My ghost shrimp died!!!
- Thread starter Froggie2009
- Start date
Although I am laughing uncontrollably, I hope we are not hurting someones feelings.
Sorry to hear about your shrimp, Froggie. I keep them in my tanks but they usually get eaten. I did have one die (he looked like he got cooked by the heater?) WITHOUT being eaten, and that was kinda sad.
Sorry to hear about your shrimp, Froggie. I keep them in my tanks but they usually get eaten. I did have one die (he looked like he got cooked by the heater?) WITHOUT being eaten, and that was kinda sad.gonefishin said:
Upon death, ghost shrimp (usually Palaemonetes paludosus/P. kadiakensis typically turn an ochre-orange "cooked" hue; the reddish tint is the pigment astaxanthin, the molecules of which, in living shrimp, are wrapped up in darker protein chains. With the death of the bearer (tantamount to the degrading thermal influence of heat on fresh-frozen crustacean carcasses), however, the protein denatures, uncoiling to render the red pigment visible. Dead ghost shrimp, even in room-temperature aquaria, will, following their terminal opaqueness, assume an 'orange' appearance.
Ghost shrimp are well-known for dying for no apparent reason, usually as a consequence of stress incurred in wholesale facilities and in collection; for this reason, quarantine is usually unviable - it is best to place specimens in a stable, established environment as soon as possible.
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