Cleaner shrimp in berry

[lwall]

I have a trio of cleaner shrimp in my 300 gal reef tank. Two that I now believe are females have what appear to be eggs under their tails among their swimmerettes. It looks just like our common freshwater crayfish in the spring when they have eggs. Do you think these are eggs? If so, do they hatch and hold there just like crayfish and disperse when they are like miniatures of the adults, or do they hatch and become pelagic like pretty much every other saltwater creature? And is this common?

 

[Anonymous]

Chances are they're eggs, may or may not be fertile. If I recollect they do indeed go through a pelagic period. And yes, this is common for at least a couple of different Lysmata spp. normally kept in salt systems.

Great first question, and welcome to reefs.org!