Orange Sunkist

Unsexed juveniles, 0.6 to 1.2 cm, about the size of a grain of rice and too young to tell male from female. Shipping at this size gives the best survival and the easiest adaptation to your water, and you always end up with both sexes. Adults are available on request at roughly twice the juvenile price.

Not on day one. The photo shows a high-grade or best-looking adult from the batch. The shrimp you receive is young and still filling in. The colour packs in with each moult. Every shrimp is an individual, so no two carry exactly the same pattern.

The grade describes appearance and says nothing about health. An Entry shrimp is as healthy as a Collector one and comes from the same parents. It shows less of the pattern and has more flaws in it. What we grade on differs by line, and the Grading panel above spells it out for this one. We grade by eye at shipping size, and shrimp rarely move a grade as they grow. If you know the hobby's letters, Entry is roughly S, Mid SS, High SSS.

Almost certainly. Neocaridina live happily in ordinary treated tap water inside the ranges in the water card above, and forgive the mistakes every new keeper makes. Keep the water steady: a reading a little outside the range is far better than one that keeps moving. The tank does need to be cycled, which means run for a few weeks until it can process waste. That step is not optional.

Yes. Every shrimp arrives pale from the trip and colours back up within hours to a few days, and a Green Emerald can take about a week. Float the bag, then drip your tank water into it slowly over an hour or two before releasing them, so the water changes gradually. If any animal is dead on arrival, photograph it in the unopened bag and contact us within 8 hours of delivery. The Live Arrival Guarantee covers it.

Express post only, bagged with oxygen and insulated, dispatched on Mondays and Tuesdays so no animal sits in a depot over a weekend. We deliver to your door, a PO box or a parcel locker; collect it the day it arrives. Parcels left by safe-drop are not covered. We cannot send live animals to Western Australia, the Northern Territory or Tasmania.

Ten is the sensible minimum for a colony that breeds. With unsexed juveniles it all but guarantees both sexes, and a group settles faster than a pair. Our volume prices are built around that. Mixing colours of the same genus in one tank looks fine, but they will interbreed and the offspring drift back toward wild colouring. Keep one colour per tank if you want to keep the line.

Lights off, bag closed. Float the sealed bag in the tank for 10 to 15 minutes so the temperature matches. Darkness lowers stress.

Drip, don’t pour. Drip tank water into the bag slowly. A sudden change in TDS, GH or pH is the number-one cause of losses in the first week.

Something wrong? Photograph and video the unopened bag and email us within 8 hours. The Live Arrival Guarantee covers a replacement or a refund of the livestock value.