Breeding Mysis Shrimp

[Mako72]

Hello, I recently bought a seahorse and have him alone in a tank with a cleaner shrimp and some snails. I have been feeding it PE mysis...but thought of using live mysis.....I have an extra 5 gallon fresh water tank....could I use it for saltwater, use some live sand and live rock...put only live mysis in there, and use it just to breed enough mysis for the seahorse?

 

[rkelman]

I have no idea but I'm interested in how you make out..

 

[ConsultantERP]

Mysids are fairly easy to care for, but are canablistic if not kept fed, Search for some breeding infor or breeding setups, and you will likely find a system with screens to help harvest new born mysids.

 

[olin]

You can do it in a single tank system, but as mentioned above, cannibalism is a big problem. If you do a single tank, give the babies lots of areas in which to hide - dense macroalgae, fake aquarium plants, rafts of synthetic nylon string or yarn, etc. You will have better survival if you can size-separate into several tanks, but for growing enough snacks for a single seahorse, a 5 with lots of substrate should be just fine. Careful of overdoing it with live treats, you don't want to lose the convenience of being able to feed frozen if your seahorse gets spoiled

 

[FMarini]

funny what a quick search will come up w/
http://www.reefstewardshipfoundation.org/forums/showthread.php?t=740

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/sept2003/breeder.htm
http://www.seahorse.org/library/articles/mysisCulturing.shtml

 

[Mako72]

Thanks for the links, I found two of the three before...but wanted to get the opinion of those on the forums here. If someone needs a smaller number of mysids...they do not need to have the extensive set-ups discussed in those articles.

 

[billsreef]

Haven't checked on the links Frank gave you, so I don't know how elaborate or simple the set ups are in those articles. However, just in case you haven't come across this simple set up in any of them...

Divide a 20L (or larger is even better) in half with screening. The typical fiberglass window screen from the hardware store is fine for this. Set it up so that water is drained (or pumped) from one end, and returned to the other end. This will set up a flow from one side of the screen to the other. Place your adult broodstock in the upstream side of the tank, the current will carry the babies through the screen and thereby separate them from the adults. This will give a degree of size seperation that allows you to easily separate and remove the smaller mysis for feeding or rearing in another tank. It won't give you high volume production that more aggressive separation techniques will, but it is low tech and easy. Of course the overflow/return pump needs to be screened off with fine enough mesh to prevent the babies from being sucked into the pump