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My shrimp passed away this morning He was about an inch long and this morning i found him on his side...but instead of being a yellowy brownish color he was white and red and didn't even look like himself I was so sad so i pulled him out right away and dumped him in the garbage bag

Im sorry to be the one to tell you this but if it was a ghost shrimp it may have still been alive.. when ghost shrimp molt.. they turn completly white and lie like they're dead for a couple of hours. I too had the same thing happen.. one starting turning white, so i posted here and someone said that it was either sick or molting so when i found him "playing dead" i did the same and took him out, only to find out on a later post that this is normal molting behaivor. I know ghost shrimp are feeders alot of time, and are only about .30 a pop, but if you buy them as a pet it still sucks when they die.. i felt horrible when i found he was probly just molting but live and learn..

Hope this helps.. dont feel bad, i think its a really easy mistake to make.. i know i did it and im sure TONS of others have too.. ghost shrimp should come with a warning lable about this

-CJ

Oh no are you serious?! Well i'm not totally sure if it was a ghost shrimp because when i bought him it said "algae eating shrimp" but like i said he was about maybe a little over an inch long and he was 7 bucks...so yeah but i hope i didn't kill the pooor guy

You probably possessed, rather than a ghost shrimp, an Amano Shrimp (Caridina japonica), so termed after its primary popularizer, Takashi Amano, father of the 'Nature Aquariums' in which C. japonica often played a centerpiece role (most sources agree that it was Amano, a well-known photographer and aquarist, who introduced japonica to the aquarium world; thus, he would be the first to have, upon noting their algae-based dietary habits, incorporated them into show aquariums). The shrimp goes under the heading of 'Yamato-numa ebi' in its native Japan, literally equivalent to “Japanese swamp shrimp” (after the Yamato province of Japan, from which Yamato received his specimens). Within Japan, the shrimp’s range encompasses the Yamato River and the southern area of Chiba and Shimane; it additionally occurs in Korea, Taiwan, and, according to certain sources, Madagascar (albeit extremely doubtfully as an indigenous species; however, a rich community of endemic decapod crustaceans, including six species of parastacid crayfishes (Astacoides spp.), at least twenty species of atyid shrimps (Caridina spp.; japonica is not counted among them), three species of palaemonid shrimps (Machrobrachium spp.), and nine species of patamonid crabs, inhabit the island’s rivers and streams. I should emphasize, on an aside, the faunal and cultural singularity of Madagascar – it comprises a unique biogeographic zone, occasionally termed “the eighth continent”, closer to the New World in some regards than Africa, while overwhelmingly individual in its own right – as in its endemic possession of boid snakes and native crayfish, not withholding the prosimian lemurs, uniquely so for the former two as a broad group within a vicinity of many tens of thousands of kilometers).

More substantively, your shrimp may well have been deceased at the time of its disposal; while many crustaceans have pink or red coloration in their chitin in the form of the pigment astaxanthin, its molecules are usually masked by dark protein chains. As aficionados of shellfish consumption should well know, this protein begins to uncoil, or denature, with exposure to thermal stress (i.e., heat) or the death and subsequent organic degeneration of its owner, visibly freeing the coloration. It is this that may have accounted for the shrimp’s reddish coloration, though other options remain viable (note that this color shift will come at differing times across the range astaxanthin concentrations in various species, and may well be affected by water chemistry, temperature, etc.). Inadequate conditions, whether purely in terms of general housing parameters or diet (including presence of certain trace minerals) sometimes results in molting death – as does tankmate presence: all will opportunistically pick at shrimp in their “soft-bodied” post-molting state.

A follow-up question:

Can you identify the overall parameters/conditions in your tank at said time of deceasement (including dimensions and filtration)? Were there any other organisms present? It would be appreciated if this was provided in regard to discerning the veracity/reasons of the shrimp's death.

My sincere apologies for steering this post off-course, but does anyone know of the likely reason for the common (admittedly internet-based) citing of Madagascar as among the range of C. japonica? Additionally, is there any individual who knows of any likely reason for the presence of native crayfish in Madagascar but not in mainland Africa; in what portion of Gondwanaland was their point of origin, and did they disperse from salt water to freshwater lake and stream systems via brackish water, or vice-versa? It would not be recent development or inability to disperse, as far as I understand; they exist today in the Americas, extremely sparsely in Europe & more commonly in temperate/tropical Asia; their diversity is higher in Oceanea. Their fossilized remains have been uncovered in Antarctica; indeed, it is contended by some, based on the discovery of the oldest fossilized crayfish in that continent (dating to the Late Carboniferous-Early Permian Age, 285-million years ago), that they developed there. If anyone keeps any Macrobrachium species (long-arm shrimp/freshwater prawns, some of which appear nearly identical to crayfish (see the "Catemaco lobster shrimp" at http://www.shrimpcrabsandcrayfish.co.uk/Shrimp.htm?Longarm.htm~mainframe]http://www.shrimpcrabsandcrayfish.co.uk/Shrimp.htm?Longarm.htm~mainframe[/link] and Macrobrachium carcinus at [link=http://www.fs.fed.us/r8/caribbean/resources/fauna_of_the_month/2003/fauna_big-claw_river_shrimp.htm) or freshwater tropical crabs, feel free to give a comparison of their behavior to that of crayfish.

Last edited by Veneer at 17-Oct-2004 17:28

oh yeah sorry about that! My parameters are 0 ammonia, 0 nitrites, 10 nitrates and a ph of 7.2, the temperature is 24 degrees celcius. Ummm...its a 20 gallon tank, it was a starter kit so it came with a filter (aquaclear 150), 100 watt heater...it has a clam and airstone for oxygen, live and fake plants. Danios, guppies and cories.

Last edited by kelso at 17-Oct-2004 18:52

Kelso where are you buying your Amanos ?

Mine were labelled as 'Algae Eating Shrimp' and they turned out to be Amanos, and $3.00 apiece..

The Amazon Nut...

I either buy them at Petland or the lfs...everywhere that i've seen them here...whether its petland, pet smart, pet cetera whatever...they have all been about7$ each....i did buy 3 more on sunday and they cost me 11$. Anyway they've been hiding out in my cave since i've bought them...but i'm assuming they are a bit stressed out from the move. My parameters are still normal so they should be fine...Anyways yeah i know i've kind of been ripped off but i haven't found anywhere else that sells them for cheaper so i guess i have to live with what i have...but i have noticed that the fish i have bought from petland or the lfs have all seemed to be happy and healthy since they seem to be doing awesome and their fry are still alive so it can't be all that bad

How far are you from Toronto ? You should come here and shop !

The Amazon Nut...

Yeah...i'm on the other end of the country lol. Calgary...