Bumblebee shrimp
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Bumblebee shrimp ( Caridina breviata ) |
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| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Caridina breviata | ||||||||||||
| NK Ng & Cai , 2000 |
The bumblebee shrimp ( Caridina breviata ), more rarely sold under the name of zebra dwarf shrimp , is a dwarf shrimp from Asia from the genus Caridina . The name bumblebee shrimp is not clear; species other than Caridina breviata are also traded under this name. The distinction between different "bumblebees" is often only possible microscopically; In addition, the species often also interbreed.
Like all prawns of this genus, Caridina breviata is a freshwater prawn . She spends her entire life, from the fertilization of the egg to death in freshwater , originally in rivers of southern China . It is bred in numerous varieties for the aquarium hobby. It is mostly kept in aquariums because of the low demands on the tank parameters and the simple reproduction and breeding .
Appearance
The bumblebee shrimp, like almost all dwarf shrimp, remains relatively small. In particular, a clear sexual dimorphism with regard to the size of the animals can be observed. When fully grown, the males are around 2 cm long. The females are around 20% larger with an average of 2.5 cm. Their bodies also appear overall stronger and stockier than that of the males.
The drawing of the animals varies greatly. However, the different variants all have the zebra pattern in common. The transparent body of the shrimp is always crossed by three dark horizontal stripes. The variations result from different colors of the dark stripes, which range from black to brown to blue. There are also reports that Asian breeders have already succeeded in breeding a variant with red stripes, similar to the Crystal Red dwarf shrimp . In addition, the spaces between the dark stripes are often not transparent, like the rest of the body, but are colored white.
Distribution area
The bumblebee shrimp is found in southern China, where it lives in nutrient-rich rivers.
Way of life
Food intake and spectrum
The intestine of the bumblebee shrimp is different from z. B. in humans, completely straight and runs, resembling a spine in the transparent animals, from the head through the abdomen . The exit of the intestine is at the bottom of the abdomen, just before the tail fan . From these anatomical conditions it follows that the intestine is 1 to 2 cm shorter than the total body length. For comparison: the intestine of an adult human is 8 m, more than 4 times as long as the average human height. This results in a restricted intake of nutrients. In order to compensate for this, the shrimp are therefore busy eating most of the day.
The animals are not very particular about the type of food they eat. As an omnivore , the bumblebee shrimp feeds on microorganisms in the water and on the bottom of the water as well as on plant-based foods such as B. dead leaves or algae .
In the aquarium, varied feeding of the animals is very important to ensure healthy moulting. All kinds of vegetables are fed here, as well as algae and conventional fish feed . There is also special shrimp and crab food in specialist shops. On live food and / or frozen food in the form of bloodworms , brine shrimp or daphnia should also not be waived.
Reproduction
The bumblebee shrimp belongs to the so-called advanced reproductive type among the crustaceans. This means that there is no larval stage , but rather fully developed young shrimp hatch from the eggs that are carried by the female all the time.
The sexually mature females develop between 15 and 40 brownish to orange-colored eggs in the ovaries in the neck under favorable conditions . If the first dark stripe of the female's zebra pattern is not too broad and strong, the eggs are visible as an egg spot . The eggs take around 4 weeks to mature. The female then sheds her skin and then releases a scent into the water that attracts the males.
When mating , the male lays the female on her side or on her back and then places a packet of semen at the bottom of the female's abdomen. The female then takes the eggs to attach to the swimming legs . In doing so, she brushes the eggs past the seed packet, fertilizing them.
Due to the constant movement of the swimming legs, the eggs are always supplied with oxygen and a healthy development is guaranteed. The female sorts out unfertilized or dead eggs on her own in order to prevent fungal growth.
By stress or drastically changing environmental conditions such. For example, strong temperature fluctuations or changes in the water values , it can happen that the female strips off the eggs. In the wild, the offspring inevitably die. In the aquarium hobby, with timely intervention, a further development of the eggs can theoretically be ensured even without the mother animal.
Under normal circumstances, the female will carry the eggs for around 4 weeks. Then the fully developed young hatch, which resemble the adult animals in their appearance. They have a length of 1 to 2 mm.
Aquaristics
For some years now, dwarf shrimp have become more and more popular in aquaristics because of their color and their limited space requirements, and the bumblebee shrimp has also become a frequently seen foster animal in freshwater aquariums.
literature
- NK Ng, Yixiong Cai: Two new species of atyid shrimps from southern China (Crustacea: Decapoda: Caridea) . In: The Raffles Bulletin of Zoology . tape 48 , no. 1 , 2000, ISSN 0217-2445 , p. 167–175 ( PDF; 605 kB [accessed November 2, 2017]).
Web links
- Caridina breviata inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . 2. Posted by: De Grave, S. & Klotz, W., 2013. Retrieved January 20, 2014.
- World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS): Caridina breviata NK Ng & Cai, 2000
- Species description in the invertebrate database
- Bumblebee shrimp on www.gerdvoss.de