Shrimps

[MarkW19]

Could someone please give me some advice on keeping shrimps. I've lost both of my cleaner shrimps (approx 6 weeks apart, the last one died 2 weeks ago) since I put them in a few months ago, and it looks like my fire shrimp has almost had it too.

Temp is 28°C, pH is 8.3, SG is 1.023, amm/trite/trate are 0, CH is 10, and I use RO'd water with a TDS reading of 2 - 14ppm (depending on containers etc.).

My tank is 35 gal, with 2" live sand, quite a lot of rock (which will now be live), 2 powerheads and an Eheim external canister wet/dry filter. I feed frozen mysis/gamma/brineshrimp and veggies once a day, which I would've thought would have got to the bottom for my shrimps. Maybe they weren't getting enough food? Although I tried to see if they were and they seemed to get a big piece every couple of days, and also pottering around on the rocks etc. during the day.

They all molted approx every 2 - 3 weeks.

Can anyone suggest anything? It's pretty disheartening when your new friends die on you for no apparent reason.

 

[fishfreek]

What is CH?

Molting every 2 weeks is a bit excessive. Your not dosing iodine by any chance are you? When you say your feeding veggies what do you mean? YOur temp is a bit high at 82.4F so if you could notch it back to 27C.

 

[indy]

I wish I could help, but my shrimp are like the rocks in my tank. Always there and fine. My temp is around 82-84 and I don't supplement anything. They seem to molt about once a month or so. What else is in your tank? Might be someone picking on them. Only real tidbit I have is that the plural of shrimp is shrimp, not shrimps

 

[MarkW19]

CH, Carbonate Hardness. I'm not dosing iodine - I use a mixture of 4 frozen cubes, one is green "sea veggies", seaweed I guess.

I'm finding it difficult to get back to 27°C, it's between 27.4 and 28.1°C recently.

I did think that molting every 2 weeks was bad.

There's nothing picking on them.

EDIT: I've just lost my Fire Shrimp too!

 

[Overstocker]

Is that more than one fire shrimp or multiple fire shrimp?...

 

[MarkW19]

Easier to say shrimps, is it not?

 

[Atari]

The only thing I can think of is high nitrates. Have you taken a sample of water to the LFS to confirm your test results?

 

[MarkW19]

My Nitrates are showing as 0 on 2 different test kits, no I haven't confirmed the results with the LFS

 

[MarkW19]

Has anyone got any ideas?

 

[Atari]

Do you ever hear clicking sounds from the tank?

 

[MarkW19]

I've only heard clicking on 2 occasions - from the Clownfish.

 

[Atari]

It was just on my mind because I heard lots of clicking from my tank today, and then I briefly saw a molt shaped like a shrimp 8O I've never added any shrimp so I fear the worst..

 

[MarkW19]

Do you have clownfish? Clownfish tend to click!

 

[Atari]

No fish.. I'm pretty sure it was he whose name shall not be spoken :?

 

[Bearfan]

pistol shrimp also click. I've only seen mine 1 time, but I know he's in there.

 

[johnkristie]

Mark, for what it's worth, I 've lost my cleaner and fire shrimp over the last four weeks also. No one can seem to figure out what it could be. Other than maybe adding too much trace elements, which it sounds like you don't do. See the thread under general discussion forum "shrimp deaths". Good luck!

 

[MarkW19]

Would acclimation (if it wasn't done right etc.) affect something weeks later?

 

[MT79]

I know other inverts like starfish, anemones, etc. may not show signs of stress for weeks, how did you acclimate them? Do you do water changes?

 

[MarkW19]

I did a drip acclimate over 2 hours, 15% water changes every 2 weeks.

 

[MT79]

When in doubt do water changes. IMO, do a couple 25% water changes a few days apart (2-3 days), then bump it up from 15% bi-weekly to 25% bi-weekly or even weekly. Make sure the new saltwater is aged atleast 24 hours, and at the proper temp. HTH