Saw my amano giving birth the other day

[josu2]

I've had a total of about 10 amanos spread across 3 or 4 tanks for a long time now. I knew they were low order breeders and always assumed they were getting pregnant and letting them all go, but in a way that I just couldn't see. I never noticed any berries or anything like that. Recently, I found my naughty betta pestering the two in his small tank (he's a little feisty, but is isolated because his fins got shredded in a community tank) so I moved those amanos into my 29g community where there were already 3 others.

 

Not long afterwards—maybe a couple weeks?—the spouse calls me into the room where this 29g is located saying something weird is going on. She was attracted because the white clouds were in midwater in a kind of swarm, which isn't typical behavior. On closer inspection, an amano was perched on a rock flinging these little, uh, things into the middle of the tank, which the white clouds found to be a very pleasant surprise dinner. And that, my friends, is how I first saw a pregnant amano. I am guessing that my preference for big amanos meant that I had an all-female cast of characters until I was stuck with some smaller ones as a LFS that had low stock, which became the pair that I just added to my 29g.

 

Now I see two others that are more obviously berried, even though they don't look so much like berries.

[Inverte Ponics]

I have a bunch of amanos of different sizes and never see any with berries.  Do you have a photo for seeing what it is like?

[Dluxeshrimps]

So do you plan to breed them? If so I purchased 20 of them at 39 cents each from my LFS. what a steal!! but i was reading on the breeding process and its a bit more complicated then i thought.

Also a little funny story, while at the LFS one popped out of the net while being caught and literally was running away on the table, it was the craziest thing i ever saw a shrimp do, these Amanos are super aggressive and are seriously reading to bolt away any time they have a chance. IDK if anyone has accidently let one fall out and onto "dry land" and see them dash away quickly.

[Crackhead Johny]

On 5/12/2016 at 7:10 AM, boothie said:

I have a bunch of amanos of different sizes and never see any with berries.  Do you have a photo for seeing what it is like?

here are 3 attempts at 2 berried anamos. they are nearly as big as bamboo/flower shrimp.

[Inverte Ponics]

It's hard to see the eggs.  Maybe that's my problem.  I can't see the eggs because they're not brightly colored?  I read something about shrimps making U shape with their tails which indicates drawing out eggs and fertilizing them to deposit them on their tails.  I see the amanos do this, but never anything else.  I'm just curious... 

[Inverte Ponics]

On 5/13/2016 at 6:41 AM, Dluxeshrimps said:

So do you plan to breed them? If so I purchased 20 of them at 39 cents each from my LFS. what a steal!! but i was reading on the breeding process and its a bit more complicated then i thought.

Also a little funny story, while at the LFS one popped out of the net while being caught and literally was running away on the table, it was the craziest thing i ever saw a shrimp do, these Amanos are super aggressive and are seriously reading to bolt away any time they have a chance. IDK if anyone has accidently let one fall out and onto "dry land" and see them dash away quickly.

 

I'm not sure who was being asked about breeding them.  I don't want to deal with the brackish water to transition larvae to to adulthood, so I'm keeping these until they naturally expire in favor of those that can breed in freshwater.  

 

I have never seen an Amano scurry on a dry surface myself, but it does sound pretty comical.

[josu2]

On 5/12/2016 at 8:10 AM, boothie said:

I have a bunch of amanos of different sizes and never see any with berries.  Do you have a photo for seeing what it is like?

 

Blurry, but you may be able to see them. They don't berry quite like the higher order breeders, it looks more like how a flower is chock full of slightly elongate seeds.

 

 

On 5/13/2016 at 9:41 AM, Dluxeshrimps said:

So do you plan to breed them? If so I purchased 20 of them at 39 cents each from my LFS. what a steal!! but i was reading on the breeding process and its a bit more complicated then i thought.

Also a little funny story, while at the LFS one popped out of the net while being caught and literally was running away on the table, it was the craziest thing i ever saw a shrimp do, these Amanos are super aggressive and are seriously reading to bolt away any time they have a chance. IDK if anyone has accidently let one fall out and onto "dry land" and see them dash away quickly.

 

At this point, no plans to breed due to my lack of experience with brackish/salt setups and general laziness. I've thought about giving it a shot, though...I sure wouldn't mind having a bunch of amanos on my hands! I love these guys.

 

I haven't seen one scurry, but I have seen one on dry land. On the day of my first ever amano purchase, we acclimated them and the spouse and I went on our way doing other things. We hadn't seen our cats for a while so went into the room where this fish tank was to see what was up. We saw one cat on top of the tank and another on the ground nearby. Looking a little closer, the cat on the ground was standing over the top of one of the new amanos! The spouse thought quickly and grabbed the amano and tossed it back into the tank. It lives to this very day. Our theory on what must have happened is that the cat on top of the tank must have been sticking his paw into one of the gaps in the lid, where the newcomers had been hiding on a heater. Being slapped probably caused the shrimp to jump, incidentally sending it out of the tank. At that point, I imagine some mixture of being slapped and scurrying/jumping landed the shrimp onto the ground.