Tieri's Dino-Bug-Fish Adventures!

[Starfrit]

Can I just geek out here for a bit?

Because I want to squeal somewhere about my upcoming adventure: Raising Dino-Bug-Fish babies!

... Well, sort of. They're Triops! :D

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They share a relation to both the horseshoe crabs and the extinct Trilobytes, and certain species of Triops have remained largely unchanged for over 180 million years, though the genus itself has been around for 300 million years. There's a reason they're referred to as "living fossils"! This is because they've developed this sort of suspended animation mechanism which allows the eggs to remain viable for pretty well forever if they dry out, so they can hatch again once they're back in the proper conditions. So a Triops could lay its eggs, and the temporary pool the eggs were in could end up drying out and staying dry for years and years, and then once it rains again and the pool fills-- ta-daa! Magic instant babies!

They get their name for the three eyes they have-- two normal eyes which locate food, and a smaller third eye on the forehead that detects light and tells them which way is up.

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They're a little creepy-looking to most people, but honestly, I find them really charming! They're very acrobatic in the water, they don't nip or bite and are actually pretty playful little critters! I used to raise these little buggers all the time when I was a kid, and it was seriously one of the coolest experiences for me; I was always buying the starter kits and hatching eggs, and move the adults into a 2-gallon tank by my bed so I can watch them swimming around at night.

A little while ago I was in a Skype conversation with a few friends who are really into fish care, and the subject of Triops came up. I ended up doing some poking around, and it turns out there's this whole online community of breeders and the eggs are super affordable! I got really excited and spent the last couple of weeks poking around and doing some research on them, and then yesterday I took to Ebay and ordered some eggs from three different Triops species: Longicaudatus (http://www.ebay.ca/itm/200935631342?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649) (One of the most common species-- these are the ones most commonly found in storebought starter kits), Cancriformis (http://www.ebay.ca/itm/200988292303?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1497.l2649) (Another common species also found in some starter kits, and also one of the largest species. Dat speckled carapace! <3) and the auction for the Australiensis (http://www.ebay.ca/itm/191108849032?ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1426.l2649) eggs (a bit rarer than the other two, originating from Australia) ends in about eight hours. I'm watching this one like a hawk!

The Longis and Cancris are on their way (Cancris were shipped last night, Longis shipped today), so I should have those in a couple of weeks!

Seriously, I'm not really much good when it comes to caring for fish. But these guys? I love the hell out of these guys. There will always be a super special place in my heart for these goofballs.

I'm pretty sure if Triops could grow to be the size of a large dog (they don't, the largest ones tend to be around 5 inches long), my mersona Starfrit would have one as her best friend/pet in a heartbeat. ...even though they're technically freshwater critters but whatever let me live my fantasy damnit!

I'm pretty excited about it, and if anyone here's interested I could post updates here about my adventures in Triop-raising, from tank setup to hatching the eggs and everything with it!

... Or are they too creepy-looking for most people? XD

[Mermaid Dottie]

YES! Those things were so much fun when I was little, and my brother was so totally into dinos, so it was a bonding experience for us!

[Starfrit]

Aren't they? I was totally obsessed with them when I was a kid, and now since I've realized how easy it is to actually get them-- and how cheap the eggs are!-- that obsessive adoration for these guys is starting to come back... XD I've been bouncing off the walls ever since I found out my first order was shipped out, I really can't wait until they get here! I'm going to have so much fun decorating their tank and getting everything set up for them!

[ShyMer]

Yaaaay I was following a YouTube channel for a while that was trying a kit and I loved watching his progress! He wasn't very good at caring for them, sadly, and they only lived a couple weeks. One of his complaints was that it was expensive because he had to use so much bottled water. I suspect his trying to use less for water changes is partly why they didn't do so well.
Do you have some way to make normal water safe for triops? I read in the directions that any chlorine or other chemicals in tap water will kill them, while having water with too few or too much minerals will cause them to not develop properly. Sounds tricky!
Anyway, I'd love to see pictures and videos. It would be fun so watch their progress!

Edit- I was too excited and didn't think before I hit submit... when I was talking about water I think what I meant to ask was how sensitive are they to the kinds of water used? The kits made it seem as if they were super sensitive.

[Aziara]

*shivers* To me they make me think of that tracker/bug that was inside of Neo in The Matrix. My husband thinks triops are freakin' awesome, though. I just don't like creepy-crawlies. I always tried sea monkeys as a kid, but 4/5 of the time they never hatched, fifth time they only lasted a few days. I do think it's cool how the eggs can last indefinitely dried out.

