how to breed pom pom crabs

[drbegalke]

Breeding pom pom crabs (Lybia tesselata)??

 

One of mine now has an orange egg sac underneath... there are 2 other crabs in the system, so there is a pretty good chance one is male and the eggs are fertile....

 

Any ideas on how to try and raise some baby pom pom's?

[c est ma]

I believe most if not all crabs have a tiny planktonic larval stage that would be very difficult to raise in captivity. Perhaps you could try something similar to the methods used to raise brine shrimp nauplii...

 

--Diane

[Caesar777]

Brine shrimp nauplii are accepted by many neonatal creatures, but result in VERY LOW success rates.

[MillerLite]

Brine shrimp nauplii are accepted by many neonatal creatures, but result in VERY LOW success rates.

 

I think she might mean that they should be raise like brine shrimp nauplii, and not exactly fed brine shrimp nauplii. LOL!

 

WHich brings me to my next question. ANy idea what the neonatal crabs might eat...possibly brine shrimp nauplii?

[Caesar777]

I mean that these animals will eat the nauplii, but that the nauplii are a poor choice because they aren't nutritionally correct. Low success rate with animals fed artemia.

[Caesar777]

"We can't stop here....This is bat country."

[c est ma]

I think she might mean that they should be raise like brine shrimp nauplii, and not exactly fed brine shrimp nauplii. LOL!

 

WHich brings me to my next question. ANy idea what the neonatal crabs might eat...possibly brine shrimp nauplii?

 

It's been a long time since I've raised nauplii but I seem to think they were fed things like Brewers' yeast...I'm sure feeding info can be found on any how-to-raise Artemia site...In general, I think zooplankton eat smaller zooplankton & phytoplankton...probably an algae-rich, slightly nutrient loaded, lighted chamber would be good--like a sump--but with no in/out flows, obviously, just an airstone or such...nothing ventured, nothing gained!

 

My FW (technically, brackish) fiddler crabs once spawned--zillions of swimming larvae, all happily scarfed down by the danios & frogs in the tank...

 

--Diane

[Caesar777]

Again, Artemia are a poor food source. Try rearing rotifers or other plankton.

[c est ma]

And again, I was posting about possible ways to attempt to raise crab larvae, not what to feed them.

 

--Diane

[drbegalke]

And again, I was posting about possible ways to attempt to raise crab larvae, not what to feed them.

 

--Diane

 

I was going to feed any baby crabs rotifers and phytoplankton.

 

As far as rearing them, I was going to place the Mom in a 2.5 gallon bowfront with a AC mini on low with a few pieces of reef rubble in it.

 

I figure it's worth a shot.

[Regal Tang]

CALL CGNANO!!!!!!!!!! lol pom pom crab master!

[c est ma]

I was going to feed any baby crabs rotifers and phytoplankton.

 

As far as rearing them, I was going to place the Mom in a 2.5 gallon bowfront with a AC mini on low with a few pieces of reef rubble in it.

 

I figure it's worth a shot.

 

Go for it! I'd suggest using well aged/colonized rubble so some tiny food will be naturally produced, but otherwise use a bare bottom as you will need to do frequent siphoning out of uneaten food & waste (and find or make a mini siphon using stiff and pliable airline tubing.

 

At the end of this post I have copied some crustacean-raising links for you. Note that most of these sources rely on Artemia nauplii for raising some larval stages. Despite what's regularly posted here, brine shrimp nauplii have been used for decades by aquaculturists with success. Nothing else can be produced in such quantity...When I used to raise egg-laying FW fish, the knock on feeding nauplii was that maybe not all fry would be big enough to eat it--well, I still ended up with more fry than I could handle, so it was a fine food source for me. If you are successful at all, you should probably expect a high percentage of mortality, as well, but think of it as weeding out all but the hardiest--no one could raise 100's of larvae, anyway...

 

One trick bs raisers use is to shine a light at one corner of the breeding container--the larvae will concentrate at that site and can be easily siphoned out. I have no idea whether or not crab larvae are phototropic or not, but you might want to try it. If they are, it would sure make it easier to siphon the bottom of their tank, i.e., if you could concentrate your larvae in one area while you siphon the rest of the tank.

 

Here are some links on the raising of various crabs & shrimp. If you feel like perusing them you may find ideas that are helpful.

 

http://www.fiddlercrab.info/uca_lifecycle.html

(pics of fiddler crab life stages, inc. zoea & megalops...)

 

http://www.aquaticcommunity.com/universal-modify-id188.html

(mangrove crab breeding--hit preview for formatted version)

 

http://insel.heim.at/malediven/350824/Engl...eien/zucht.html

(w/ humorous lost-in-translation malapropisms)

 

http://www.reefs.org/library/article/magnasco_toonen.html

(raising shrimp larvae)

 

http://www.wetwebmedia.com/hermitreprofaqs.htm

(scroll down to "Marine Hermit Crab reproduction methods)

 

http://www.advancedaquarist.com/issues/nov2004/breeder.htm

(more on rearing shrimp larvae)

 

http://www.fao.org/docrep/field/003/R7401E/R7401E00.htm

(prawn breeding)

 

http://mit.biology.au.dk/cenTER/April99.pdf

(see page 8 for larval crab food)

 

--Diane