Brachyura larvae
Laboratory rearing

Undescribed larvae can only be positively identified when raised from known parentage. The first zoeal stage may be obtained by keeping a berried female until hatching occurs. However, other developmental stages can only be acquired by raising larvae in the laboratory. The simple tackle box (Costlow and Bookhout, 1959; 1960a) and finger bowl (Costlow and Bookhout, 1960b) techniques still suffice today. This includes regular changes of sea water and feeding with freshly hatched nauplii of the brine shrimp Artemia and the rotiferan Brachionus, readily available commercially in the form of dry cysts and resting eggs, respectively. This food source will suffice for larvae of many, but not all species. For those interested in more details of decapod larval culturing techniques, mass culture and single rearing methods have been examined and developed by Provenzano (1967), Rice and Williamson (1970), Sastry (1970), Roberts (1975), Kinne (1977) and Dawirs (1982).