[Starfrit]

@ShyMer - The water issue is one that I've found a lot of breeders can't seem to agree on! Everything I've found on the subject of "What water is most suited for Triops" has turned up with one contradiction after another. Some say not to use mineral water because the minerals found in them will harm baby Triops, others insist the mineral water is the best option because the baby Triops need them to thrive, some say to only use distilled water found in grocery stores, others say to only use spring water... Even the instructions that come with most starter kits contradict each other the same way!

When I was a kid, my dad and I used to just take a whole bunch of tap water, run it through a filter (like one of those Brita filters for waterjugs) and then let it sit at room temp for a few hours before pouring it into the containers or changing the water in our 2-gallon filtered tank. It seemed to work fine for me, most of my Triops (I'm fairly certain they were Longicaudatus?) regularly grew up to about 2" and lived for around four months, which is a pretty impressive lifespan for them!

So, honestly, I'm not really sure about the water problem, and I don't really think I know of any methods for completely removing chlorine and such from tap water. I'll look into it, though! I may take the opportunity to try different kinds of water and see which ones give the best results in terms of raising these guys!

@Aziara - Funny thing is, that's the opposite for me! It was the fact that they looked so much like the tracker-thing from the Matrix that convinced me to first buy a kit! XD I still hate like 90% of bugs, though, but I have such a major soft spot for Triops. <3 Meanwhile, my boyfriend is... really, really not looking forward to when the eggs arrive. He's so creeped out by them and wants absolutely nothing to do with them, haha! XD

[Fun123joker]

WHOA H]WHOA WHOA WHOA ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT THERE IS ACTUALLY A CREATURE THAT CAN LIVE IN A 2 GALLON TANK ⊙０⊙

[Starfrit]

YUP.

EVEN BETTER, SEVERAL OF THESE BEAUTIFUL BABIES CAN LIVE IN A 2-GALLON TANK.

... They're very little.

I picked up a 3-gallon tank with a light and filtration system earlier, which'll be plenty of space for my babies. I should be getting about... 260 eggs in the mail? But I'm only going to be hatching a few at a time so I'm not totally overrun by like, billions of Triops. Especially when they get old enough to start laying their own eggs... XD

[Cordelia]

A reverse osmosis filter could work for water filtration, but the systems can be expensive. For fish, I usually use a water conditioner in tap water to remove chlorine and let it sit for a few days. :D

[ShyMer]

I guess it's not as big of a deal as some of them make it out to be. Thanks for the information!

This is so cool! Thanks for being willing to share your progress with us :)

[Starfrit]

That might work! Although the person I ordered my eggs from suggested that I avoid using conditioners in the water because the Triops can be really sensitive to it, so I'm a little wary of it (then again I'm the paranoid sort when it comes to not wanting to screw something up, so that doesn't take much!)

I have no idea, though, when it comes to water all of the advice I'm getting from people contradicts everyone else. >.o Turns out one of my local friends, who obsessively breeds and raises all kinds of fish, ordered Triop eggs from the same guy I did so chances are we'll be working together on raising them-- I know more about Triops than she does, but she knows a lot more about water quality and such than I do. XD

[Fun123joker]

you know if the tripod thing dosnt go as planned you have a big enough tank for a betta (required gallons 3+)

[Starfrit]

Oohh, I hadn't thought about that! I'll definitely consider a betta if the Triops don't work out. :D

[Mermaid Jaffa]

Are they the same as those just add water packets that you could buy from comics?

Well prob not these modern comics, I meant from my day long long ago... Before mobile phones and computers...

[Starfrit]

Pretty much! I'm not really familiar with those sorts of comics, but I do know these things were often shared in similar offers in starter kits, so I wouldn't be surprised if they were!

My elementary school used to do these Scholastic book-order things where everyone would get these little catalogues full of neat stuff and kids' Triops starter kits!


And in other news CHECK OUT WHO JUST WON SOME GORGEOUS AUSSIE GREEN BABIES

I'LL GIVE YOU A HINT IT'S MEEEEE

:yay::dance::yay::dance::yay:

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[Mermaid Jaffa]

That one looks like a big cockroach! They are not fishy looking creatures.

The first pic you posted, that one looks like a King Crab.

[Starfrit]

They're related to horseshoe crabs, so they're actually tiny crustaceans. :D

[Mermaid Jaffa]

How big can they grow to?

[Starfrit]

Depends on the species! Longicaudatus averages around 2 inches, Australiensis is around 3 inches, and Cancriformis are among the largest captive Triops I know of at an average of around 4 inches. I think the largest known breed is Numidicus, which can reach almost half a foot in length. (Which is pretty damn big (http://mytriops.com/articles/images/Triops_numidicus_pic_s.jpg) when you think about it!) Numidicus is one of the only ones I know of that aren't found as pets; they're only found in Africa, where they are considered an endangered species and as far as I know, capturing a Numidicus from the wild, or even harvesting eggs are both considered highly illegal.

