# Yippee - I have some MTS!! (4 flavours!)



## Mr Bee (2 Sep 2008)

Well, this morning I was greeted early on with my parcel from the snailshop people......

I now have:-

2 'normal' MTS
2 Mahogany MTS
2 Spike Tail MTS
2 Dominican Republic MTS

Lovely looking little creatures, nice colours, and all were very alive and active, even while still in their packaging.

On putting them in the tank, one of my female cherry shrimp promptly found them and spend a good few minutes giving their shells a thorough cleaning!!

They gonna be hard to find when they get hidden in the gravel though I think, some of the gravel pieces are bigger than the snails - I assume this is 'cos they are fairly young and need to grow yet?

The trumpets are only ~1cm long, and the spike tails & dominicans are only ~5mm long.


On another note, I have seen 2 definate juvenile cherry shrimp, and 2 or 3 little baby shrimplets (not sure if I saw same one twice!) so it looks like my cherries are breeding too   

I havent noticed any females with eggs though....... they do lay eggs which hatch don't they?? (not livebearers)


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## Egmel (2 Sep 2008)

Congratulations 

MTS are fairly small any way, they only get to about an inch long when fully grown.

Cherries have eggs but they keep hold of them until they hatch.  If a female is carrying eggs you should be able to see them yellow on her back legs.


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## Thomas McMillan (2 Sep 2008)

Wow, I didn't know there were so many different types of MTS. Where did you get them from?


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## Mr Bee (3 Sep 2008)

Egmel - o they have eggs, but don't actually 'lay' them as such and leave them, but hold onto them until they hatch, is that right?
I suppose thats effectively an equivalent of livebearing really!


Thomas, I got them from the snailshop (http://www.snailshop.co.uk) have a look at MTS in the aquarium snails section.  


I actually got them from the snailshop's ebay shop, as the postage was cheaper    (http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Snail-Shop_W0QQcolZ2QQdirZQ2d1QQfsubZQ2d999QQftidZ2QQtZkm).


This is the item I got, only had limited number, but I suppose they might do mixed bags again time to time:-  http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI....40&_trksid=m38.l1313&_nkw=120255224031&_fvi=1


OMG - Only put them in this morning, and tonight I've seen 2 baby snails on the glass......do they really breed that fast, or would these babies have been already 'created' within the snail, and just happened to have been released after I got them??


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## Egmel (3 Sep 2008)

Mr Bee said:
			
		

> Egmel - o they have eggs, but don't actually 'lay' them as such and leave them, but hold onto them until they hatch, is that right?


That's basically the gist.



> OMG - Only put them in this morning, and tonight I've seen 2 baby snails on the glass......do they really breed that fast, or would these babies have been already 'created' within the snail, and just happened to have been released after I got them??


They may have hitched a ride on 'mum's' shell, my babies quite often hang on to the neck of the parent snail until they're a bit bigger.


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## Ed Seeley (3 Sep 2008)

Mr Bee said:
			
		

> Egmel - o they have eggs, but don't actually 'lay' them as such and leave them, but hold onto them until they hatch, is that right?
> I suppose thats effectively an equivalent of livebearing really!



If they're retained inside the body then, strictly speaking, that's Ovivipary.  Looks like Vivipary though and you know what they say, "If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck and tastes like a duck it's probably a duck!".


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## Mr Bee (4 Sep 2008)

But my snails dont quack like a duck, are they supposed to!!  :?     

Ovovivipary looks like what it could be then http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ovoviviparity

Sounds like the eggs are kept until hatching, then the larvae transform outside the mothers body.  BTW, how do shrimps mate? and is there any kind of courtship ritual I might get chance to see?


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## Thomas McMillan (4 Sep 2008)

So... I forgot to ask - do they taste nice?


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