I'm Bringing Sexy Back

Sexy shrimps that is. I finally got my hands on a trio of sexy shrimps by making a special order through my favorite LFS. Sexy shrimp (Thor amboinensis) are commensal shrimps that are found in the tentacles of anemones and various coral polyps. This fascinating shrimp exhibits an unusual trait of swaying its abdomen back and forth, hence the name Sexy shrimp. Growing to a maximum size of 1.5 inches, they are tiny which is why most aquarium shops don’t carry them regularly and are only available by special order.

 

I made a special order last weekend and finally got my shrimps over the weekend and what a sight to behold. Apparently they fare better in odd numbers so I got three, which is a pretty good number as far as odd numbers go.

 

Here they are huddled together in the bag from the store.

Sexy shrimps—like all shrimps in general—are highly sensitive to changes in pH and salinity so a slow drip acclimation process is required. I used a simple drip acclimation kit I got from Drs. Foster and Smith a while back but this can also be easily rigged together using airline tubing and a check valve.

I hung the hard u-shaped end inside the tank…

…with the opposite end with the check valve dangling over the bag which I secured inside my graduated bucket.

After starting a siphon I adjusted the flow rate to about four drops per second for the next two hours.

I topped off the tank with saltwater as it evaporated while disposing some of the excess water from the bag. After an hour, I began recycling the water back into the tank as it was mostly tank water at this point.

I used a small glass container to transfer them from the bag to the tank to allow me to give them a close inspection.

Once they were in the tank they began finding their own niches.

It wasn’t too long before they started gyrating their bottoms, which they are famous for.

The first twenty-four hours were critical but they all successfully passed. In fact one of them has already molted. I feed them shrimp pellets every other day and frozen brine shrimp once a week before my water change to minimize the mess. I also plan to give them some variety so I’ll be including Cyclop-eeze and mysis shrimps in their diet.

 

I’ll make sure to capture their sexy dance on video to post up here soon.