[Mermaid Jaffa]

Tieri, the Dino fish expert!

[Starfrit]

Haha, I try. :P It helps that I've been really digging in and researching over the last couple of weeks so a lot of the information that I've been reading up on them is still pretty fresh in my head!

[Starfrit]

Okay, I meant to post this earlier but then the site apparently went down for a while and I had to take off for work. Here's the current supplies I've got for my Triops!

Note: Almost everything I'll be using for this is coming from Petsmart, mostly because it's literally a five-minute walk from my house. However, also nearby there's a small locally-owned shop that apparently specializes in tropical and marine pets, so I'm going to stop in there next week when I get paid again (Had to budget myself on Triops-supplies this week because rent is due!) and see what they have, as I do have to pick up a couple more things!


TANK

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Nothing fancy-- A "Marineland" brand 3-gallon plastic tank with attached LED lamp and filtration system (not pictured). Was originally just going to look at tanks for the time being on my trip to Petsmart, but found this one on sale for super cheap and the sale would have ended in a couple of days so I went ahead and grabbed it. I'll only be raising a small handful of Triops at a time at first, so 3 gallons will be plenty of space for them!

A small crack DID appear in the top of the plastic as I was attaching the lamp, though-- My own fault, I twisted the screws that hold the lamp in place a liiiittle too tight. It's not a very noticeable crack and from the feel of it I don't think leaks will be a problem, especially where it's so high up and I don't think I'll be filling the tank that far anyway. No harm done! Though I'll definitely be keeping an eye on it, just in case.


FILTER

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This is the Whisper micro filter that came with the tank. Fits easily into the tank using a suction-cup on the back that holds surprisingly well, and a quick plug-in and flick of the switch confirms that it works. Comes with one filtration cartridge, and Petsmart carries refills.


THERMOMETER

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'Nuff said-- A simple, cheap floating thermometer for use inside the tank to monitor my water temperature.


TERRAIN

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A few small jars of fine white sand to put in the bottom of the tank. I chose white because it will be easier to see my Triops against it. Triops like to play around and dig around, so I decided to go with sand so they could do that; the last time I was raising them, I had gravel in the bottom of the tank, which they really struggled with. On a couple of occasions they managed to try to move some gravel around to dig into it, but then a few of my Triops were crushed and died when it fell on them. :( I'm hoping I can avoid that happening with the sand!

To keep my tank's water as clear as possible, and to prevent any dust particles that may harm the Triops, I'll be rinsing the sand out before I add it to the tank-- I'll be making a video of my sand-rinsing process to show how I do it. :D


There are a few more things that I'll need to pick up:

Small Fish Net -- This will come in handy for scooping out any possible sick/dead Triops from the tank.

"Turkey Baster" Dropper Tool -- Triops are messy, and as they grow they shed their old carapaces similar to a reptile, and these pile up fast! Having a dropper will make it quick and easy to remove these carapaces from the bottom of the tank and keep the water clean, as well as help to remove any eggs that may be laid in the sand before they hatch.

Water Heater -- My biggest concern is going to be the water temperature for my main tank; Triops are pretty sensitive to changes in water temperature, and the only room I have space for this tank in (my bedroom) fluctuates a lot in temperature, especially on days and nights when I have the window open! I'm thinking the best way to keep the water at one temp will be to get a heater for it.

Hatching Container -- A small container for hatching the eggs in, and raising the babies until they're old enough to be transferred to the 3-gallon. While they don't need to be fed in the first 24 hours of their hatching, and do grow quickly, they're still so small over the next few days when they DO need to be fed that more space in a tank = more space between them and their food. A larger container can make feeding the babies difficult, as they'll have more difficulty actually finding the food you put in for them and they actually run the risk of starving to death before finding the food; as a result, a smaller container to keep the babies within close range of their food is recommended. A simple tupperware container or plastic jar works fine for this, so long as there's a large enough opening in the top to provide plenty of oxygen! The babies will be living in this container until they're about a week or two old, and large enough to be moved to the 3-gallon.

I can use a tupperware container from my kitchen, I'll just need to give it a good rinse with boiling water to make sure it's clean enough; this technique has worked well among breeders I've been following.
Thermometer -- I picked up one floating thermometer for the main tank, but totally forgot to pick up a second one for the hatching container. D'OH!

