Questions on Cherax Boesemani Care

[Revaria]

Backstory. So this last Saturday, I found a new fish store that sold a ton of cool stuff, (Axolotyls, chameleons, tiny rope fish, tiny bichirs and tiny tire track eels), and they also had a surprising set of crays as well. Anyway, upon seeing that they had Blue moon crayfish I bought 5 thinking they might be Cherax Pulchers,due to a article I found (http://www.advancedaquarist.com/blog/the-blue-moon-crayfish-finally-has-a-name). However after I purchased them I believe they turned out to be Cherax Boesemani's and are pretty cool and a solid #2 on my list.

 

Anyway I was wondering if anyone here knows the parameters of their native habitat (Lake Ajamaru/ Ayamaru) cause I can't seem to find a lot of information regarding these crayfish on the net and I'm not sure if they prefer alkaline water (Wiki says lake pH is about 8) or slightly acidic water, what hardness do they like, how aggressive they are to each other during molting, or even the temperature they like, etc. I also am confused on what their max size as the scientific article I read said they could get up to 25 cm in tail length (10 inches) https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4443586/, while aquatic arts says 6 inches https://aquaticarts.com/products/supernova-crayfish. I know Aquaticarts isn't exactly reliable, but at this point I'm sorta grasping at straws. Any other relevant information for these guys would be helpful as well cause no website seems to have any sort of specific detail on them at all. 

 

Also the coloration of the crayfish is similar to Figure 1C of the scientific article, but darker. I'll try to take pics when they aren't hiding. 

[Revaria]

Update followed with a long text wall 

So now it has been 2 weeks on having these guys and I believe I combed the internet well enough for information on these crays and  there doesn't  seem to be much info on keeping crayfish at all, so I guess I'll put up my experience for these guys so far and as a side note there is no way am I an expert, so feel free to discuss the info. 

 

Background

The species I currently own is known as Cherax Boesemani or Cherax Blue moons in the industry and they originate from Lake Ajamaru/ Ayamaru and the Ajamaru River located in Western Irian Jaya, Indonesia. They are a tropical crayfish and the rivers they live in have a pH of 8.0-9.0,  but can be within the range of 6.0-6.5 as well. The temperatures can range from 65-85 degrees Fahrenheit, but personally I will try to keep mine in the 70-80 degree range just to be safe. The rivers also have a high, but unspecified tds value. I am currently keeping mine at 7.0 with a tds of 130-150 depending on which tank they are in and they seem completely fine, one of them even molted when the tds of the tank was 108. The Ajamaru River is also where the popular Boesemani Rainbowfish is found as well, so water parameters fit for those fish (in theory) should be the same as the parameters for the Blue moons. Supposedly tropical crayfish can breed around the year due to the stability of the water parameters they are found in, so I hope to maybe see a clutch of eggs. I believe I currently have 3 females and possibly 1 male. The Australian tropical crayfish species I have taken a quick glance at  can live up to 5-8 years, but the average lifespan for these have not been determined, so I am hoping these species live that long as well.

 

Behavior 

I would say they are not aggressive towards each other on a daily basis, but the aggression when it occurs will happen rapidly and without warning. For the last 2 weeks I have had 3 crayfish in 1 tank with 2 of them sharing a 6 inch teddy cholla and the third would climb and hide between the popular double sponge filter we use. They would normally just hide all the time with no problems. Earlier today at 6 am I checked on them and everything was fine, fast forward to 9 am when I checked on the tank once more, 1 of the crays usually inside the cholla had its claw severed where the "arm" meets the thorax. It was behaving like a dying roach basically, it was outside of its normal hiding spot, did not react to light, moved sluggishly and did not react when I netted it and moved it to a clean quarantine tank filled with the original tank water. The only signs of life was that it moved to the darkest corner of the tank when I wasn't looking and laid still. I checked on it roughly 6 hours later and it had died, mostly likely from the shock of having its arm removed as the water parameters were exactly the same. These crayfish also do not appear to recognize their owner at all like fish do, and do not ignore us like shrimp do. Mine constantly hide and if they were in the open would retreat as soon as they my presence, do not expect to see much of these guys, unless you do a head count to make sure they are all still kicking. They are also really choosy about their hiding spots, for mine, they will take pvc if nothing else is available, sponge filters and teddy cholla wood. The most important aspect of the hiding spot it appears is size, texture and stability, they like a spot which is as narrow as possible for themselves to fit in, is a material they can grasp underneath them and the hiding spot should be unmovable by the crayfish themselves. If it is missing one of those it will most likely not choose that spot. For instance my crays avoid my pvc hiding spot even though it is rock solid and is against the back of the tank so there is only one entrance as it is quite tall and I don't think they like the texture of the pvc compared to the wood and the sponge. 

