Pregnant Shrimp?

Hey everyone, I've been in London for a week my grandma was looking after my fish for me and I have come home to find my shrimp looking different I thought she could maybe be carrying eggs?

Definitely looks like eggs.

Unfortunately it's incredibly difficult to raise Amano larvae (they don't give birth to miniature shrimp) to adulthood as they need brackish/salt water from just after hatching and then gradually reducing salinity back to zero over an extended period of time.

But, since the larvae are so small, most owners never even see them before they become a snack for the rest of the tank! 

I thought this would be the case! That's why when I saw them I actually thought oh no that's not going to end well! Mean as I don't have a brackish tank to put them in 

Yes I thought it's a complicated task! I just feel Really guilty looking at her carrying all the eggs and not being able to save them 

I'm afraid I can't see any eggs in the photo, where am I supposed to look?


Shrimps carry their eggs under their abdomens. I can only see one shrimp in the photo and that one does not look as though it is carrying eggs.
Going by my amano shrimps when I had some, the markings on the amano in the photo look like a male (dots, females have dashes) though the shape of the abdomen does look more female 

Eggs stuck to a surface like that won't be shrimps eggs. Shrimp eggs hatch from under the mother. With amanos they hatch into tiny larvae, which in the wild get washed downstream to salt water where they grow then metamorphose in to tiny shrimps which swim back upstream. You will never see these larvae as they are very small and will either get eaten by the fish as soon as they hatch or they will die because the water isn't salty - and being so small you won't see any dead larvae. I had amanos in my tank for 5 years, both males and females. The females started a new batch of eggs as soon as the previous batch hatched but I never saw a single larva.


But they could well be cory eggs. If you want to try and hatch them you'll need to roll them off the filter without squashing them, than put them in a separate tank or maybe a fry net - ones of those made from net fabric as any fry will soon escape from the plastic ones with slits as they are so tiny they will fall through the slits. Any eggs that turn white are infertile or fungused. If you leave them in the tank the fish will will eat them (and probably the good eggs as well) or if you move the eggs, you'll need to remove the while ones.

The first year I kept fish I always let nature take it's course. I ended up with a small number of survivors who managed to find hiding places, but not so many that I had to re-home any.
Several of my amano shrimp hatched eggs, which were all greatly appreciated by the other fish in the tank.
My cories ate most of the eggs that they laid, and they laid a lot. Even if your gang eat what they have laid now, it may still be worth getting a fry net tomorrow as it is quite likely that your cories will lay more eggs, and you'll be prepared to save some.
Daft as it seems, there's something quite lovely about having baby fish in your tank and watching the little ones grow up. 

If there are any eggs left you will need to remove them from the filter. With care, it is possible to roll them till they come off then carefully transfer them to the trap. It might be easiest to position a net under the filter so that any that fall will be caught. You would just need to empty the net into the trap.

Keep an eye on the eggs and remove any that turn opaque white. A plastic pipette is ideal for this - I always saved them from packs of medication but I bought some longer 1 ml ones off Ebay that are better because they are longer.
Once the eggs hatch you will need to feed the fry. When first hatched they need very tiny food. Do a search for how to culture infusoria, you have time to start this. As a second food, microworms are ideal. Starter cultures can be bought from Ebay, you will also need at least two cheap plastic tubs with holes stabbed in the lids (so the worms can breathe) and some cheap instant porridge. Adding a bit of dried yeast also helps the worms grow faster.


If these eggs don't make it, the cories will probably spawn again. And they could well have laid more eggs where you can't see them. From about a week after the eggs were laid, keep a close eye on your water change water as cory fry are very tiny and you'll suck them up without noticing. If you use buckets to do a water change, pour the last couple of inches of water in the bucket into a container where you can examine it thoroughly before throwing it away. When my pygmy cories spawned, the fry looked like tiny little black bugs on the sand. When I used a magnifying glass to look at what I'd sucked up I discovered they were cory fry.