Bendy-Necked Desk Lamp-- I'll need one of these for the hatching container, to keep the water warm enough (I thought about a heater for this, but the container will likely be too small for one to be of any practical use. Most breeders simply use a poseable desk lamp to warm the babies' water and that seems to work fine! (Plus I have an old one sitting around in my dad's basement that I can hijack for free, so that'll save me a few bucks. :P)

Plants -- Triops will eat anything, from raw or boiled vegetables to worms and brine shrimp to... each other... And it's generally recommended to keep a couple of simple live plants around for them to nibble on. Once I figure out what types of aquatic plants are best for a Triops' diet, I'll be picking them up and planting them in the tank before the Triops are old enough to be transferred into it. I'll also be picking up a Marimo ball, partly because they're great for keeping the water clear, but mostly because, for some reason... I find them kind of adorable. Like really, even though they're just balls of algae, they look like little green tribbles!

Decorations -- Not really necessary, obviously, and I definitely won't be picking up very many (not much space for that in a 3-gallon, obviously) but I figure a little bit of color wouldn't hurt! There were two very colorful rock-and-barnacle sculptures that I saw at Petsmart, and I think I'll be picking them up the next time I'm over there. I might also get a couple of colorful artificial plants as well, but I'm not entirely sure yet as I don't want to clutter up the tank too much. We'll see when the time comes!

[Mermaid Jaffa]

Oh... When you said you were buying a tank, I thought you were going to swim with them!:$

[Starfrit]

Oh, nonono! XD Unfortunately I'm only renting a very small apartment and definitely wouldn't have the funds for a huge tank for swimming in!

... Although now that you mention it, that IS tempting... >_> Though I'd be worried I'd harm my Triops!

[Mermaid Jaffa]

That is an idea for a future pool sized tank eh?:lol:

[Starfrit]

Haha, definitely! If I ever win the lottery, anyway. :lol:

[Mermaid Dottie]

I love the colors on that green triop, Tieri! So pretty!

Sent from my C6916 using Tapatalk

[deepblue]

This is awesome. I've been trying to decide on aquatic animals I'd feel comfortable keeping in our home. We don't have a ton of resources, but we'll have more after we move, and I don't want to invest in as much as a 40 gallon tank situation like I had years ago.

I was thinking about getting red crabs or fiddler crabs for me and my daughter to raise (me primarily of course, she's only four years old) and take care of, but I LOVE what these little critters look like.

I look forward to your future postings about these little lovelies. I'm going to start researching it myself. :)

[Starfrit]

They're definitely worth investing in, I find! :D You can find starter kits for these in all sorts of places for pretty reasonable prices! They're great starters for children, too-- I got my first Triop kit in a school book-order when I was 8.

I'll have more updates here later on in the week when I can get paid and pick up more supplies for them, and I'm still waiting on the eggs in the mail, though they should be here in a week or so! ;w; I'm so excited, aaaaahhh.

[Vixy]

Bettas are awesome, I called mine Sam the Red. Anyhow good luck and have some fun, hope to see some pics if you're able.

[Starfrit]

This thread's been pretty quiet, but here's an update, finally: The first batch of eggs arrived in the mail from Germany today!

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These are the Longicaudatus eggs, in the bag on the left. They're mixed in with some sand from the bottom of the breeding tank they were harvested from, so there really isn't as much there as it looks!

The bag with the green stuff in it is algae dust; a toothpick-tip-ful of this stuff every second day is what will keep the baby Triops fed until they're big enough to eat the food pellets in the last pack there on the right!


Just waiting on the Cancriformis eggs and Australiensis. I got the Cancriformis eggs from the same breeder as the Longicaudatus, and they were shipped only a day apart from each other, so I should have those by the end of the week! The Australiensis eggs were shipped from Indonesia, so I imagine they'll be another week or so yet.

Not planning to start hatching these babies until I've got all my eggs in my possession, and I do still need to pick up stuff for raising the babies; haven't been out yet to pick up any of the other supplies I listed here a few comments ago, due to budgeting stuff, but I should have a fair bit of disposable income once I get paid this week so I'll be able to get at least the stuff I'll need sooner to start hatchin' some pretty fishybugbabies!

I'm pretty pumped! :D

[Gem Stone]

Man, my brother and I used to raise these guys until they would get huge! we actually starting putting them in the pond with the bigger fish. I might look around and find them again. give my evil fish some companions

[Starfrit]

HOKAY, so things went quiet again, but I have an update!

I got the Cancriformis eggs in the mail a little while ago, and now I'm just waiting on the Australiensis! I don't have a picture of the Cancriformis egg packet atm, but it basically just looks the same as the Longicaudatus and came with all the same algae powder and adult pellets that the Longis did, so it's nothing all that special anyway.