 

Feeding

I feed my crays before lights out and they appear to eat a lot, as the food will disappear by morning, but in reality often times they will stash food within their hiding spots for later consumption. They poop a lot and are extremely messy eaters, and I don't believe I would recommend a substrate for them as the poop and food will accumulate beneath the substrate. I do a 15%-20% water change twice a week to keep my bare bottom aquarium free of debris. They accept any sort of pellet, but really like frozen vegetables currently I have only fed mine organic frozen squash, which have been chopped and steam beforehand. You can also feed them trimmings from your planted aquariums, which I plan to do in the future. I tend to over feed mine to prevent them from fighting over food, but now that I separated them I will feed them only a few pellets. They won't starve easily as they are scavengers just like shrimp. 

 

Hardiness

They seem to be relatively hardy so far, as they acclimated quite easily, I used the cup method as I acclimated all 5 in different buckets at the same time and from their natural habitat appear to be able to withstand a variety of different temperatures and pH values. Mine are currently in tanks with a nitrate level of 20, even with the frequent water changes and they seem fine. 

 

In store purchase

In the store all 5 were active once removed from their hiding spots and immediately "lobstered" away, they can even lobster a good 3-5 inches off the bottom of the tank if they wanted too. If a crayfish is acting like a dying roach, where it doesn't react to light, potential threats etc don't buy it as they will most likely die during acclimation. Prior to these crayfish I bought a orange lobster which displayed those signs and it died within 2 days of inactivity (standing still in 1 spot, waving 1 leg in the same motion).

[oem]

Thanks for the update on these crays.  Interesting information about your journey with them.

[Soothing Shrimp]

Wow! Excellent write up!

[Greenteam]

What size tank are they in? Any chance for a pic of the setup?

[Revaria]

Currently 2 are in a 55 gallon that has a divider in it and another 2 are in a 30 gallon, I'm considering moving the smaller one into a 10 gallon. I'll post a pic of both in a few days, but they are both very basic setups with just a bare bottom, a few hiding spots and sponge filters. Most likely the crays won't be in the pictures, although I'll snap a pic of them if possible.

[Revaria]

Finally got the pics to sum it up, the first one is the 30 or 40 gallon tank, with 2 crayfish, usually one is in the log (you can see its claws) and the other one is literally between the two sponges. 2nd pic is the right half of the 55 where the crayfish is always hiding in the small triangle spot between the two pvc pipes, I literally never see it and I only know its alive cause it moves the food around. 3rd and 4th pic is of the 1 and only crayfish that actually comes out to explore. and the last pic is of the explorer's crayfish's half of the tank. 

[newellcr]

Revaria,

 

Nice write up.  I'm not really a cray keeper but currently have two blue varieties (alleni and vasquezea).  Mine won't settle down without substrate and often dig in it create their own hiding spaces.  I share your concern about the waste building up.  I handle it the way I do with bigger fish - more water changes.  My crays were tank raised for probably several generations before I got them, that always makes it easier. 

 

I hope you are doing well with your crays.

 

Regards,

 

Chris

[Revaria]

I'm glad you liked the write up and I still plan on updating this at some point in the future when I have enough that is noteworthy to talk about and the crays are fine currently one molted just yesterday in the 55 gallon and is currently still alive, so all is well. I considered the blue cobalt allenis, but I used to have some regular ones and they got pretty aggressive towards each other at some point and would always cannibalize each other after a molt or would fight for what seemed to be no reason. And the store which I bought them I was told had them for like 3 weeks and it was bare bottomed as well, so I guess they got used to it.

