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Identify this cherry "morph"

3525 Views 7 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  Sunstar
She's in my shrimp tank and has no cherry colouration. I removed her in a "cull" to my shrimp bowl. I'll let her live out her life there. I think she came in as one of the youngsters and this is her first clutch, but unlike most of my cherry youngsters, she seems to lack any red colour.


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I would like to get better pics of her in the bowl, but she appears to be incredibly shy. but I do't blame her she just had her aft turfed out of her nice big shrimp tank into the smaller shrimp bowl.


She appears sort of "milky" in colour and her eggs are a pretty lemon yellow.
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Well keep in mind that Red Cherry shrimp and Yellow shrimp are actually two different color morphs of the same scientific species, Neocaridina heteropoda. My first guess would be that the person you got your RCS from keeps both types and somehow had some cross-contamination (perhaps this one was clinging to a net that was used first in the Yellow tank and then in the RCS tank, or maybe a plant was pulled out of one and placed in the other with a small yellow shrimp hanging on for dear life, etc.) Or the second possibility is that this shrimp was produced from your RCS through a random genetic morph. If it happened once (as it must have to start the Yellow shrimp line years ago), no reason to think it couldn't happen again.

Either way, you were smart to pull her, as normally when RCS and Yellow shrimp interbreed, they hybridize and produce all natural (drab brown) young.

Since this one is berried, it will be very interesting to see what her babies look like. If they are all brown, you can probably assume the latter situation was the cause. If the babies are all yellow, then it's likely the former option.

The one thing that worries me is your reference to "milky." If the shell is milky, that's okay. But if the shrimp's body itself (the innerds) are milky, that's usually a sign the shrimp is dying. Once they start down that path, there is no saving them, in my experience.
See less See more
Well keep in mind that Red Cherry shrimp and Yellow shrimp are actually two different color morphs of the same scientific species, Neocaridina heteropoda. My first guess would be that the person you got your RCS from keeps both types and somehow had some cross-contamination (perhaps this one was clinging to a net that was used first in the Yellow tank and then in the RCS tank, or maybe a plant was pulled out of one and placed in the other with a small yellow shrimp hanging on for dear life, etc.) Or the second possibility is that this shrimp was produced from your RCS through a random genetic morph. If it happened once (as it must have to start the Yellow shrimp line years ago), no reason to think it couldn't happen again.

Either way, you were smart to pull her, as normally when RCS and Yellow shrimp interbreed, they hybridize and produce all natural (drab brown) young.

Since this one is berried, it will be very interesting to see what her babies look like. If they are all brown, you can probably assume the latter situation was the cause. If the babies are all yellow, then it's likely the former option.

The one thing that worries me is your reference to "milky." If the shell is milky, that's okay. But if the shrimp's body itself (the innerds) are milky, that's usually a sign the shrimp is dying. Once they start down that path, there is no saving them, in my experience.
other than all that....the eggs looks really cool though :rolleyes:
They look so pretty
she has some faint red marks I think on her. So she might be a sort of throw back? I think her lemon yellow eggs are so pretty.
update? whats up with the eggs? i dont know much about inc time and all that, but shouldnt they be hatching soon?
She took on a redder colour in time, and she threw out some babies just yesterday. where they are, I have no idea. she still has a couple eggs in her swimmers. think she had a poor clutch.
I haven't seen any babies anymore. I think they died :(
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