Electric Blue Crayfish Growing

      Back on September 30th I wrote a post about my mother crayfish releasing her babies. You can see her in this shot above taken this morning.  Over a few days time, I had removed a total of 270 baby crays from this 30 gallon breeding tank, and spread them around to various tanks and "holding containers".  The few babies left in the tank with the mother, have turned out to be at least 30 more!  Yikes.  From the original 300, I expect I easily have 120 or more still alive.

      The larger crayfish near the top is the mother of the 300 baby spawn.  Two of the babies in this picture are about half her size at only three months.  Although the original male died, I will certainly have no problem in procuring breeding stock.

Procambarus alleni

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.

Electric Blue Crawfish

      My first experience with the Electric Blue Crayfish, Procambarus alleni, was to purchase a bag of three adults at the Keystone Killie Club picnic held at my house on August 18, 2012.  I got babies from that trio and raised them to adulthood, and got more babies again.  All of this activity was with the crays all together in a 15 gallon tank.  In that batch there was a berried female that I isolated to a 2 gallon tank, where she released all of her babies about a month later.  Shortly after that I separated babies into various tanks and counted them during the process.  178 babies!  I should be swimming in crawfish.

My largest male, December 20th, 2014

      Over time, the general wisdom about the babies being cannibalistic proved to be true.  Out of the brood of 178 babies, I managed to save only five to about the two inch size, less five that I was smart enough to sell as babies.  So it was time to try to breed them, as no new berried females were noticed.  I had separated my one large and five smaller adults to save them all.  Figured out how to sex them, and discovered my problem. All males.  Last month I visited with the buyer of my five babies.  Alas, he had only one survivor, which also was a male.  The seller of my original trio apparently has lost his crays, so I was in a pickle with six males. Having found no luck tracking down any crays at all in local stores, I started following Aquabid, where I had never had the courage to make a purchase.  Well, now I had no choice.
     http://onestopaquatics.com/ had several listings of blue crays, and after several email exchanges with Jerry, I arranged to buy five females at 8 dollars each, plus 17 dollars shipping.  They arrived yesterday packed in separate little bags, and I left them overnight in small containers.  One had actually shed during her trip in the mailing box.  This was my first transaction with Aquabid, and I think it and One Stop to be good for more business.
     Here is a good site for info on blue crays: Aqua-terra Crayfish care.  There is useful info on how to breed the crays, so I put a female in with a male, and he tried to mate with her immediately.  He was aggressive, and pulled off a claw, so I removed the female to a separate tank to recover.  A second female went in with a Form II male, and no mating occurred within twenty minutes.  The female was a bit small anyway, so she went to a grow out tank.  A third pairing resulted in breeding behavior immediately, and the female was within the male's embrace for about 15 minutes.  Upon separation, she was moved to an isolation tank where she hopefully will berry after receiving a sperm packet from the mating. The female that had molted in the bag is in an isolation tank to harden off before I try to breed her.  A fourth female was put in with a different male that turned out to be very aggressive, so she was taken out.  Upon further reflection, I concluded that the females would benefit from resting and feeding after their shipping experience.  So after day one:

           Female #1:  Claw ripped off, put to recovery
           Female #2:  In with Form II male, put to grow out tank
           Female #3:  Apparently successful mating, put to separate tank to berry
           Female #4:  Smallish, put to grow out tank
           Female #5:  Smallish, put to grow out tank

Same cray from above