Ornamental Shrimp enthusiast Josef Myllyluoma organizes a Shrimp meeting at his facility and personally invited those who are interested in the hobby.

During the Easter Holiday season, Josef organized a 2 day meeting for hobbyist to attend and we (Helsinki Aquarium Society) have also received an invitation and visited the Shrimp event on Saturday 8^th April 2023.

Josef’s mentor from Singapore Benedict Tay (“Bene”) arrived and visited Finland for the first time to provide guidance on his “Apprentice’s” shrimp. The reason for doing so is he will be able to share immediate feedback of what can or should be done. European hobbyists were also invited to this event and the meet up with Norwegian hobbyist was scheduled on Friday. Bene’s goal in visiting Finland was also to learn and experience Finnish Tradition. On Good Friday, Bene got to experience Finnish sauna and Ice bath. A man accustomed to tropical conditions was able to stay in the freezing water for a minute! During the visit, Bene had a guided walk into snow covered forest and had experience Finnish tradition of grilling sausages over an open fire in the middle of Finnish snow-covered landscape.

I interviewed Josef in February 2023 and had also received an invitation to cover the shrimp event schedule between 10:00 and 14:00 Saturday 8^th April 2023. There were 2 of us from HAS covering the event and a total of 7 hobbyist at the main event, 2 of which were from Netherlands. Due to space limitations not everyone who showed interest was able to join the event. Hence, Josef has plan to organize another Shrimp event in May catering for those who have missed out during the April event.

A round of introduction kicked off the event and because of international guest, the sharing session was mainly in English. However, Josef was able to help us bridge any translation gap. During the round of introduction, some of the shrimp hobbyist shared their background which made me feel nervous because i am unaware or not have experience in shrimp breeding knowledge. However, my concerns are quickly resolved as there were hobbyist taking their first steps into Caridina Shrimps where their tanks were only established for half a year. At the end of the presentation, Bene summarized “Each of us has a different story in the hobby – Let’s stop comparing ourselves to others.”

After the introduction, Bene gave a high-level presentation about keeping Caridina Shrimps, the basic requirements to ensure their survival. It is important to have a direction in the shrimp hobby and one can be both a shrimp breeder and a shrimp keeper. These two are not mutually exclusive and everyone can and should enjoy the hobby. In general, shrimp breeders maintain their shrimps in individual tank based on their lineage. Shrimp breeding requires a disciplined approach to improve the quality of the shrimp genetics. i.e. Shrimplets will look like their parents and for shrimp keepers who wish to mix their shrimps will have different variety of shrimps in their tank. According to Josef, if we have a mix tank, the lineage is untraceable and while there may be a unique shrimp colour, it usually cannot be use for selective breeding. In addition, Bene discussed the 4 Guiding Principles for Caridina shrimp in his presentation where only after the fundamentals are done right, such as keeping them alive can we move onto the next step; shrimp breeding.

After the presentation, Josef gave us a tour of his facility which showcased spectacular shrimps of different colour forms. There were some changes since my last visit here and there were even new shrimps that arrived in Finland, Snowfall. Josef has plans to create his own shrimp by using different type of Caridina shrimp. In one of his tanks which I found interesting (I may not have notice during the last visit) had “Caridina Mix” bred by Bene written on it. Josef highlighted his Shrimp room infrastructure setup including the Reverse Osmosis done by one person is simply magnificent.

As the event progresses on, there were some hands-on sessions for the hobbyist to learn and understand the process used by breeders. For those who were willing could try and select out the shrimps as part of the learning process. For the demonstration, the tank of Black King Kong was used to highlight the concept of selective breeding. The Black King Kong with one stripe and two stripe were separated from those without stripes. The hobbyist was able to net out and split the shrimps into the breeder box. Bene added another breeder box to further separate between one and two or more stripe. Those Black King Kong that have too much white (under the belly, etc.) were removed to the 2^nd breeder box. As an example, Bene classified the full Black King Kong were the best and worth $5, one-line Black King Kong $3 and more than one line Black King Kong $1 as an example how professional do it – comparing to someone seeing it for the first time with varying degree of black and white.

Josef runs an Easter Sunday special on the Black King Kong. These could be the ones that were net out by the hobbyist themselves during the event.

Time flew by and the event was coming to an end, it was truly an interactive session where questions were raised. As Josef said in an interview at the beginning of the year, the thirst for information and knowledge has grown tremendously in Finland; this was clearly visible at the ornamental shrimp event. Bene was open and happy to share his know-how and made sure he imparts his knowledge to inexperienced hobbyist. Hobbyist also shared their experiences from their perspective which enhances the dialogue during the event. At the end of the event, it was mentioned that a few hobbyists were heading towards HAS’s spring auction to see if there were anything new e.g. in aquarium plants.

Feeling truly satisfied we drove towards a Sunny Spring Easter weekend. So if you are interested in the ornamental shrimp hobby or would like to receive an invitation to the shrimp meeting, i strongly recommend you to reach out. There was enough interesting stuff and things to do even for such an inexperienced person and a “refresher course” wouldn’t hurt and looking forward to an invite in my (e-mail) inbox. Thanks once again to Josef and Bene for a rewarding Saturday.

Text by Miia Siikasmaa, Translated by Josef Myllyluoma and Benedict Tay. 2023