I was originally gonna wait for the Aussies to arrive before I actually started on anything, but after a minor robbery on Tuesday night while I was working alone, I've been kind of an anxiety-riddled mess and needed something to take my mind off of everything and relax a lot more, so I decided to go ahead, pick up the last of the supplies I needed, and get started with the tanks last night!

This is the hatching container, where the Triops will be hatched and spend the first ~10 days or so before they're moved to the adult tank:

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Nothing too fancy, it's a 1.5 gallon betta tank I found on sale, it came with a stand and decorative gravel, and I got a separate thermometer for it so I can check the temperature every couple of hours to make sure it stays in the right range (between 22-29 degrees Celsius).


And here's my most proud achievement-- The adult tank!

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I kept the decorating fairly simple, a few coral decos and a Marimo moss ball to keep everything nice and clear. The water is actually a little lower than it should be, because I'm currently using a dropper to take it some out at a time to acclimatize the tank's first resident...

Now, when I originally went out today, the plan was to just get a little snail to put in there and help keep the glass clean, and mostly because I wanted something other than Triops in the tank as well. So I checked out two stores near my house-- PetSmart and a locally-owned shop called Tropical and Marine pets and asked several reps at both what they recommended for a three-gallon freshwater tank in terms of clearing algae and being a tankmate for a bunch of Triops.

Surprisingly, nobody I was talking to recommended any of the snails (though in fairness, both were sort of low on freshwater snails today, so maybe that was why), and actually recommended I get a Bristlenose Pleco for the tank-- they stay small so they're perfect for a 3-gallon, they're pretty chill critters so they won't bother my Triops and the Triops don't really bother with them either.

So imagine my boyfriend and roommates' expressions when I walked into the kitchen and loudly announced "COWER BEFORE THE MIGHT OF ALDUIN THE ALGAE-EATER!"

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... And yes, I named him Alduin after Alduin the World-Eater from Skyrim. It seemed fitting.

I have him currently sitting in a small container on my desk while I acclimatize him to the tank water, and so far he's doing really well! I broke up an algae round for him to nibble on and he's starting to relax enough to pick at it every now and again (I even caught him pushing around one of the larger pieces and playing with it while eating, which was super adorbs <3), so I'm thinking in about another twenty minutes or so after I've done another few water changes for him, I'll introduce him into the larger tank and see how he fares.

I'm already kind of madly in love with him. He's the first pet I've owned since I moved out of my dad's place almost a year ago, so he's kind of a big deal to me right now.


::EDIT:: ... I have no idea why the other picture of the adult tank is showing up here as an attached image. I deleted it, and it's not showing in the code here, but I can't seem to get rid of it... D: Halp?

::EDIT 2, ELECTRIC BOOGALOO:: I figure out how to get rid of it, oops. XD

[Aziara]

Looks like an Alduin to me too, lol

[Starfrit]

It's now been about 24 hours since I introduced Alduin to the tank, and he seems to be doing well, which I'm really happy about! Currently he's hiding inside the outer casing on the Whisper filter-- which freaked me out the first time, but after unplugging it and carefully pulling it out (and making sure he let go of the inside and went back in the water), I've found that the gap in the casing he was hanging out in is just a wide, empty space, so there's no way for him to hurt himself or really even get stuck, so that was a huge relief. I put it back in, plugged it in, and he's now back up there-- I'm assuming he's choosing to hide out there because of the sunlight coming into the room, but I'm keeping an eye on him just in case.

I haven't seen him eat since he was in his little container and being acclimatized the other day, but I think that's just because he's still not used to the big tank and hasn't completely settled down yet. I switched out yesterday's algae pellet for a fresh one today, though, just in case.

And in other news, I've finally added some Triops eggs into the hatching tank! The water's been steady at a good temperature (23 Celsius), so I moved the lamp a liiiittle closer to the water to see if that would help and then poured in some eggs; some from the Longicaudatus batch and some from the Cancriformis batch. Because the eggs are all mixed in with sand I have no idea how many eggs of each I actually put in, but I suppose I'll find out between Friday morning and Saturday morning once the eggs have all hatched!

I tried to pour them all on top of the gravel in the hatching tank, since the gravel's absorbed a lot of the heat from the lamp so it's a little warmer there. I should start seeing babies in about 20 hours or so, so I'll post back if I see anything! :D

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[Starfrit]

AAWWWHHH BUDDY. Just went to the mailbox, and there was an envelope for me! My Australiensis eggs have arrived! :D

I won't be adding them in with this current batch of eggs for hatching, though-- While the other two breeds will hatch between 18-50 hours after being in the proper conditions, Aussies can take up to a week, which means that by the time they hatch, the other Triops in the hatching tank would be almost fully-grown and would likely eat the baby Aussies as soon as they hatched. So I'll either have to wait until the current batch of Triops are adults and have been moved to the adult tank, or I could use the container I acclimatized Alduin in the other day (a large wide-mouthed glass jar) and find another lamp and raise them in that while I'm raising the other Triops.

