Baby CPO's!

I saw eyes yesterday, but I had only noticed my female being berried about 2.5 weeks ago, so I thought there would be another week or so before they hatched. This morning, however, I caught sight of at least 2 tiny baby crays bouncing around the tank! Hoping they make it to maturity! She decided to hatch them in the one part of the tank where there was the LEAST cover...



Pic sucks, but the darn things are so tiny I'm having a really hard time getting it to focus. For size reference, those are two juvenile ramshorns that are about 1/2 an inch in diameter.

Tank is a 20 long with 7 pieces of hollow cholla wood, tons of plants and moss, 3 rock caves, 1 plastic cave, and 13 charcoal bamboo tubes. There are a lot of hiding places, but you cant tell in the pic because the stupid female picked the empty corner to hatch out in...

4 days old now! I found 3 and scooped them up to put in my shrimp tank so I could watch them grow up on my desk! They are quick little boogers, that's for sure! And VERY good at hiding. I got a pic last night I will upload when I get home from work and will try to get more as they grow

Mine are living and breeding in the same water params as my gold occies, though I keep the temp at 74-75 for the crays rather than the 78-79 of the cichlids. Crays like slightly harder water. They're pretty hardy as long as you keep the nitrates low. I usually do 2 40% water changes a week on that tank, but that is also my fry growout tank and my blue ramshorn breeding tank so I like to keep it very clean. Lots of snails = lots of waste.

New pictures! Forgive the crappiness, its so hard to get good shots of them. Sooo tiny, and fast, and active, and they only stay in sight for a minute tops before they are back in the jungle.

3 days old:


1 week old:



They're so adorable!