OSUOKC79
Aquarium Advice Apprentice
Just a quick question. But a rather long post to make sure I cover all the info. I have a planted 10 gallon tank. I had a big problem keeping shrimp alive in this tank for a long time, finally I realized not to worry about what the ph was, just make sure it was stable. It's been cycled for over a year. I got about 15 RCS about 3-4 months ago, and amazingly I didn't lose one when they went into the tank. Then they started to breed, rapidly. I did find that although my filter has a small intake, it still had to be covered (spent the better part of an hour picking at least 50 shrimp out of the ceramic media and sponge, luckily this filter pulls water thru it instead do pushing it into it, so the pump was not the first thing they met). But other than that I haven't had a problem. But the last few days I've found some dead shrimp. Probably about 12 or so. Not big adults, medium sized I would say with one that was pretty small. Found 6 one day, 3 the next, 2 today. There are probably 75+ shrimp in the tank maybe over 100, so I'm not scared yet, but I don't want to slowly lose all of them again. They have really cleaned up the algae in the tank, last week or two I've noticed a huge reduction in algae. I was thinking that maybe they are not getting enough to eat, so I moved my tiny pleco to my 55 gal, and I'm thinking about moving the three otocinclus and 2 apple snails also. The ph is right where it should be, kh was a little low, 1-2 degrees of hardness (I added some fresh crushed coral to the filter yesterday, also added some seachem stones for more bio media surface), GH is super hard as always, I normally don't finish the test after about 15 or so drops of test stuff it still hasn't changed. Out of curiosity I tested the ammonia and nitrites, both 0, I never worry about that anymore. Nitrates tend to run a bit on the high side, 30-50ppm, tap water is a bit high, but I do weekly 25% water changes (once I skipped a week a few months ago and didn't have any problems). About a month ago I changed the lighting from CFL to a T5 plant bulb, and added a string of LED lights for viewing brightness. This tank does not have CO2, and I only dose florish when I do a water change.
Anyone think I should be worried? Seems strange to have 0 deaths (that I actually saw) and 12 in three days.
Here is a pic:
Anyone think I should be worried? Seems strange to have 0 deaths (that I actually saw) and 12 in three days.
Here is a pic: