Neocaridina takes the world by storm The aquarium market undergoes a major shift in direction about every ten years. In earlier days the blood parrot cichlid, other cichlids, the red arowana, and the flowerhorn were all popular, while today ornamental shrimp in a range of brilliant colors are winning consumers’ favor. Previously the main type was the crystal red bee shrimp, developed in Japan. Today, however, “five-­elements” shrimps, which come in many colors—red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, purple, and white—have the largest market share. And the source of these shrimps is Taiwan. Taiwan’s largest cluster of businesses in the ornamental aquatic animal industry is to be found in Ping•tung County. Wu Pei-shan, executive secretary of the Ping•tung Ornamental Aquarium Product Association, says that of some 250 ornamental aquatic animal firms in Taiwan, about 200 are in Pingtung. One of these is Larmax International Co., a leader in the ornamental shrimp business and located in Ping­tung’s Zhu­tian Township. The “five-elements shrimp” developed by Larmax founder Wang Kuo-•chung in fact derive from the Davidi shrimp (Neocaridina davidi), a freshwater species commonly found in Taiwan. Because in its natural environment the normally green-brown Davidi shrimp sometimes will have streaks of red, blue, and numerous other colors, it was previously used to develop the red-colored cherry shrimp (Neocaridina davidi var. ‘Red’). Wang Kuo-•chung has built on the achievements of his predecessors to develop additional new varieties. From among countless Davidi shrimp, Wang selected strains with color variations to serve as the parent generations for new varieties. Through breeding he cultivated successive generations, continually stabilizing their gene expression. Then, on the basis of the three primary colors, he developed various different hues, so that now in addition to red he has produced shrimp in chocolate brown, orange, yellow, blue, snow-white, and other colors. When you add in the changes of hue on different segments of the shell, he has so far produced more than 20 varieties. Wang has named them “five-elements shrimp,” evoking the five elements of Chinese philosophy (metal, wood, water, fire, and earth) that are considered so important in fengshui. Larmax sells over a million shrimp annually, accounting for 60% of the global market. excerpt from<Taiwan Panorama> December 2017 .