Future Shrimp Tank

[Coyne]

Picked up a 2.5g Fluval Spec today and set it up. Its to be the future home of some freshwater shrimp. As I have never kept shrimp before, I am open to advice and suggestions.
Also, this is my first time using Java Moss. How long until I should remove the string thats holding it down?

 

[Berylla]

You may not need to remove the string as it will be covered with the moss. If it's xmas moss, it will take months of growth.

2.5 gallons is a bit small, but if you perform 2x water changes a week and not overfeed, your shrimp will thrive. Cherry shrimp will overpopulate a small tank so you will need to think about selling or re-homing into a 10G or larger. I have a 29G with Cherry shrimp and my husband calls it an infestation!

 

[Fishfur]

One thing you need to allow is time for biofilm to grow. Shrimp do not do well in new tanks, because they both eat biofilm and it appears to have some other benefits for them as well. It can take several months for enough of it to grow to keep shrimp happy.

You can, sometimes, get away with newer tanks if you really pack them with plants.. moss is not enough, though shrimp do love to pick at it. A sponge filter will be very much appreciated by shrimp too, they like to feed off them, and they never damage the shrimp, unlike HOB types which can suck them up.

I'd wait, if I were you, but if not, the shrimp may not live very long. It is just the way they are, it can't be helped. Also, juvenile shrimp do much better than adult shrimp do. Adults tend not to ship very well, and die more often from shipping related stress. Juvies adapt much better, so get young ones when you do.

 

[Coyne]

Thanks for the advice. I was originally going to wait a month, but maybe I'll give it a little longer. I also have some Dwarf Hair grass in there that I'd like to get established before adding any shrimp.
The tank has built in filtration system, so I dont foresee myself adding a sponge filter. Good to know in case I ever upgrade though.

 

[Coyne]

Finally added shrimp

I finally added some Cherry shrimp to this tank (and a Nerite snail a couple weeks ago). I picked up three from my LFS last night. I did a slow drip acclimation for 2.5 hours, but when it came time to add them I discovered that one of them had already died.
I took it back to the LFS today, along with a water sample. They replaced it and I went ahead and picked up two more. After the same acclimation process, I lost another before I could even add it to the tank.

This is my first time having shrimp and I went with the Cherry shrimp because I had read that they were a little sturdier than other shrimp (and less expensive). Any insight into what I could be doing wrong?

 

[Legit Fish]

if they are selling it to you as fully grown adults it is going to happen somehow. the reason some are dying is because they are used to one tank/water parameter that is stresses them so much when they move again and again

 

[Coyne]

Hmm... I guess I thought the point of the slow drip acclimation was to reduce that tank changing stress. Am I not acclimating them slowly enough?

 

[Fishfur]

Cherry shrimp are fairly hardy, but they are sensitive to differences in the water. So, slow dripping is done so that the shrimp have more time to adjust to the differences in the new water. But the sad fact is that adult shrimp have a much harder time adjusting to new parameters than juvie shrimp do. Juvie shrimp ship better too, having much higher survival rates than adult shrimp.

If you can't get juvie shimp, there is one other thing you can try, and that would be to get a TDS meter. This measures Total Dissolved Solids in the water.

Marine fish keepers use these all the time. If you can match the TDS in the new water to the TDS in the shrimp's old water, they will have a much better chance of making it. TDS meters are fairly simple gadgets. Most of them, you just dip the probe end in the water and read the resulting number. Then dry and replace the cap. Don't drop one, they're not that robust.

Test your tap water to find out what its TDS is, then test the shrimp's water. Just for an example, say the tap water TDS is 200 and the shrimp water is 300. You'd mix enough DI or RO water with your tap water to make it read 200 and then drip the shrimp with that. You'd also match pH as closely as you can.

If it's the reverse and the tap TDS is much lower than the shrimp's water, then you might have to add some kind of remineralizing salts. One product would be Salty Shrimp. You'd add enough to the drip water to get it the TDS to match.

Get the TDS quite close and the shrimp will have a much better chance to adjust and survive.

 

[Coyne]

Im unsure how to tell how old they are. They are about 1/2" long, maybe less. I'll see if I can get a picture of one of the four that survived.
At any rate, I'll focus on keeping the ones I have alive and healthy before I think about adding more.

 

[Coyne]

Well...
Of the 4 that survived the acclimation process, I can now only find 1 remaining. Not sure where the other 3 are or if they are even alive. Its not a very large tank, but there are places tiny shrimp could hide. Im assuming that if they were still alive I would see them from time to time.
Who knows though... I was fairly convinced they had all died until I saw the one today, so I suppose the other 3 could behind a rock or under the driftwood. Im not to the point of pulling everything out to look for them yet.

I did suck out about a dozen of these little water flea looking bugs while doing a PWC this weekend. Glancing in the tank now, I see 3-4 more. Not sure what impact (if any) they could have on shrimp, but I'll keep trying to get rid of them.

 

[Coyne]

So, Ive been noticing tiny shrimp fry(?) for the past week or two. Im guessing that either the one surviving shrimp, or perhaps a shrimp that didnt survive, was carrying some eggs.
They seem to stay up in the mass of java moss, though sometimes I'll see one down on the substrate. I cant get a good count, but Im guessing between 6-10. One of them, while still tiny, is developing the red coloring. The rest are even smaller and still clear.

Obviously they have been able to find food, but I was wondering if there is any special care I should be offering to supplement their health/growth?

 

[AliGee]

So, Ive been noticing tiny shrimp fry(?) for the past week or two. Im guessing that either the one surviving shrimp, or perhaps a shrimp that didnt survive, was carrying some eggs.
They seem to stay up in the mass of java moss, though sometimes I'll see one down on the substrate. I cant get a good count, but Im guessing between 6-10. One of them, while still tiny, is developing the red coloring. The rest are even smaller and still clear.

Obviously they have been able to find food, but I was wondering if there is any special care I should be offering to supplement their health/growth?

Babies are pretty darn hardy little suckers! They are definitely fine just scavenging for now. So just keep your water clean. =) Also, Copper is a killer so be aware of that. You can add special sinking shrimp pellets and maybe a chunk of an algae wafer, but be careful to not overfeed as 6-10 babies will hardly consume much.

 

[Coyne]

That's good news as that's roughly what I had been feeding the 1 Cherry shrimp and 1 Nerite snail.
Once a week about 1/5th of a veggie wafer. Once a week a couple Hikari Crab Cuisine pellets. Once a week some Omega One Micro Veggie pellets.