The Opae ula shrimp Forum and online store

Hi there! I have a small opae ula tank. It started out as an ecosphere rescue of 1 shrimp, which I then bought 10 friends for and now a year or so later I’m pretty sure they have multiplied to over 100 shrimp in there!

Anyway, most of the shrimp are pretty similar, nothing too distinctive about them. But there’s this one shrimp I keep seeing who is much bigger, is a mixture of red/grey/white, has a wider abdomen and just all round looks a bit “beefier”. Is it just that this one happens to look different to the rest, or is there often a bigger, alpha shrimp amongst them, or have I somehow ended up with a different breed in there? (Looking at pictures, I feel pretty certain it isn’t a metabetaeus lohena?) There are always a few berried shrimp around, but I’ve never seen this one berried or saddled.

Just interested to know really, since it often catches my eye!

Thanks


(Sorry, they aren’t the best pictures. They’re screenshots from videos and it was during a very active time in the tank!)

from the picture, it look like an female shrimp that give birth before, as the saddle is widen.

Looks to me that it could become berried soon.

Ok, I’ll keep an eye on it but it’s looked like that for some time (weeks/months). It’s also so much bigger than all the others.

Just an Opae Ula. Some get a good size bigger than others.