Q: Crayfish eggs

Answered by crayfish bob on 7/8/02, 8:45 pm

A: Crayfish eggs

> My son brought a crayfish home at the end of the
> school year. Now we've discovered eggs. Any
> chance they will hatch? And what should we do?
> I will attatch notes from my FAQ. Sure they will hatch, in about a month.

From my Crustacean FAQ:
> I just niticed tonight, that my crayfish had this
> "stuff" hanging from her rear. It does look like
> eggs. I'm not sure how to take care of her now. We
> had two, and we think she killed the male after
> breeding. we didn't know this happened. This was
> a school project last Dec. and now we are having
> babies, I assume. I have been feeding her gold
> fish flakes. Is that ok? Then what

> Try feeding it other things too, like sinking pellets that have over 30%% protien. However overfeeding will result in a shedding, wich could prove disasterous. Just give her tiny bits every day. Having the crayfish in it's own private quarters, away from fish and other crayfish is recommended. When the eggs begin to hatch, they will ride on mom's back for a couple of days. They do this for protective reasons, not nutritional. feed mom lots of food during hatching time, and meanwhile seperate the babies as they go on their own. watch mom like a hawk, she will eat the babies. Most species do this, especially in captivity.
Try to put the young in as many different container as possible, giving each aeration. A new method is to put a few onion bags or similar material in the aquarium to give the young lots of hiding places from each other.Feeding them boodworms, daphnia, shrimp, shrimp food, brine, chopped finely, goldfish flakes, and even a few old dead wet half rotted leaves