Do shrimp sleep? Your thoughts and experiences

[Fishnchips808]

I've searched the Internet for the answer to the question "do shrimp sleep" and I've come up with plenty of articles but I wanted to get some input from actual current shrimp keepers. Some people said that shrimp do in fact sleep, and do so by sitting motionlessly, while others said that motionless shrimp are a sign of impending death. I ask this question because I recently had an ammonia spike in one of my shrimp tanks in which many of the shrimp were laying still which led me to do water changes to save their lives. However months later my tanks are stable and my parameters are ideal, but every now and then I see a group of shrimp huddled in the corner of my tank sitting still with the lights on. I assume that they're in the corner since the darker and they're sleeping, if in fact they are sleeping. Or perhaps they're all congregating in the corner to die together. Anyone else have similar experiences with shrimp sleeping?

[dao]

Can't tell if they sleep, one would assume they have to rest and regenerate somehow.

From my observation - shrimp do become inactive but for very short periods of time, but if it is a longer period - let's say a day or more, than I am worried. I have to say though, that I had shrimp that were inactive for a few days, after which they returned to their normal level of activity.  I still assume, maybe wrongly, that there was something not quiet right and they just managed to recover.

A group of inactive, hiding shrimp is definitely a bad sign in my experience, but I have just two tanks with 50 and 30 shrimps, so maybe if you have more than you can see groups of them become inactive.

Lastly I had a single Red Cherry shrimp in my mischling tank - She was never interested in any manufactured food (and for me lack of interest in food is like #1 cause for concern), and I could hardly see her grazing - but she lived for around 1,5 - 2 years total, so maybe the activity drops with age as well.

 

In any case this is an interesting topic, hopefully someone more experienced will post some information about that.

 

 

[TheGlassBox]

They do seem to become less active with age.  They don't swim freely around the tank as much and mostly just sit on leaves and graze.  That being said, I have a couple hundred BMs in a 40 gallon breeder community tank and I've never seen them form a group in a corner.  But maybe it's because there are all those pesky fish around keeping them on their toes.

 

I would imagine that they do sleep.  Pretty much everything does.  They might just find an out of the way spot to do it, or like some animals, 1/2 of their brain is always awake to alert them to danger.  You might see some movement in their legs and feelers if that's the case.  It would make them look awake...

[travellife]

I'm new to the hobby but notice my shrimp are pretty calm during daylight hours and begin to actively graze early evening 6pm or so. It's almost as if they find more biofilm later in the day after the light has been on for a few hours.

travellife

[SPARKACHU]

I'm very interested in this as 3 of my new shrimp (who were active all day) are congregated in a corner inactive. The other 5 aren't visible from anywhere I see so I can't compare. My first thought was that they were sleeping as they certainly aren't dead since dead shrimp drift. I'm hoping this is the sleeping phenomenon rather than a sign of deterioration. I will update this later...

[wil]

On 12/4/2016 at 6:48 PM, dao said:

Can't tell if they sleep, one would assume they have to rest and regenerate somehow.

From my observation - shrimp do become inactive but for very short periods of time, but if it is a longer period - let's say a day or more, than I am worried. I have to say though, that I had shrimp that were inactive for a few days, after which they returned to their normal level of activity.  I still assume, maybe wrongly, that there was something not quiet right and they just managed to recover.

A group of inactive, hiding shrimp is definitely a bad sign in my experience, but I have just two tanks with 50 and 30 shrimps, so maybe if you have more than you can see groups of them become inactive.

Lastly I had a single Red Cherry shrimp in my mischling tank - She was never interested in any manufactured food (and for me lack of interest in food is like #1 cause for concern), and I could hardly see her grazing - but she lived for around 1,5 - 2 years total, so maybe the activity drops with age as well.

 

In any case this is an interesting topic, hopefully someone more experienced will post some information about that.

 

 

how long is the short periods of time

[ysipes]

Oh, It definitely yes. I think all creatures like humans, have time to sleep. But I think Shrimp don't shut their eyes and they just lay down somewhere. Their bodily functions slow down and make no movement.