By Pat McNiel
This group of shrimp includes "Common" Tiger, Super Tiger and Blue Tiger. I am currently keeping all three of these varieties in my tanks. I am not including "black tigers" or other color varieties in this paper due to uncertainty as to whether they are crosses with other shrimp, or not. Click any image for larger view...
PH: 6.4-7.2 in my tanks. Tiger shrimp need soft acidic water to do well and for the baby shrimp to survive. Temperature: 70 - 78 I have found that my Tiger shrimp do better at the cooler end of the temperature range. Color Varieties: From tan with faint black stripes running up and down on the body and across the back to almost solid black. You will usually find Common Tigers, Blue Tigers and Super Tigers available in the US. I have kept my Common Tiger shrimp in the same tanks as my Bumblebee shrimp since the beginning of my shrimp keeping experiences. To date I don't have any young who appear to be hybrids.
The picture to the right is a group of "Common" Tiger shrimp. They are a smaller shrimp that range in size from ½" to ¾" approximately. My Common Tiger shrimp are a very pretty group of shrimp with color variations from some white on the black stripes to solid black stripes with some of them being a very light blue with black eyes. I have wondered whether some of the tiger shrimp available have Super Tiger shrimp mixed in their lines. A while back a seller had a group of Tiger shrimp very similar to what is now called "Super" Tiger. I was lucky enough to get a few of these shrimp.
Tiger shrimp are the "characters" of the dwarf shrimp I keep. They are very curious of any activity in
their tank and are quite easy to catch. If you put your net into the tank you will likely have several shrimp come over to see what is in their water. They are also very active shrimp. You will see them swimming all over their tank all day long as well as being very active picking at the plants and substrate in their tank.
The shrimp pictured to the left is the "blonde" coloration of the Golden Eyed Blue Tiger shrimp. The dark blue are quite striking and I like the lighter blue and blonde shrimp as well. The golden eyes are very pretty.
The last group that I keep is the "Super" Tigers. These shrimp have a good amount of variation in their colors. They range tan to reddish body color and their stripes being solid black to having white with the black lines. The largest Super Tiger I have seen is around 1" long. Babies are light in color and resemble Blue Tigers with the exception of the golden eyes. They don't start showing vibrant coloration until they are about ½ grown. The shrimp to the right is a young Super Tiger.
The picture to the left and right is of a mature female. Her coloration is stunning.
Tiger shrimp were the first shrimp I began keeping. It was totally by accident. I ordered "Zebra" shrimp from an online wholesaler as filler for an order I was submitting. It took a considerable amount of time and searching to figure out what shrimp I actually received. I decided I would like a few more of these shrimp but the second time I received a group of what I now know are Dark headed bumble bee shrimp…..I was severely bitten by the shrimp bug by that time.
The last picture below is a group of Super Tigers. Super Tiger shrimp show many color variations that are very difficult for me to photograph well enough to do them justice.
