Mysis Shrimp Propagation

[leliataylor]

I have decided to once again propagate mysis shrimp and over 4 years ago sustained a population for over 4 months. It just got to be too much working full time and raising seahorse fry. I ordered 500 shrimp from MBL Aquaculture and they arrived 2 weeks ago. Currently most of them are housed in a flow through system consisting of a 20 gallon nursery, a 30 gallon tank and a 29 gallon sump. I do need to upgrade the out sleeve on the nursery to 1000 micron mesh and build a tray to capture the larval shrimp that are flushed out of the tub. Some of the shrimp have already been moved to other tanks and nurseries as food for my seahorses and some are being fed for deworming my wild caught pair. Currently I have 3 species of macro in each system since 31% of their diet is plant material. They are being fed coral food, such as, live pods, Reef Roids, Cyclop-eeze, phyto and Reed Mariculture Shell Fish Diet. They go crazy and swarm on the shell fish diet. Feeding is being done 3 times a day. One of the things I have noticed is these mysis are far more active, use every inch of a 16-24" tall tank and are much faster than I have seen in the past. Today I moved some of the pregnant females into a smaller tub until they deliver, as a experiment. I know they are cannibalistic so I need to separate the young from the adults and keep them all well fed.

I would appreciate any experience, suggestions, etc. that any of you have had working with them.

On a side note, it took some of my young seahorses a couple of days to figure out how to catch them and when they did the seahorses looked like little fat sausages.

[BBQHILLBILLY]

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[FarmerTy]

Very cool! The cannibalism part is the real reason I never attempted. Seemed too much work to seperate them out. Keep us posted!

[leliataylor]

Well I have newborn mysis in two tubs that have not been eaten. A friend of mine found a dramatic reduction in cannibalism as long as they were well fed. I have actually cut back slightly on the amount I am feeding them, unlike when they first arrived, I am not seeing the larger shrimp grabbing hold of the smaller ones. I did change my plan slightly from using the flow to flush the newborns out of the tank into a tray, to setting up a box inside the tank and using a air stone to flush the newborns into the box. This is the same technique MBL Aquaculture and Scripps use in their propagation systems, except they use round containers and I modified a old HOB overflow for now. I should know more tomorrow morning as I have a number of gravid females. The next hurdle is having enough small tubs to house the newborns until they reach juvenile stage at about one week. I will say that some of the males have already grown larger than any mysis I have kept before.

Another side note to Shane, that 45 gallon Bean tank I bought from you had a large number of mysis in the overflow. The guy from MBL Aquaculture told me that is where they find the mysis they have added to their tanks and is also where I find a number of amphipods and copepods in my tanks.

[FarmerTy]

Well I have newborn mysis in two tubs that have not been eaten. A friend of mine found a dramatic reduction in cannibalism as long as they were well fed. I have actually cut back slightly on the amount I am feeding them, unlike when they first arrived, I am not seeing the larger shrimp grabbing hold of the smaller ones. I did change my plan slightly from using the flow to flush the newborns out of the tank into a tray, to setting up a box inside the tank and using a air stone to flush the newborns into the box. This is the same technique MBL Aquaculture and Scripps use in their propagation systems, except they use round containers and I modified a old HOB overflow for now. I should know more tomorrow morning as I have a number of gravid females. The next hurdle is having enough small tubs to house the newborns until they reach juvenile stage at about one week. I will say that some of the males have already grown larger than any mysis I have kept before.

Another side note to Shane, that 45 gallon Bean tank I bought from you had a large number of mysis in the overflow. The guy from MBL Aquaculture told me that is where they find the mysis they have added to their tanks and is also where I find a number of amphipods and copepods in my tanks.

Great observations! I appreciate you sharing! Any chance you could post pictures or videos of your setup. You've peaked my interest.

[leliataylor]

The box/airstone flushing system kinda worked, just not the way I expected. I managed to trap at least a dozen small juveniles, didn't try to count them. I don't know if the newborns made it into the box and were eaten or never got flushed into it. Today I changed out to mesh on the top of the box to keep the juveniles out and reduced the air flow. Tinker time. The females I placed in the tub did deliver and I do have newborn shrimp, however removing the females was rather time consuming. Great sport for someone that has nothing else to do. LOL

I will get some pictures posted once I figure out why I can no longer upload pictures.

I thought the mysis would decimate my pod population and they are scarce in the mysis tub. My filter sock and 30 gallon tank that are plumbed into the same system are full of them. I may change out the filter sock to a larger micron mesh or remove it completely. For now it is one change at a time.

[leliataylor]

Well I trapped a few newborns, but not the number I wanted. I could see a number of them in the tub and they were all staying in close proximity to, or in, the chaeto. The chaeto provides them a hiding place and they are attracted to the light over the chaeto. I moved the light to the other side of the tub and they emerged from the chaeto. Using a rigid airline attached to a flexible one I was able to siphon off a couple of dozen newborns within a few minutes, so I changed my trap. I covered the top of a 200 micron sieve with 730 micron mesh, tilted it slightly so the light shines through the bottom. I placed some chaeto on the top and am running a airstone around the chaeto with the current moving over the top of the sieve. I will know more tomorrow if this works better. Siphoning them off was not difficult or very time consuming once I figured out how to get them to congregate in one area, however it would be nice to have come to me.

[FarmerTy]

Thanks genius if it works out that they follow your light to the chaeto.

[FarmerTy]

Thanks genius if it works out that they follow your light to the chaeto.

Oops! Meant to write "That's genius". Dang you auto correct!

[leliataylor]

Not to worry, I have used the light technique for years on seahorse fry and brine shrimp. Turn off the lights, shine a bright light in one spot near the top and wait a few minutes. Chasing a couple of hundred tiny baby seahorses around a 65 gallon tank is not my idea of fun. All the copepods I have had tend to do the opposite heading for the darkest spot away from the light.

The new trap design is working much better, although I still have a few more mods I would like to try. Not only am I getting newborn mysis in the trap I am also getting copepods which will help feed the mysis. I do still see some of the newborns swimming with the adults in open water so I am going to build another trap to put on the opposite side of the tub. Now that the trap is working better I am going to build some shallow tray's out of acrylic. The plan is to drill a one inch hole in the bottom, cover it with 200 micron mesh, cover half the top with the same mesh and have a hinged lid on the other half of the top. The trays can then be placed in the tub, tank or sump. This will keep their water quality stable, make it easy to grade them by size and means I won't have to set up more tanks. I can cover the overflow on the 30 gallon tank, that is plumbed into the same sump as the nursery tube with 730 micron mesh, release the juveniles into that tank and once they reach adult size move them to the nursery tub.