How often do shrimp molt?

[Michael]

I bought a peppermint shrimp about 5 weeks ago...and it molted the next day.
Yesterday, a month later, I saw that he/she (hard to tell sex of shrimp :wink: ) had molted again. Is this normal? Is the rate that shrimp molt dependant on water conditions?
He/she seems to be doing fine.

Thanks

Michael

[Seriak]

I can't tell you specifics, but my Cleaner shrimp has molted every 2-3 weeks for the last 3 months.

[sumpfinfishe]

Michael- your right on the money-most molting creatures will molt when there added to a new enviroment, due to changes in the water chemistry.
I keep two cleaner shrimp in my reef and they both molted the second day in my reef. They will molt in my reef usually after the kalkwasser additions, which are dripped in very slowly at the end of every month. I would not be to concerned, both my cleaners are two years old and appear to be very healthy. :wink:

[Bob I]

I would also think it is directly related to the amount of food they get, and thus how fast they grow.

[sumpfinfishe]

Yes rcipema your so right, and now that I think about it- maybe I should cut down on the amount of spinach that I feed them in my custom food blend :lol: :wink:

[Mak]

My Coral Banded used to Molt almost exactly every two weeks.

My Cleaners are about every 2-3 weeks.

My Peppermint shrimp... well I haven't found a Molt yet.

[Michael]

Thanks for the replies.
I really don't feed my shrimp anything...but sometimes he is more aggressive at getting the flakes I feed my damsel than the damsel!. He will go right to the water surface to get it. (surprised me!)

TTYL

Michael

[BCOrchidGuy]

Unless I'm mistaken all shrimp are hermaphrotites so they aren't he/she, get two and chances are they will spawn right after the molt.

[Michael]

If having 2 shrimp normally means they spawn, do the young survive, or just pollute the tank by getting sucked into the filter or dying? Has anyone had any success raising captive breed shrimp (as a hobbyist, not a hatchery)?
Just curious.

Michael

[BCOrchidGuy]

My understanding is that people don't have much luck with cleaner shrimp, but I have two peppermint shrimp in a 20 and they have hundreds of babies. I keep a sponge filter in there and they seem to be doing well, I will focus and really give it a shot in the near future. Baby shrimp make excellent food for your fish, inverts and corals. My cleaners breed often but I doubt I will ever get the babies to grow, however like I say, everything thinks they are yummy.

[Delphinus]

I second BGOrchidGuy's comments. AFAIK, ORA sells captive raised peppermints (or at least someone does), peppermints have been raised to adulthood from fry but not cleaners. Again only AFAIK maybe things have changed in the last year or so. From what I understand, the problem with cleaner fry is they tend to get "stuck" to one another and after a few days they are literally one big glob of dead larvae. Weird.

Peppermint spawn and cleaner spawn, they're excellent food. I don't think they so much "pollute" the tank because they just get eaten up so fast, a couple of hours is all it seems to take.