop the eggs? Healthy, normal behavior is the female shrimp will carry the eggs until they hatch. If the shrimp has dropped them, it is extremely difficult to get the eggs to mature to hatch. They require near constant water flowing around them.

You do not need to remove the young shrimp from the adults. RCS's are very docile. But the fish with them may dine on the young shrimp.

[babygeige]

Oh, so they "give birth" like livebearers?

[GoldLenny]

Well, the female holds the egg clustered under her tail with her swimmerettes under her tail and the swimmerettes move the eggs around to keep them constantly exposed to fresh oxygenated water. She will hold them for several weeks during the gestation period and then the eggs hatch and tiny shrimps come out of the shells.

[babygeige]

That's interesting. Maybe I caused her to drop the eggs early by moving the shrimp to the 10 gal on Sunday. I haven't quite figured out how to sex them (too lazy to research, maybe someday, lol) so I didn't know any shrimp had eggs. Hopefully I'll have better luck in the future.

[pixl8r]

The females are larger and have more color than the males.

[GoldLenny]

Yep, the move likely caused her to abort the egg cluster. Moving shrimp will also cause them to moult which will result in the dropping of the egg cluster.