Compatibility Issue?

[rcherry]

I have a moderately heavily planted 17 gallon tank. I currently have 4 zebra danios, 4 rummynose tetras, 8 red cherry shrimp, and 2 rescues from my sisters old tank (a neon tetra and a female guppie, obviously not ideal). I do have a lot of narrow leaf chain sword in the foreground, some Moss, and a lot of nooks and crannies for the shrimp. I'm hoping they will start breeding soon.

I'm looking to add a center piece fish to finish the tank off, and really want it to be a German blue ram (maybe a pair). I'm afraid they might take out the shrimp population, which I'm obviously trying to maintain and grow. If I add a young enough ram, do you think the shrimp would have enough time to grow to a more resilient number? Would it even be worth it? I'm thinking if the shrimp had a large enough population, in a heavily planted tank, the ram could pick some off but never decimate the entire population. Please let me know your thoughts.

 

[Discusapisto]

Get the shrimp population up and going for a bit plus have plenty of moss for the young shrimp to hide in. After pop is up add a pair of young rams keep them fed well and you should be fine. I've kept rams and apistos with various shrimps and if they picked off any I never noticed I think you'll be just fine my friend. Just a note though rams prefer warmer water so make sure the warmer temps won't hurt your shrimp, for example tiger shrimp prefer cooler temps so a ideal dwarf cichlid match would be apisto borelli who also enjoy cooler temps if you follow me. Just research and take your time add more cover and get that population going.

 

[rcherry]

thanks for the advice. i haven't noticed any increase in numbers yet, but I've only had the shrimp for about 3 weeks or so. I'm hoping for some shrimplets in the next few weeks but we'll see. any tips to get them in the mood? i plan on adding some Java moss over the weekend so that should provide plenty of cover. my Temp fluctuates between 78 and 81 degrees depending on how long the lights have been on, should be fine for the rams.

thanks again.

 

[Discusapisto]

thanks for the advice. i haven't noticed any increase in numbers yet, but I've only had the shrimp for about 3 weeks or so. I'm hoping for some shrimplets in the next few weeks but we'll see. any tips to get them in the mood? i plan on adding some Java moss over the weekend so that should provide plenty of cover. my Temp fluctuates between 78 and 81 degrees depending on how long the lights have been on, should be fine for the rams.

thanks again.

Sounds like your doing everything that you should, maintain excellent water quality and cover for your shrimplets and you should be good to go. Just keep fish outta there that will feed on the young until your population is up and running.

 

[rcherry]

It appears that all shrimp in the tank have died, without any loss or disease in the fish.

two days ago i noticed some baby fish swimming around. i have no idea what species they are yet. there are 3, and they were about the size of half of a tic-tac at the time. the next day (yesterday) all the shrimp in my tank had died.

does anybody have an idea as to what happened to the shrimp? did over protective parents kill them all? the parameters are all stable and nothing has changed besides the new baby fish. I'm very confused about what could have happened.