Jimbo's Picotope!

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how long did your pico take to cycle? did you see a noticable ammonia spike? I've had mine going since 12/12/08, and nothing yet. I used a little water from a mature tank, and eubbed the filter media from the pico on biomax media that has a year's worth of thriving bacteria on it, so maybe that has something to do with me not seeing a spike. ,,,,cause everything is 0ppm....ammonia, nitrate, nitrite...
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Sorry, got excited about my shrimp and forgot to post on your question. Um, the rock i am using in the tank is half from my already established 90 gallon and i let the other half sit in the sump for a couple weeks. Did you initially add a source of ammonia to kick off things?
 
What thread were you reading on the sexy shrimp?
And congrats. If I were you I would be SUPER SUPER SUPER excited!!!!!!!!!
 
Nothing other than unseeded live rock from the LFS. I picked the rock with some good coralline algae nyself, but I did something I never did before...I don't know why I did it, but I swished all of the pieces I picked back and forth, and some cloudy debris came from the rocks ( this is while still in the LFS holding tanks). The detritus was probably a little die off that would have brought some ammonia to the tank> I'm thinking of just getting a little clown goby to help start it up. I've never had one before, so I'm too sure they are hardy enough to withstand a cycle...may have to get a damsel instead.
 
I myself am against using a fish to cycle..there are so many more ways that you can achieve a good cycle without putting the fish at risk. What i did to cycle my shrimp was go to a local supermarket and asked the guy for one jumbo shrimp. Just make sure it is unseasoned and uncooked. The dude gave me a crazy look, and then just gave it to me for free. Just hang that in your tank for a couple days and it will decompose all sorts of good ammonia for you. There are all sorts of articles around here on how to do this. You can also just buy straight cleaning ammonia from a hardware store of some type, again make sure it has no perfumes or dyes in it.
 
Newest Addition!
i know this won't be exciting for anyone else but me, but i thought i would post anyway. My custom glass lid for the pico came today. Hopefully it will help cut down on evap by quite a bit. We dont have control over the heat in the dorm but they insist on keeping it like a furnace in here. We have both our windows open with fans in them just to keep it comfortable in here.
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The black wrapped glass is where the baby shrimps are. Im headed out to my local LFS in a min to see if i can hunt down some BS eggs and a hatchery of some sort.
 
yeah...I prefer not to use a fish either....never have done it before....good idea on the jumbo shrimp.
 
Can you get a pic of the babies? Are they big enough to eat BBS? I would think they will need something like Rotifers to feed on. I haven't done any research on raising shrimp so I'm shooting in the dark.
 
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Very nice aquascaping SON! What a good idea to include those sexy shrimp! Now why didn't I think of that? BTW, you forgot a few frags here, can you say "YOINK!"
You can "yoink" all you want, i will have my secret ninja brother bag them and bring them when he comes to visit..plus the ones i forgot i split off so there is no point stealing an identical frag. And in no way did you think of the sexy shrimp idea...there is a whole Sexy Shrimp Pico club on another forum which is where i saw them...so :p
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Bwa ha ha secret ninja brother checking in. Tank looks great so far. That's very cool the shrimp had babies. You should take pictures of the zoa's that need coloring up every week or so so we can see the difference.
 
Can you get a pic of the babies? Are they big enough to eat BBS? I would think they will need something like Rotifers to feed on. I haven't done any research on raising shrimp so I'm shooting in the dark.
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I will try and get some pics of them up in a bit. And yes, while they are freakin tiny little things, they can grab BBS and just munch at them for awhile... But that doesnt matter because i called every lfs within 30 min of me and NONE of them have eggs. i am pissed. i may have to get some delivered from home with my next care package.. I guess i will have to see what i can do with this batch with just cyclop-eeze.

Bwa ha ha secret ninja brother checking in. Tank looks great so far. That's very cool the shrimp had babies. You should take pictures of the zoa's that need coloring up every week or so so we can see the difference.
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i may just do that...they are the only thing that i got from that guy that wasn't stunning...they are quite drab ATM.

I also got a small CUC... 2 nassarious 2 blue legs and 1 astrea...temp acclimating them now.
 
So...how many do you have in there. I count 4 in that pic. If you get all 4 of them to survive that would be pretty cool. Petco and Petsmart sell BBS eggs did you check either of them?
 
I would guess around 8-10..its hard to get an accurate count. I will try tomorrow, i have to get something to syphon out the bottom and see if there is a petco local.
 
That's cool. Are they supposed to be hard to raise? Would you put more in your tank or sell them all if you got them to survive?
 
From what i have read, its not that hard. Fresh BBS once a day, and they settle around 20 days. We left the window open last night, and their mug temperature dropped to like 69 this morning. Im not sure if they pulled through. I just turned on their light now so i will check on them in a bit.

I'm not sure what i will do with them, havent thought that far ahead. I have already got a few offers on them lol. I would like to have a few more in the tank, so eventually i will keep some of them. I think it will be a fun hobby if i can get the setup to do it right. I think it will distract me from my corals, otherwise i just sit here staring at them wanting more. haha.
 
Secret Ninja Brother (otherwise known as Bum in Basement) can take your care package to the postoffice today. I have time to pack it up since we don't have school. -10 at the moment. Are they still alive? When I hatched the brine shrimp eggs at school, I needed a heater to keep the tank temperature up. Also, your replacement light fixture arrived. Don't forget the Mommy. Beyond the Reef is selling Sexy shrimp for $25.00! Ridiculous.
 
No unfortunately due to uncontrollable temperature fluxuations with such a small water volume i had massive evap problems i couldnt keep up with. Hopefully with my new care package i will be able to have a better setup. Im not too worried about the temp because our dorm room is kept like a boiler room. we ususally have to keep our windows open just to make it manageable in here and its like -2 out today.

Yea and i bought my sexys for 18 apice, totally rediculous but hopefully will pay off in the long run.

took some updated tank shots but they all came out pretty crappy. I will try again later today or tomorrow.
 
That's rather high for sexy shrimp. I can get them for $6 at my LFS. If I buy 10 or more I get them for $4.50.

I hope you are able to raise them and sell some to get back some money off those little guys!!
 
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