FAO : Cherry/Sakura Shrimp Keepers

[Vale!]

If you keep/have kept Cherry Shrimp or (preferably) Red Sakura Shrimp and have observed any that have died, please would you look at the following two pics …








Have you ever seen one of these shrimp show this blue colour after death, please?

[fr499y]

Yes. Anything odd with the water tests?

Usually they go dark before a molt, and if it doesn't go to plan..... well that happens ( as you most likely already know )

Have you tested for copper?

[Vale!]

I haven't, no. I've just had a rootle in my museum and it appears I don't have a test kit. I'll see if I can pick one up later this arvo.

There's nothing untoward showing in any of the tests I've done. This is 'Sheba'-related, btw.

Everyone else : please don't let fr499y's reply prevent you from adding observations/comments!

[plankton]

Do they have a calcium source? I know your MK water is calcified enough, but.....

[Vale!]

No specific source of calcium to speak of, other than from any fish food that they can scavenge.

If I were to test the water that they share with their fishy tankmates, it wouldn't register on a GH test. To a buttfull (c180L) of peat-infused change-water I add (typically) : 3g JBL Aquadur ; 3g calcium nitrate ; 2g magnesium sulphate ; 3g potassium phosphate ; and a capful of Discus Trace.

The shrimp have endured this sort of regime for many years. I now have hundreds of them. I've not been able to observe any dead ones in 'normal' tanks - hence my appeal for info about whether such a bluish colour is usual or unusual.

[Martinspuddle]

Think you'll find that is a Chitinolytic bacterial disease infection.

[Vale!]

None of the copper tests on done on all Shebas returned a positive.

There are no signs of Sakuras carrying disease in any tanks. It's possible, I guess, that the conditions into which the individual (pictured above and sourced from my Eirmotus tank) was plonked caused some latent chitinolytic hooligans suddenly to flourish and kill it within 12 hours. A biological cause isn't No.1 Suspect at the mo, but I'll keep this in mind. Whatever it is, it kills fish as well as shrimp.

[Martinspuddle]

Whatever it is, it kills fish as well as shrimp.

Somewhat worrying.

[stuaz]

I haven't seen it before with my shrimp... but its possibly the shrimps blood?

Similar to how humans have hemoglobian and the iron in that gives it the red colour, shrimp have copper in there blood (I forget the exact name) which will give it a blue tint.

[Vale!]

Thanks, S. After reading your comment I tried to find out what colour shrimp blood is, with little success! It's apparently not blood as we know it (Jim!) but 'haemolymph'. The molecules in it that transport oxygen are, as you say, built around one or more copper atoms. The nearest I got to an answer was a suggestion that its colour might be blue-ish as a result.

Anyway, that's definitely something else to keep in mind. Of the two shrimp that I put in latterly, the other one had perished a couple of days previously but I didn't photograph it. That one had turned a really vivid shade of blue - as though it was made of lapis lazuli! In both shrimps, though, that colour faded after 24-48 hours.