... Only problem is, boyfriend doesn't want anymore lights on in the bedroom at night when he's trying to sleep, so that miiight be out. Unless I set them up in the closet...

... Hmm. This will require some brainstorming.

[Starfrit]

AND WE HAVE A TRIOP!!

I texted Dave (my boyfriend) while I was working tonight and asked him to take a look at the hatching tank for me, as up until I went to work at 3pm there hadn't been any sign of anything happening with the eggs and I'm anxious and impatient.

Things went quiet on his end for a bit, and then suddenly, I get this text: And lo, on this dark day, there was the firstborn. Congrats, you have a fishy minion.

So far it's just one, but IT'S A TRIOP. I ACTUALLY HATCHED A LITTLE TRIOP. I'd been so nervous about the water quality and the temperatures and everything that I was starting to get really scared that the eggs wouldn't hatch, BUT THERE'S A TRIOP BABY AAAAAHHHH. He's white and kind of translucent and about the size of a grain of sand, so it took me FOREVER to find him when I got home from work tonight, but sure enough, there he was at the bottom of the tank, hopping around!

I've circled him in this photo because he's so small that this is literally the clearest photo I could get. I tried getting video of him hopping around but the focus was even worse once I switched over to video.

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The instructions I got from the breeder said not to feed the babies until about 24 hours after hatching, so I won't be putting any algae powder in the water until just before I go to work tomorrow afternoon (as I'll be at work by the 24 hour mark). No idea if he's Longicaudatus or Cancriformis yet, but we'll find out in the next few days when he starts getting big enough to develop his colors!

[ShyMer]

So exciting! I'm looking forward to seeing him grow <3

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[Starfrit]

Hee, me too! <3 I'm absolutely giddy about it right now! At first he was only bobbing around a little bit at the bottom of the tank, but now he's starting to get stronger and swim up about an inch off the bottom before landing again, so he's starting to get the whole swimming-thing figured out!

These guys grow REALLY quickly (they'll be adults in roughly 7-10 days), so I'll definitely be taking lots of pictures of them as they get bigger!

[Starfrit]

I've been a little behind on updates, but I now have eight confirmed baby Triops swimming around in the hatching tank! :D I was so worried after about 24 hours passed since the first Triop arrived and there were no others. Seriously, I was stressing out! Did I screw up something, was there a problem with the water??? I thought I was going to have to raise this one little Triop all by himself, move him to the adult tank, then drain the hatching tank, dry the eggs out and start all over again! Then I got up yesterday morning and checked on The Firstborn before heading out of town for the day and sure enough, there were more of them! Looking at the numbers I'd been writing in my temperature log for the tanks, I'm convinced now it was because the water wasn't quite warm enough for the eggs; late last week the water was only at about 23 degrees Celsius, and the day I found the other hatchlings the water was at about 28.

There might be more than eight, but most of the babies are still so tiny that they blend in really well with the sand, and that plus the way many of them are darting around (and the fact that when I look in their little shapes reflect off of the inner sides of the tank) are making it difficult to keep their numbers straight! Sometimes I only count seven, sometimes I'm counting as many as nine or ten... It'll get easier when they get bigger though! :P

The Firstborn, now dubbed "Jarl Firstborn" in keeping with my tank's unintentional Skyrim theme, is starting to darken a bit and is by far the biggest one in the tank-- You can see two of his beady little black eyes already! His third eye isn't visible yet, but that should only be another couple of days! The carapace itself is still transparent, so you can really only see his body darkening under his shell. I'm convinced he's Cancriformis, but I won't know for sure until his shell starts getting some color-- if it's a solid pale grey-green, he's Longicaudatus, but if he's a mottled, almost camo-print brown and green, he's Cancriformis. I'm really excited to see how he looks! And for that matter, I really wanna see how the rest look too-- I put in the entire Cancriformis packet (~50 eggs) and half of the Longicaudatus packet (probably around another 50), so it should be interesting to see how much of each is after hatching!

And after this, I still have all my Australiensis eggs to hatch, too! ;w; I'm really excited for those!


This isn't the clearest photo of Jarl Firstborn, but it's the best I could get since the little bugger wouldn't sit still long enough for my cellphone camera to focus!

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[Mermaid Jaffa]

Name the next one, Lysander of Daggerfall.

[ShyMer]

How are your babies???????

[Starfrit]

Ack, I'm sorry I haven't been updating! Things got a little crazy on my end and I totally forgot about this thread! D: Here's pretty much everything that's happened since my last update!

