A beautiful small transparant shrimp that lives in brackish water ,
almost always found together with another shrimp: mysis.
They live from nematodes (worms) and algae , that they find on leaves of
the waterplants. As the name suggests it has the ability to change
of color, but very slowly and only slightly, depending on the surrounding color.
It''s for a big part transparant and in the evening they
look a bit blueish.
The brackish water prawn just catches a bloodworm
A commercial closed system: it contains a grass shrimp
and waterweed in light brakish water.
Such a closed ecosystem has a live span of
more then 3 months , and thus making it suitable
for giving it as a present for patients in a hospital
or prison, as there is no contact with the outside
environment. The grass shrimp eats algae, waterweed
and small snails, The waterweed and algae feed on
the waste products of the shrimp.
The grass shrimps are abundant in estuarine ecosystems, and can be found in
ditches with brackish water.
There they feed on everything they can get, worms, detrusis, artemia nauplii,
etc. In aquaria they can also be feed with flock food, like Tetramin.
The grass shrimp feels fine in cloudy waters, the mud gives some protection
against predators. These shrimps are very tolerant against changes in
yemperature and salanity: They can live in sea, brackish and fresh water.
Grass shrimps produce two broods a year normally.
There are many prawns and shrimps that look transparant
The names ad appearance are confusing: Palaemon elegans is partly transparant,
has yellow rings on its legs and above them blue rings.
The stripes on its body are brown/red.
Palaemon serratus This shrimp has yellow rings on its legs
but also brown red rings. Brown/red stripes can also be found on its body
Grass shrimp (Palaemon varians)
This shrimp has yellow rings on its legs and the stripes on the abdomen are hard to be seen
