# Failed Molt?



## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Do shrimps that have failed to molt properly always die or can they still go walkabouts? I noticed one of my female cherry shrimps this morning that's quite a red colour but she has a clear line just behind her head that runs all around her body, right about where the split normally is when I find molted shells lying around. Very strange. Thing is I'm not sure what's going on... is that her normal marking or is something bad happening to her? I don't suppose there's anything I can do even if something is going on though is there? :icon_conf


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## mordalphus (Jun 23, 2010)

that's how they get before they molt, that's not a failed molt.


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## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Oh so that's what it is? I just never really noticed. Was a little sad that if she were to die, I'd have only one brightly coloured female left... All the others look so pale. So approximately how long after that line appears before they do molt?


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## mordalphus (Jun 23, 2010)

Not sure, generally when it's triggered... That line sometimes shows when they are growing too big for their current exoskeleton.

You're correct that sometimes it is present when they will molt incorrectly the next time, but it would be evident from the point of their last molt.

Try doing a 10% water change with cool clean water to help stimulate a molt.


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## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Today is my scheduled weekly 20% water change day anyway. I hope this is not an omen of bad things to come. Will feeding more often with calcium-enriched food like Shirakura Ebi Dama Special help? At the moment I feed 3 times a week, once with shirakura, once with stinging nettle sticks and once with Tropical shrimp sticks with that beta glucans and red colouring stuff I can't recall the name of. On other days they probably scavenge whatever gets missed by my guppies and Sunday is a starve day for everyone. They don't seem to like the shirakura stuff as much as the other foods.


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## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Hmm... It's been about 8 hrs since water change and said female is now more or less motionless on the ground near the front of the tank. She doesn't flit away like other shrimps do when I bring the back end of my fishing net close to it... in fact, I can even nudge her and she'll batt her swimmerets but not go anywhere. I think she's dying. Hubby thinks she's just old, and I wouldn't rule that out, since I bought the shrimps in a mixed batch of different ages and sizes and she was redder than most.  Poos to my first impending shrimp death!


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## fishykid1 (Apr 5, 2010)

Bell, I doubt it's the first shrimp death. It's probably the first that you've noticed.


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## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Nope, it's my first. I've had them for about 2 months. I officially bought 15 of them but the guy who sold them to me said there were probably more like 17 in there but he couldn't be bothered taking them out of the bag. Yay Freebies! I couldn't count them properly that day I introduced them to the tank cos they were all transparent from the journey home. But I fished them all out to do a major re-scape a few weeks ago and counted 18. Meaning, he either gave me HEAPS and I've lost a few, or I've lost none at all... up til now that is....


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## fishykid1 (Apr 5, 2010)

They haven't started to breed yet?


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## Bell (Nov 11, 2010)

Well dying female was berried about week after I got them and was carrying the eggs for almost a month, but throughout the entire time there were always fewer and fewer eggs and I don't think she carried any of them to term. One day she was full of eggs, a couple of weeks later there were less than half, then only a handful and one day there were simply no eggs left, and I've seen no shrimplets (though they may have been eaten if any really did hatch). She also never developed a new saddle. 

I currently have 2 other berried females, one has been berried for 3 weeks and has a new saddle (around the time the other female lost all her eggs)... she still has all her eggs, or at least it looks that way. One female just became berried yesterday , another female looks like she might berry within a week or 2. 

I _THINK_ I have a healthy small colony... or is something wrong with this picture?


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## mordalphus (Jun 23, 2010)

Sounds good!


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