Discussion of the sad losses of PRL a few weeks back
A quick summation is I lost about 150 of about 177 PRL Shrimp.
This gut wrenching event happened several weeks ago.
After a review of all things, over and over and over again, the only thing I can identify is there was something poisonous in the city water like a rinse out/flush of the lines.
There was effect on my Angelfish tank as well which were the only tanks which I had used tap water in, and the only detriments.
In overview, as always I do a small pwc and usually a bit larger one. 12G tank.
Smaller is about a 1 gallon pitcher - larger is 1-3 gallons but usually ~2G.
On the larger pwc, I am usually scooping out Duckweed and it just keeps coming. Remove the 1st gallon, then the 2nd and usually add back the 1st 1G amount and if there is too much Duckweed or I have time, will do a one more gallon removal. Add back in 1 gallon and then the last.
Pretty much always like that and usually 2G.
I had missed the 1 gallon small pwc that week because of being busy.
So there seemed like more Duckweed than usual.
After removing ~ 2 gallons from Duckweed removal, I added in one gallon of water. Noticed a big increase in activity very active as if roaming around after pwc and breeding behavior.
By the time I was 2/3 done scooping duckweed into the next gallon pitcher they had started to group in clusters and banging into the glass and each other. Completely uncharacteristic of any good situation in a tank.
I added in Prime in case there was something wrong.
I always add Prime first to the bucket or pitcher before filling to avoid any mistake like that. I usually add more than the Chloramine dose - not stingy with it.
But who knows.
The fish were gasping and starting to turn sideways and upside down. In a matter of seconds to minutes I was terrified to see what was happening. I added in a new gallon of water as it seemed there was a lack of O2. Even though the filter was running.
Shrimp were clumping into bunches in apparent near death and looking like death.
I had a 5G of bottled water for the machine dispenser sitting in there. Again Dosed with more Prime, and threw the 5G into a clean bucket and 2/3 filled it and some into the other bucke and began removing everything I could get from the tank, like stones plants and rocks into one bucket.
All this took just a few minutes, and I tried to scoop out shrimp but they were handfuls of dead shrimp by then. So I scooped out any which looked like possible dead only into one container and the other - any which was any sign of life even upside down ones twitching, into the bottled water bucket with some Java Fern and Plants.
Almost NOTHING I thought had made it. There seemed about 6 shrimp moving around. That tiny 12G tank being a Fluval EDGE with very small opening made the recovery a little bit slower.
I finished getting all stones out and there were many!!! And the plants, - it was jam packed like a jungle, thick moss, Subwassertang, and plants, large floating mass of small Water Wisteria, a big clump of Mini Butterfly, more moss encrusted on the DW and stones.
Torn down and decimated in a matter of a few minutes.
Scooped out all remaining water and substrate, went into a tub and let to settle there were 3 MTS which survived. Later rinsed it with about 15 buckets of treated water to clean and tested the substrate with Ghost shrimp to see if it was alright.
2 Ghost Shrimp lived for 12 hours and several days. So I believe the larger shrimp was over stressed, as she was berried & was the one that died after 12 hours. The one after several days not too sure had a tiny bubbler in the container for air and a sprig of Java fern and a sprig of moss plus a tiny Micro Anubias plant, and fed a shrimp pellet 2x - the kind that are the size of a shrimp eye. Think, that the substrate was okay.
All the big rocks got set on a table, plants were dipped and thrown into a new tote. After the recovery of the shrimp bodies, all the questionable shrimp maybe one was alive. In the other container was one and in the plant bucket a couple.
Fish mostly made it, lost one, and one flopped out of a plant while moving them over, I think fell to the floor and was found a bit later in a little puddle and of water on the floor alive and maybe made it too.
Counted the LIVE shrimp and there were 27 in total.
I rough counted dead bodies and there were about 150. Previously had rough counted live ones the week or so before and figured about 165. This wouldn't include super tiny babies lost from counts, hiding in the moss and plants.
It was a hellish panic nightmare. Not knowing what was the problem.
Sick, distraught, traumatized, dying inside, incredulous, I just do not know, but one of the very most awful things in fish keeping ever to have handfuls of shrimp just dying in your hands.
Just a bit after the hell of the tank catastrophic losses, I was thinking it was possibly the new container of Prime. I went over to the Angel tank in time to see them starting to swimming sideways. There weren't really words to describe this.
Grabbed another 5G bottled water and put it into a bucket and scooped out all the fish. 3 Angels and 2 catfish from the 46G.
By morning one Angel had died and the other Silver which had been already having illness issues over the other few months died a couple days later.
The last Koi Angel seemes to be much better and the 2 Spotted Raphael Catfish are okay. One is about 7 years old and the other is a small/still young baby one.
Ran Polyfilter to see what might have been the issue and still not positive. There was iron, no other like copper.
Also bag of carbon.
The 46G tank runs a 5G Fluval FX-5.
Did a feeder shrimp test on that too and it was alright.
After finding it didn't have any toxins. Fish went back in.
PRL Shrimp are doing okay the plastic tub is full of plants.
New build for them in the next 2 weeks, Either a 12G long bookshelf or a Mr. aqua 12G I already have or a brand new 12G Edge. Stay tuned.
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After determining that the new bottle of Prime was fine, more testing.
Poisoning was the suspect.
I kind of ruled out a pH crash as the 50G of water in the 46G plus 5G in the filter were only topped off with about 2.5-3G of water. In my opinion would not have caused a pH crash.
Anyhow I am not able to trust the water supply really any longer and am looking for a larger RO type filter or figure if using my small one makes sense.
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As it sits right now, I have a plastic tote with the HOB filter running on it like it were a tank. Feeding sparingly.
There are the possibilities of tanks mentioned. There is a tank manufacturing wholesaler a couple hours away and can save a lot of money on buying a tank that way. So I am wondering to upgrade the SW 2 nanos and use the Mr. Aqua 12 rimless for the PRL.
I found I can get a brand new glass tank for half of the cost of a new 12G Edge tank, but likely rather need the other new parts - light and filter (and new white plastic to match my stand) as well should just buy a brand new set up if going in that direction.
There is a nick and a tiny chip on this 12G Edge tank and it was purchased used with the tiny chip, (not any integrity issue) and I nicked the front with a stone that slipped a few years back. Never got any bigger or anything also tiny.
It took me awhile to be able to put this all down. I mentioned it before in what did you do with your tank today thread.
There are 3 water districts that run our water out of the mountains. I was told it is not unusual at this time of year to clear/flush lines, kill algae and other very healthy treatments for water to keep us all safe - Yummy. But likely not safe for inverts.
Also no bug sprays, lotions, suntan lotion/sunscreens, soap, flea meds or any other thing of that nature.
