That’s when doubt creeps in. Walking through your local fish store, you see electric blue crayfish right away. Behind some driftwood it move. Its antennae twitch. And there it sits among living plant. It looks fake. But it is alive.
That’s when most of us get hooked on the hobby. There’s all this white, orange, and crazy bright blues you’ve seen, so you think they must be lab experiments or at least dyed. Nope. They’re just normal crayfish with lots of color forms. Understanding what those crayfish colors mean make them more than just something to look at. It will make keeping them even more interestinger.
How to Keep Crayfish Healthy and Happy
We have all seen charts of the visual spectrum that a keeper can works with today (see chart above). But that’s just half the picture. The other part is knowing why those colors persists. A crayfish isn’t painted up like a car. What we see on their shells change according to where they live. If the water chemistry isn’t correct, then a blue cray will appear dull gray. That’s because proper water hardness and stable pH is more important than supplements costing big bucks.
During molting cycles, the shell becomes softer, and unless there are minerals present, the shell won’t re-harden properly or be as bright. Without the minerals, the pigment appears washed out. Each time you change your water, you’re managing a chemical process.
Many people begins with the wrong species. Why? Because they’ve seen one species, maybe a little crab, in a tiny container. Any aquarium, right? As the table shows, that’s simply not the case. Species size vary. While you might keep a Florida Blue in a 20g long (4-6″), an Australian Redclaw would be overgrown (8″). And those larger species generates more bio-load, so good filtration become necessary.
Remember, bigger claws mean rearranging your fancy fish tank overnight. That’s not aggressive behavior. It’s natural instinct. In nature, they also dig. So providing sand as a base meet that natural desire. Sand won’t get destroyed by the crayfish either.
Surprisingly enough genetics also come into play with your purchase. If you get two blue morph parents, the recessive gene of brown or green will show up. Later on the trait becomes stable, but not initialy. Albinos are worse as they don’t have that protective melanin. That makes them more susceptible to stress and light.
When picking up your new crabs look at their shell. Is it hard? Do they have a good posture? Soft shelled crabs has just molted and need time to recover. A new crab should of been quarantined since they may have brought some parasites in. If you put them straight into the tank, those parasites will wreak havoc. They can destroy your whole tank within days.
Another tricky spot is compatibility. A crayfish doesn’t belong in a community tank with Neon Tetras and slow moving Bettas. They’ll be lunch for the crayfish. Faster moving ones such as Giant Danios has a greater likelihood of surviving. Bottom dwellers such as Bristlenose Plecos are armored so they fare better too. Yet even in those spots, it will move things around or nip at their fins. When it does that, it’s searching for some hidden food. Ideally, you want to house them by themselves or with vetted species that can outrun its claws.
Coloration depends heavily on feeding too. Red and orange colors comes from astaxanthin and carotenoids, which is supplemented by adding spirulina. Bright colors are brought out by blanching veggies. Overfeeding makes for fouled water rapidy. The objective is not just a brightly colored decoration but one that is healthy. Molting regularly is part of that.
Get your water parameters correct along with some hidey holes and the crayfish will settle in. You will no longer see them frantically scurrying about, instead it’s calm & grazing. That’s the true pleasure, going from escapee to happy resident. When that occurs, the blue shell signals that all is well in the tank.
