Malawa and Babaulti

[Wycco]

About a year ago- I put six green Babaulti in with my shrimp tank (w/ Malawa and Cherries).

Now I know longer have any green shrimp... but one thing I have noticed is I have a lot of Malawa shrimp that LOOK like Malawa shrimp... and then I have some shrimp that have the body shape of Babaulti not Malawa... only transparant.

I thought it safe to put in my greens with my Malawa that Malawa wouldn't cross breed.

Either my greens have lost their "green", my greens died without reproducing (I was still seeing some, often beried until a few months back- never did see a baby green though) or my shrimp have cross bred.

 

[david052856]

These two will not cross, Malawa will not cross with any shrimp in the hobby. They even have different colored eggs.

I have the same set up with no problems. Greens have been troubling for me to sustain. At first they all died and then died again. It was not until I made my water hard, and then bought juv that they sustained and are now berried.

 

[Wycco]

Yeah, I've read they won't cross... but I swear I've got two different species that are transparant (and no- it's not male female - and I don't know where they came from- unless I got two in with my original Malawa and didn't notice)

Different coloured eggs don't mean anything. Even with the same colour variant of some shrimp you can have different coloured eggs- like Cherries- most have yellow eggs some have green.

The ones I think look like Babaulti- have a brownish tint and the larger ones have a feint white line down their back- like female Babs and female cherries do.

The slightly smaller leggier "species" don't. They have very little colouration at all- a few slight brown speckles and some have white lines between segments.

I'll have to take photos... although anyone that's seen my photos on here know how bad a photographer I am!

I guess it's highly possible I had one or two colourless shrimp of another species in with my Malawa and never noticed and they bred with the greens.

 

[spypet]

my c.babaulti.green remain in hiding in the plant cover a lot more than other shrimp I've kept like CRS and RCS,
so you may have them, and not even know it. I put a dozen babaulti in a moss tank - I rarely see a single one,
but I know they are there and busy, as I've already moved 3 berried females to another more hospitable tank.
I have yet to see one color up as dramatically green as many of the resellers here like to photograph them...

Malawa won't cross with CRS RCS or Babaulti, however they bore me cause they're plain looking and breed profusely.