Electric Blue Crayfish, Procambarus alleni

      On September 27th, 2015, I noticed that my female Electric Blue Crayfish, Procambarus alleni, had released a batch of babies!  I had put together a pair of adults maybe six or eight weeks ago, but had never seen the female berried.   Finally took the male out as he was basking on top of a rock.  Thought he might be trying to molt, but he has returned to more normal behavior in a separate tank.
      The babies and mother are being fed a combination of sinking pellets and flake food. Remembering that the babies will be cannibalistic, I tried to catch some with a turkey baster.  No luck, the little squirts are fast. Some sinking pellets in a peanut butter jar left in the tank for a few minutes attracts some babies, which are caught by simply pulling out the jar. Now begins the process of catching babies to transfer them to multiple tanks that contain lots of protective cover.

      Here are pictures of the first six baby crays that were caught. At this point. they are just over 1/4 inch long. These six just got a 10 gallon tank of their own! But not for long, see below:
      The latest count:
         
                  Number      Total           Container
9/30/15           6               6            10 gallon tank A  - added 14, see below for 10/3, done
9/30/15          10             16           10 gallon tank B  - added 10, see below for 10/3, done
9/30/15           7              23          2.5 gallon plastic A, done
9/30/15          10             33           15 gallon tank A  - added 20, see below for 10/3, done
10/1/15           7              40           2.5 gallon plastic B, done
10/2/15          30             76            15 gallon tank B, done
10/3/15          20             96            15 gallon tank A  -  now has 30 total, done
10/3/15          10            106           10 gallon tank B  -  now has 20 total, done
10/3/15          14            120           10 gallon tank A  -  now has 20 total, done
10/3/15          20            140           10 gallon tank C, done
10/3/15          10            150             5 gallon tank A, done
10/5/15          40            190           20 gallon long A, done
10/7/15          40            230           20 gallon long B, done
10/8/15          30            260            4 gallon Sweater box, done
10/12/15        10            270            4 gallon Sweater box, done
10/20/15          5            275           1/2 gallon plastic container

      11/24/15  Finally got box filters running in the two 20 gallon long cray tanks in the front room.

      11/29/15   The last listing with 10 crays in a 4 gallon sweater box was taken down this morning.  There were 5 surviving crays that were moved to the twenty gallon high that had already contained five crays from just before our Florida trip that I had accumulated in the 1/2 gallon plastic container listed above. The five crays that had been in the heavily algaed twenty since 10/20 have the best color of any of the babies.

       8/15/16   A new batch of baby crays released in the 30 gallon breeder tank!  Good thing too as my cray population has been steadily decreasing to maybe 10 to 15 left.