Should I even feed my shrimp?

[whatsgoodm8]

Hey everyone
6 gallon shrimp tank with 7 cherry shrimp. Heavily planted, has driftwood and rocks with moss. Used to contain 3 little cory cats before I added the shrimp so there's debris in the substrate. It's been a little over a week since the tank turned shrimp-only so I obviously fed the cories before, but now that there's only a few shrimp, do I really need to feed them? The last time I gave them a quarter of a hikari sinking wafer and after a few gathered, it took about an hour for them to finish eating. Is that a good amount for one feeding session? How many times a week do I feed them? I really don't want planaria and stuff, because I've heard if you only have a few shrimp you don't have to feed them, or you can feed them once a week. Oh and I don't have any snails in there (yet, fingers crossed).
Thanks in advance

 

[Floop123]

What kind of shrimp do u have

 

[amethystfern]

Yes, you should definitely feed them! In my experience, it can take a while for the fish and inverts that like to hang out on the bottom to eat. My pleco and snail can take hours to even notice a wafer. It's a common misconception that you don't have to feed cleaning crew kind of fish. The shrimp will scavenge and eat any leftover food from the cories but you'll still have to supply them with food for them to be eating enough.

I've seen some people who recommend feeding shrimp daily. It really depends on how many plants you have and the rest of your stock. In my opinion, I'd start by feeding them the wafer every other day and see how they do. That's what I do with my bottom feeders and they do well on that.