Ghost shrimp breeding is a project that any well informed beginner can take on. But it takes a little more effort than keeping several shrimp together. You may even need a separate tank. But you will learn a lot about shrimp biology in the process.
How Do Ghost Shrimp Reproduce?
Ghost shrimp are egg layers, like most crustaceans. Once they mate the female will lay anywhere from 20 to 80 eggs at a time. They are referred to as “berried ghost shrimp” in this stage since the eggs look like a cluster of yellow or green berries under the female’s tail.
She holds these ghost shrimp eggs under her tail for 2 to 3 weeks, fanning them to keep them oxygenated. And protecting them from fish and other predators until they are ready to hatch.
Why is Ghost Shrimp Breeding Difficult?
If you’ve ever seen a batch of ghost shrimp at a pet store then you’ve seen a berried ghost shrimp in the bunch. Ghost shrimp mating happens all of the time and eggs are easy enough to find.
Yet breeding ghost shrimp is impossible in most home aquariums. The problem is that ghost shrimp larvae are planktonic for the first couple of weeks. They free float in the water, feeding on other planktonic life.
Baby ghost shrimp will be sucked into your filter after being born. Most fish tanks also don’t have a whole lot of planktonic life for them to eat. Fish also enjoy eating ghost shrimp larvae.
Ghost shrimp are different from red cherry shrimp. When cherry shrimp babies are born they are already fully formed little shrimplets. Their large size and lack of a larval stage makes them easier to feed and raise.
How to Breed Ghost Shrimp
Breeding ghost shrimp means you have to plan for this free floating ghost shrimp fry. Any aquarium filter you use should be gentle enough to preserve the baby ghost shrimp.
Another approach is to set up a separate breeding aquarium for any berried ghost shrimp. A week after your female produces a clutch of eggs, catch her with a net. Be careful not to stress her with a long chase. Sometimes females will shed their eggs when trying to flee a predator.
Once you have her, move the pregnant ghost shrimp to a breeding tank, which should use a small sponge filter for filtration. After she releases her eggs in a week or two, move her back to your main aquarium. If you want to try ghost shrimp breeding in the main tank then you’ll have to use a sponge filter there.
Another approach is to set up a Walstad aquarium, which uses live plants and a soil substrate for filtration. Walstad tanks are also great at cultivating planktonic life, which baby ghost shrimp and adults feed on.
Ghost shrimp fry take 1 to 2 weeks to develop legs and become shrimplets. In the meantime, you should have a steady source of infusoria, green water algae, and other planktonic life for them to eat. Powdered spirulina also works, though it will foul the water if you offer too much.
Once the baby shrimp are visible and have legs you may either continue to raise them separately. Or move them in with their parents. Ghost shrimp will cannibalize sick or dying shrimp. But they won’t prey on healthy young.
Conclusion
Breeding ghost shrimp is simple to do once you prevent the babies from being sucked into a filter. You also need to provide them with enough microbial food for their first couple weeks of life. Once they develop legs and sink, baby ghost shrimp are as easy to care for as their parents.
FAQs
A ghost shrimp pregnancy lasts 2 to 3 weeks. Once the larvae have left the eggs, the female may produce a new clutch in another 2 weeks. Since these shrimp live less than two years they produce eggs all of the time.
Full grown ghost shrimp show strong sexual dimorphism (you can tell the sexes apart by looking) a few months from hatching. Males are about ½ the size of females of the same age. An adult male is ¾ to 1 inch in length, while females are 1½ to 2 inches long.