So after Jarl Firstborn, there were 11 total Triops that hatched; three of them lived beyond the Jarl's "Delicious Newborn" stage, leaving eight-- And on April 29th, their colors had come in enough to determine that I had four Cancriformis, and four Longicaudatus.

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Here you can see all but one of them (one of the Cancris is on the other side of the tank behind the gravel pile in this pic)-- The Triop on the left, on top of the gravel pile, is Jarl Firstborn. The others still weren't quite old enough to be distinguished clearly from one another, so The Jarl is the only one who's been named.

Another shot of the tank, same day:

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This is around the same time that I started introducing them to some heftier foods-- up until this point I'd been dropping in some algae dust for the smaller ones, and the bigger ones were still on their hard who-knows-what kind of pellets that came with their eggs. I started adding in a couple of freeze-dried bloodworms and small chunks of brine shrimp, which they went absolutely BONKERS for. I wish I'd have gotten video, it's like the second they caught scent of the stuff they were off their freakin' heads!

Here's Jarl Firstborn clinging to a clump of brine shrimp:

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It's really interesting watching them eat, and kind of funny too, because a lot of food is too big for them to eat while swimming at the same time so they'll roll onto their backs and cling to the food like some sort of sea-otter, and just sort of clumsily move around on their backs while they eat.

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The Jarl, eating some brine shrimp. This is the clearest pic I was able to get at the time of his underside, which was a really beautiful crimson compared to the dark brownish-black of his carapace. He was pretty cool, and also about one and a quarter inches in length.

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Another shot of some of the Longis, you can see the pearly pink and greens on these little buddies-- the colors made them REALLY hard to take good pictures of most days, as the water got murky so quickly after changing and the colors made them blend in too well for my camera to really make out. While The Jarl was about 1-1/4 inch, the other Triops were only maybe slightly under 1 inch.

Jarl Firstborn doesn't like babysitting the other Triops. The Longis sometimes get clingy.

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On May 1st, I discovered that one of my Longicaudatus's wasn't having trouble getting his colors in or growing: He was ALBINO! :D :D :D Meet Ragnar the Red!

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I also decided that I was sick of constantly having to clean out and change Morrowtank (The design is pretty, but made it REALLY hard to properly clean out the algae that had started to grow almost out of control at that point; I was changing almost half the water out of it twice a day), and decided that the Triops were all big enough to cross the border and move to Tankrim, the adult tank.

As a test, I moved the two largest Triops into Tankrim first-- Jarl Firstborn, obviously, as well as the largest Longicaudatus, Lysander of Daggerfall (thanks for the suggestion, Ireneho! :D). It didn't take long to adapt to the change and soon after, Ragnar and the remaining Triops followed.

Alduin the Algae-Eater was not happy with me for a while. His precious sanctuary had become consumed in chaos as eight hyperactive Triops went crazy with excitement from the move and began to explore-- even finding Alduin's special hiding place inside the filter.

Later that night, I was checking on the Triops and found The Jarl flopping around on his back in the middle of the tank. Curling in on himself, then thrashing around, flexing, curling, thrashing... I almost had a panic attack, convinced that he was dying. Dave, my boyfriend, came in from the other room as I started to freak out and wonder what the hell was going on.

Then The Jarl shot upright and did this crazy superfast twirl in place, and-- POP! Off came his carapace.

Turned out, that's how they shed. They thrash and wriggle to split the dead exoskeleton and then spin around really fast to knock it loose. I'd NEVER seen any of them actually in the process of shedding before, and it was actually REALLY cool to get to watch. The shedding itself looks really neat, too-- It still keeps its perfect form, only its almost completely translucent. It looks like a ghost-Triop just sitting in the water. I'll see if I can get pictures the next time one of them sheds; Lysander shed today, but I threw out the carapace without thinking of getting a pic first. D'OH.

On May 2nd, shortly after I returned home from a job interview, I found Jarl Firstborn laying curled-up underneath Alduin's hiding place, unmoving. From what I can gather, he went into Alduin's hiding space, got too close, prodded Alduin a bit too much and Alduin ended up injuring him somehow in a territorial flail. The Jarl died fairly quickly, leaving a population of six.

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After his passing, Lysander of Daggerfall, who by this point had outgrown The Jarl and was two inches long, succeeded in his place as Jarl Lysander.

On May 4th, the Triops had begun to mature to the point where I could now determine that my entire population consisted almost solely of females-- They had developed brooding pouches on their undersides that were already beginning to fill with eggs.

