Well SOMETHING Has Spawned

[monicaswizzle]

Last week I noted my attempt to spawn black cap basslets. Tonight I had some indigestion and got out of bed to let things settle down. When I checked my tank I found dozens of larvae swimming in the areas directly below my lunar lights. I have no idea what they may be. It would be a bit too good to be true for them to be black caps, but they might be.

Unfortunately, I am not really set up yet to try and rear larvae (working on my first batch of greenwater--still waiting for my order of resting rotifers to arrive), but I have "harvested" several dozen of the larvae by sucking them up with a turkey baster. I currently have them in two small acrylic specimen boxes which are hanging into the tank to stay warm. In one box I added enough of Kent Phyto Plex to give the water a faint tint and in the other box I added a mix of Coral Fenzy and Two Little Fishes Phtyo Plan. I sincerely doubt that these will work as first foods, but they are all that I have on hand that might have any hope. I am running a small pump with an air hose into each box just to keep the water in motion and the "food" particles suspended.

Before I return to bed I will capture several dozen more of the larvae and transfer them to a 20 gallon tank that I have had set up for several months that has noting but a live sand bed and a small amount of live rock. If any of the larvae survive until I can get some rotifers going I will see if they get large enough to identify.

If anyone knows of a site with pictures of various marine larvae (shrimp, snails, fish, etc.) I would be interested in checking it out.

Night all!


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[monicaswizzle]

Probably shrimp?

Probably shrimp?

Well, I am pretty sure the spawn is not black caps. NOAA has a website that shows hundreds of pictures of various fish larvae and all of them appear more or less "fish like". The larvae in my tank look a bit more like shrimp to me, so I suspect that they are either peppermint, blood red or camel shrimp, all of which are living in my system. When examined under my dissecting scope, the larvae have very clearly segmented tails and what appear to be "legs". They seem to move either by running on their legs, or more often drawing their tails up near their heads and then quickly extending the tail, causing them to move through the water in a rather "jerky" fashion. All of that makes me suspect shrimp, so I guess I won't loose too much sleep over not having food ready for them to eat. They will make a nice snack for my corals.

 

[monicaswizzle]

Morning Update

Morning Update

Well, this morning both of the specimen boxes still have live fry in them. The box that I "fed" with phyto plan and coral frenzy seemed fairly cloudy and many of the particles had dropped to the bottom of the box. I used the turkey baster to remove the particles and added enough of Kent Phyto Plex to both boxes to give the water a light tint.

Another (two) reason to believe that the larvae are shrimp that I forgot to mention: 1) The tails appear to be triangular, shaped roughly like a shrimp tail and 2) the larvae appear to be oriented in the water with a "top" side containing both eyes and a "bottom" side that has the "legs". When they curl their tails for locomotion they always seem to curl them on the "bottom" side. The eyes remain on the side that is on the outside of the curled larva.

So, I will have to search around for references on how to raise shrimp larvae. I know that April Kirkendoll wrote a book about spawning, rearing and "training" pet peppermint shrimp, but I don't own a copy. If anyone out there knows a quick web reference, I would love to have it.

Thanks!

 

[FB]

Well I can't give you any advice. But Good Luck.

FB