 

Just for kicks I changed the layout of the 30 after I realized they weren't using the driftwood at all and it impeded cleaning so I removed it and added a plain gravel substrate with some large stones to half the tank and added a half pipe of PVC just to see the reaction of the crayfish and over a week the one behind the sponge built a burrow using the large stones to block one side of the entrance and made the other side taller so only it could enter, so I find that pretty fascinating. And my concern was correct there is a lot of waste build up in the gravel, but since its only one side of the tank I just gravel vac a portion of the gravel each time and rinse it out and put it back in. So far nitrates are still 0, so the bacteria isn't getting too badly harmed and I will probably keep maintaining it like so. 

[jumpsmasher]

Most on the information on the papua crayfish are in german unfortunately and that is where most of the breeders are as they are amongst to first to get their hands on the rarer ones.

 

This is a good summary
https://www.garnelio.de/mehr/garnelioblog/cherax-aquarienkrebse-haltung-im-aquarium

 

crustahunter is also a good site to check out. There is more content available if you stick with the German version of the site

 

This article is for the monticola but many of the same things can be said for the other papua crays as well

http://crustahunter.com/keeping-and-breeding-cherax-cf-monticola/?lang=en

 

Recent testing by Chris Lukhaup found that Blue Moon and Hoa Creek are both cherax pulcher and even with the wild caught hoa creek's you get a range of colour from "dirty" blue-green to the vibrant pink they are famous for.

 

Boesemani is generally used now for the red / green chilli (aka red brick / green brick)

For tank size; the ideal size would be something with an larger footprint  something like a 40gal breeder (36x18") or 48x18" it is possible to keep a community of them if you have a large enough tank with plenty of hiding spots;  i had around 20+ in a 110gal; there will be some jockeying for territory at first but eventually they will establish a peaking order with an "alpha" male 

They love digging their own tunnel / cave so i generally recommend a decent layer of gravel or fine sand (3-4") so they can dig their own hiding spots. When carrying eggs i find my females usually bury herself deep inside her cave and rarely come out.  

food wise their diet should be more vegetable based than meat or protein based.  My loves the Shrimp King peas and leaves loops as well as a steady supply of Indian almond leaves.  

The older the males get, the greater chance they might lose a claw while molting; they get some big that it is very hard for them to get it out of the old exoskeleton successfully 

[Revaria]

On 11/16/2016 at 4:17 PM, jumpsmasher said:

Most on the information on the papua crayfish are in german unfortunately and that is where most of the breeders are as they are amongst to first to get their hands on the rarer ones.

 

This is a good summary
https://www.garnelio.de/mehr/garnelioblog/cherax-aquarienkrebse-haltung-im-aquarium

 

crustahunter is also a good site to check out. There is more content available if you stick with the German version of the site

 

This article is for the monticola but many of the same things can be said for the other papua crays as well

http://crustahunter.com/keeping-and-breeding-cherax-cf-monticola/?lang=en

 

Recent testing by Chris Lukhaup found that Blue Moon and Hoa Creek are both cherax pulcher and even with the wild caught hoa creek's you get a range of colour from "dirty" blue-green to the vibrant pink they are famous for.

 

Boesemani is generally used now for the red / green chilli (aka red brick / green brick)

For tank size; the ideal size would be something with an larger footprint  something like a 40gal breeder (36x18") or 48x18" it is possible to keep a community of them if you have a large enough tank with plenty of hiding spots;  i had around 20+ in a 110gal; there will be some jockeying for territory at first but eventually they will establish a peaking order with an "alpha" male 

They love digging their own tunnel / cave so i generally recommend a decent layer of gravel or fine sand (3-4") so they can dig their own hiding spots. When carrying eggs i find my females usually bury herself deep inside her cave and rarely come out.  

food wise their diet should be more vegetable based than meat or protein based.  My loves the Shrimp King peas and leaves loops as well as a steady supply of Indian almond leaves.  

The older the males get, the greater chance they might lose a claw while molting; they get some big that it is very hard for them to get it out of the old exoskeleton successfully 

 

Thanks for the input jumpsmasher! 

 

I visited those sites before and they were part of the research I compiled a while ago, but I don't speak german, so I couldn't utilize those sources very well. The main source of info I used was http://aqua-terra-vita.com/?/CrayfishWP/CheraxBlueMoonCare.html althought that site is a bit outdated the information should still be good. I also used a decent amount of wiki and took a look at the parameters of the Boesemani rainbow fish. Also would it be possible to source the link where they are the same species? I have been following Lukhaup for more info on these crayfish, but I couldn't find any sources where he said they were exactly the same, only that there was a chance as they lived very close to each other. 

