DevinB Posted December 26, 2017 Report Share Posted December 26, 2017 So this seems odd to me, when I first purchased my tbs for breeding I ended up with a very high male to female ratio (as in like 10 to 1..) which seems normal enough because I bought mainly adult shrimp and I know most cull males more than females. However I did have 2 female BB and 2 female black kk, they are almost constantly berried and I've had about 3 separate batches of babies from each which is way better than I expected for success in my first year of breeding these lil guys. However every single baby that survived has been a male.. I keep my tank at 73°f/150 tds all shrimp are super healthy and nice thick carapaces but I know my females are due to stop breeding before long as they were adults when I bought them about 8 months ago.. Are the males just harassing the young smaller females to death without me noticing since the m/f ratio is so high? Do temperatures in which eggs develop determine what sex babies will become as I have found with some fish species? Should I cull out all but 1 or 2 primo males? I don't plan to ever deal with shipping shrimp to people so I'd feel bad about culling 20 shrimp by feeding them to my cichlids.. especially if all new babies end up male again anyways.. I would really like this colony to establish so I don't have to buy more come spring time just curious as to any ideas to fix this, or is this typical for tb's? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shrimp Life Posted December 28, 2017 Report Share Posted December 28, 2017 High Male ratio is very dangerous for female shrimp. The males will harrass and kill them and if you don't have a tank basically full of moss for hiding purposes, you can expect this outcome with a 10:1 ratio as you described. You have a few options, accept it and just hope for the best if breeding is not really your concern or remove many of the males so that there is better balance within the tank. I too had this issue in the past, they can really dwindle the existing female population quickly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shrimp Life Posted December 28, 2017 Report Share Posted December 28, 2017 I have this issue right now with one of my black pinto tanks. If anyone needs some male black pintos (mixed black belly pintos etc) I can sell them for cheap. They are all young males, but nonetheless I have way too many. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevinB Posted December 28, 2017 Author Report Share Posted December 28, 2017 Thanks for the reply dazalea, so that pretty much cements what I thought was happening.. I do have plenty of hiding places in my tank but the only females in the tank still are the 4 originals I received. Looks like I'm going to probably set up one of my spare tanks to be a "fraternity tank" of sorts. I don't plan on breeding to sell, but a "self sustaining" colony would be nice. Shrimp Life 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DevinB Posted March 26, 2018 Author Report Share Posted March 26, 2018 Just wanted to update this thread, I culled out most of the males from this tank and did some selective breeding over the last few months. And I am glad to say that I have this tank fully worked out and now have 15 female babies that survived to breeding age, and since they started breeding now have probably 75-100 babies ranging in size from freshly hatched to a month or so old. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chan011 Posted September 19, 2018 Report Share Posted September 19, 2018 so culling out the males worked to build the population. this is good to know and makes sense. thanks for the update Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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