Jarl Lysander of Daggerfall is easily my prettiest Triop. Seriously, this specimen is perfect. Beautiful colors, excellent carapace shape, and her butt-prongy-things haven't broken once and are super long and flowy. The picture below was taken the other day; Lysander is now a little over two and a half inches long!

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(Also pictured: Aela the Huntress, easily distinguishable by her short, kinked-up buttprongs).

The rest of the week went by pretty much without incident; the Triops have been behaving themselves, and have learned not to bother Alduin, and Alduin is being a good little worl-- er, algae eater.

On May 8th, the Triops had matured enough to start laying eggs; in a few places in the tank you could see little rust-colored eggs nestled in with the white sand.

This also meant that the Triops had begun to obsessively dig everywhere to create holes for laying these eggs. Which, by the 9th, led to another problem.

When I first set up Tankrim, I took the two decorate coral structures and laid them, as well as the Marimo moss ball, and laid them on top of the sand. The Triops quickly decided that they liked digging under the structures to lay their eggs. I lost one Cancriformis to a "mining" incident when they decided to clear all of the sand out from underneath one of the support ends on a coral structure, causing it to shift and crush them. I didn't notice in time-- by the time I had, the others had dug it out and decided that the best way to deal with the body was, uhm... eating it.

Yeah. So, that left five in the tank.

About an hour later I was leaning back in my computer chair, watching from across the room as Lysander dug in circles around the Marimo ball, effectively making a little trench all the way around. Then, in an utter stroke of brilliance, decided to dig directly underneath the Marimo, causing it to shift and roll on top of her. Thankfully the Marimo wasn't too heavy, it just kind of pinned her in place and left her wiggling a bit. I went over and used the end of the dropper to gently roll the Marimo away and free Lysander, who... Proceeded to try and dig under the Marimo again until I nudged her with the dropper and made her lose interest.

So I started looking around in the tank, and... Oh boy. Do you remember earlier when I mentioned that one of the Cancris had disappeared shortly after the move into Tankrim? Yeah, Lysander found him on the 10th. Or what was left of him.

He'd done the same thing shortly after moving into the tank-- He'd gone into the back and dug under one of the 'feet' of another one of the structures... Structure shifted, he was crushed. I couldn't see him any time I checked the tank, and with all of the digging the others were doing, where he was ended up getting buried. So Lysander ended up digging around there and found the old, decomposing remains.

I took the structure out completely and used the dropper to pick up the remains and put it in a plastic cup. I chose not to take a photo... You could hardly tell it was a Triop. And the smell... Dear god, the smell. He'd been rotting for a while-- it's a wonder the others never got sick.

With that, I decided I had to declare a State of Emergency, fill a bucket with some fresh water, move the heater into it to warm it up, add some sand on the bottom of it and move the Triops and Alduin into the bucket so I could completely clear out all of the water and sand, scrub the dirt out, and rearrange the structures so they couldn't crush any more of my Triops.

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As circled--

Red: Ragnar the Red
Orange: Lydia
Yellow: Jarl Lysander of Daggerfall
Green: Aela the Huntress
Blue: Ma'iq the Liar
Purple: Alduin

None of them were happy about the sudden disturbance and move into this tiny bucket, Alduin least of all-- any time the Triops got too close he'd lash his tail and throw sand on them. He resorted to trying to hide underneath the thermometer, with minimal success.

Ragnar started having problems from the get-go, though; she was having trouble swimming around in the emergency bucket, and often moved really, really slowly when she did. I assume it was shock from the change in water; she was a bit smaller than the other Triops and not as hardy, and the water was about two or three degrees colder than Tankrim was. The others didn't mind the temperature, but it really got to Ragnar, I think.

I worked fast to reorganize the tank and get everything set up again. The process took a few hours, mostly because I needed to go out to Wal-Mart and grab a few jugs of distilled water, since I didn't have the time to distill my own and wanted the Triops back in Tankrim as quickly as possible.

That night I had everything reinstated, the structures firmly rooted to the bottom of the tank, the Marimo ball partially buried, and the water ready to go. So I began the quick process (save for Alduin, he's a stubborn little arsehole) of moving them back into the tank.

Ragnar died shortly after. It was the first time I cried over it, and even now I'm still kind of beating myself up over it. Thinking about all of the ways it was my fault, and so on.

So the tank population is currently down to four Triops; three Longicaudatus, Jarl Lysander of Daggerfall, Aela the Huntress and Lydia; and one Cancriformis, Ma'iq the Liar. Thankfully, they all seem to be handling the change in the tank really well. Hopefully things stay that way!

[MorningSun]

It's the crazyest still colest pets I ever heard! (cous I never heared abot "domesticated" triops)

I'm curious if this dynasty still lives. :biting nails: