Wow Oh Wow Happy Dance

[Baccus]

Ages ago I got some chocolate cherry shrimp which should have produced (or been well on the way to producing black cherry shrimp), the tank they where in had a minor disaster in that a dragonfly or damsel fly laid eggs in the chocolate cherry shrimps tank, the upshot many of the shrimp being eaten and my breeding plans scrapped with me putting the few remaining shrimp in with some of my red cherrys.
Fast forward a few months and I ended up with so many shrimp I was running out of places to put them and ended up putting them in my pond, eventually the shrimp numbers in my tanks reduced and I retrieved previous reject shrimp from my pond, only to find very few reds, a couple of pale chocolates and lots of near wild type cherry shrimp.
Fast forward to today and after having sorting the non-red shrimp from the reds over the past few months I now am getting more reds and better coloured and the huge bonus dark chocolate if not black cherry shrimp in their respective tanks.

 
Here is one of my young reds, already looking impressive


And my dark chocolates




and a pale chocolate or perhaps a Mocha?

 

[Liv15]

Wow how'd you get all those colours? Mine are supposed to be red but they're really all clear/red

 

[Baccus]

Luckily I started with good quality reds, more by pure chance than by good planning and shopping around. Cherry shrimp colour can be greatly influenced by the water they are kept in such as gH and pH, as well as their own genetics and foods.
 
My cherry shrimp are just kept in my local council supplied tap water with a good variety of foods offered from tree leaves which I know are safe for them to eat, tropical fish flakes, algea wafers and shrimp pellets. They really aren't fussy in the food stakes.
 
As for getting chocolates and blacks, there are lots of colours now available in cherry shrimp with more colours being developed all the time.
 
if your shrimp are more clear, are yours perhaps all males? Males often don't have the best colour unless you start getting into the really high grade shrimp. That said it is possible to improve your shrimps colours by culling (removing) any shrimp that are not displaying the colouration you desire. It can be a long tedious process but it will eventually give you good stock.
 
Oh and the other little gem I found hidden in my chocolates is this little blue.

 

[LyraGuppi]

Wow! They're all so pretty..

 

[Ch4rlie]

Nice one Baccus
 
Lovely red cherry in first pic, good colours.
 
And love the little blue shrimp on last pic.
 
Very well done indeed

 

[RRaquariums]

Cool shrimp I love cherries such happy active little shrimp.