 

How did you sex your crayfish, as I like to just take a snapshot from underneath the glass bottom where they can't see me and it doesn't bother them much. Also when you used to breed them, would they show various colors growing up, or would the coloring be similar to the parents?

 

I'll consider the gravel, I'm adding more slowly, but I'm worried about collapsing their tunnels when I do a gravel vac. Also it sucks that they may lose a claw, but I have been noticing their claws are starting to get huge on some of them, so I'm not too surprised. 

 

I'm currently feeding mine a more vegetable related diet as well with mulberry and indian almond leaves along with some algae tabs, CSF Omnipro, zuchinni and mixed greens. I'm planning to switch later to Omega veggie from the algae tabs for the iodine in the spirulina, start adding Kale for the calcium and I'm still looking for something with protein. 

[Revaria]

Update

This is probably the last or second to last update on these guys, partially because the information I originally wanted to build already exists and is now accessible, I believe all Indonesian crays are now banned from imports into my city (that is what the shop which got me these guys said). I would also like to state here my crays are thriving, more on that later.

Over the last 4-5 months (Wow time flies) my crays are actually doing pretty well. The layout of my tanks changed partially due to the crayfish activities and partially due to Jump smasher's advice. The divider in the 55 went down, some coconut huts were thrown in, and the giant piece of driftwood in the 30 tall is gone replaced with some coconut huts, some gravel and half a pvc pipe. Starting in either late November or early December I revisited the sites that jumpsmasher gave me on my phone and strangely enough google automatically translated the care sheets for the Blue moon crayfish. Man was I surprised cause I realized instantly you could just copy paste all the information into the google translate, which is what I should have done in the first place (like duh). This allowed me to read up on a huge amount of information on these guys. Probably the biggest piece of info I learned on these crays is that they should really only have 10% of their diet comprised of animal protein, the rest should just be a mainly vegetarian diet. Either with veggie pellets or actual vegetables. If they eat too much protein, then they will grow too fast  which may lead to a loss of claws when molting which is quite common in their species. Also they are still extremely messy eaters, like it has only gotten worse as I fed them more. 

 

The largest reason for me stopping the guide is because I actually managed to breed my crayfish and I think I can't truly improve the care I am currently giving them, I just have to keep doing what I'm doing. The websites above allowed me to sex them which is extremely simple, once I learned that only the males have a white patch on the yellow parts of their claws. I currently have 3 adult males and 1 female, the 5th one I lost was female as well. Anyway now I have roughly 12 half inched crayfish running around my 55 gallon. I didn't even notice them until I accidentally gravel vacced like 8 of them cause they love hiding in the piles of half eaten food and crayfish excrements. They don't seem to be particularly aggressive towards each other, and often back off if another one approaches. Food is plentiful in the tank and they are growing quite fast. They can actually lobster around as fast as shrimp and can lobster both upwards and downwards in the tank, they have great control of that and its pretty cool to see. They are good enough at doing so its actually annoying to catch the 2 one clawed ones, so I can help them recover. This batch should only be around 1.5-2 months old and some of them already have color while others are starting to gain it. Its starting as a really really light blue, or gray color which I am hoping to see develop into that deep blue that the adults have. It would be cool if I managed to get a different color morph as well. 

 

TLDR: All my crayfish are alive and well. I now have around 12 crayfishlets (like shrimplets?) running around and they are perfectly fine.

 

Normal tank parameters and final thoughts:

Temp: 74-75 F, could be as low as 65, dunno about the high.

TDS: 200-250

Foods: Green beans, Veggie sticks, Hikari shrimp pellets, Zucchini, Indian Almond Leaves, Mulberry leaves. Protein should be given infrequently

Ammonia: ? most likely 0-.25, Nitrite:? Most likely 0, Nitrates: 10-20, they are even fine with 30, at least mine were.

Difficulty: Pretty simple they are pretty hardy, they aren't aggressive towards each other, just feed them mostly vegetables, clean their water occasionally and you'll be fine.