Guide to Starting a Shrimp Tank

[bud29]

I've been seeing several shrimp tank-related questions lately, so I decided to make this thread, a guide to setting up and maintaining your very own shrimp tank.

Picking the tank: One reason shrimp are popular is that they don't require a large tank. Some keep them in tanks as small as one gallon. The size of the tank you need is mainly based upon what you are wanting to do with the shrimp. For example, Crystal Red Shrimp (CRS) breed more readily in bigger tanks. A 20 gallon long is a very common tank to breed CRS in. They still will breed in small tanks such as 5 gallons, but not as readily. If you are looking to breed a type of Neocaridina (Neo) shrimp such as Red Cherry Shrimp (RCS), a tank 5-10 gallons will do. They will still probably breed at the same speed in tanks even smaller than that, the problem is that they are prolific breeders, so space will quickly become an issue. If you are looking to keep shrimp just for the fun of it and not for breeding, small tanks such as 2.5-5 gallons will be fine. Usually the maximum capacity of tanks for dwarf shrimp are 10 shrimp per gallon of water.

Substrate: Various substrates can be used in a shrimp tank. Common substrates used in Caridina tanks are pH-buffering and water-softening substrates like ADA Aquasoil. However, these substrates can be very expensive and are not necessary for survival. Mainly, these pricey substrates are used to obtain the conditions preferred by shrimp such as Bee Shrimp and Orange Eye Blue Tiger Shrimp without purchasing an RO/DI unit. Outsider of using these substrates, nearly any other substrate is OK for your shrimp tank. Playsand, gravel, pool filter sand, etc. are perfectly fine. Just be sure to research your substrate to make sure it doesn't have any "side effects" on your tank like raising pH.

Decor: With decor, mainly the rules of adding decor to any fish tank apply. Do the vinegar test on rocks, don't use wood with sap, etc. Live plants are commonly used in shrimp tanks, but are not needed. However, fast-growing plants can absorb many toxins and stop them from potentially harming your precious shrimp. Also, some mosses such as Java Moss and Christmas Moss harbor microfauna, used as a food source by young shrimp. Remember that shrimp also like their hiding places, so providing lots of hidey-holes will be appreciated.

Filtration: Similar to fish tanks, you can never have too much filtration in a shrimp tank, but you can have too much flow. Especially due to the small size of shrimp and shrimplets, low-flow air-driven sponge filters are popular. Shrimp also like to graze on them between meals. HOB and canister filters are also fine in shrimp tanks, but a fine intake strainer is probably needed to make sure no shrimplets get sucked into the filter. Tying a pantyhose around the intake is one of the simplest ways to make your filter shrimp-safe.

Inhabitants: Now, comes the fun part: picking inhabitants for your tank. One thing to keep in mind is that not all shrimp are created equal. Many are more touchy than others, and need different conditions. It is up to you to research which shrimp you can best supply a good home for. RCS are a favorite shrimp to keep, and for a reason; they are one of the easiest. They can be kept well in both soft and hard water, and breed very readily in both. CRS are another popular shrimp among hobbyists. Their needs are a bit different. They like their water to be on the softer, more acidic side of things, they also prefer temperatures around 75 F. One more shrimp I would like to go over is the Orange Eye Blue Tiger Shrimp (OEBT). They are very touchy shrimp. They, like CRS also prefer soft, acidic water. They are definitely not beginner shrimp.

One thing you hear about with shrimp is interbreeding. The thought is that if you have two types of Neocaridina shrimp, or two types of Caridina shrimp, they will interbeed, and their offspring will be reverted to wild form. This is not true for all shrimp, but it is generally the case. Because of this, keeping two Neocaridina species or two Caridina species together is generally not a good idea.

"What fish can I keep with my shrimp?" some ask. If you are really wanting to breed the shrimp, the answer is few to none. Many fish are unable to resist a tiny shrimplet. Your shrimplets are probably not even safe with small fish such as Neon Tetras or Galaxy Rasbora. The only other inhabitants that can safely be in your shrimp tank are plecos and snails.

Feeding your shrimp: Many questions are asked about shrimp feeding. Your feeding schedule and amounts are mainly dependant on the size of your shrimp colony. If you have a very small colony of shrimp, and you are not looking to breed them, the algae present in the tank already is probably enough for them. If you have a larger colony, though, and you are looking to breed the shrimp, you probably have to feed them.

A common food for shrimp is algae discs, normally fed to plecos. Veggie sticks, barley pellets, and other shrimp foods are also available and very nutritious. Be warned, though; many commercial shrimp foods are composed of the same thing as fish food, but more expensive. Don’t be fooled!

How much should you feed your shrimp? You should feed them an amount of food that can be consumed in 2-3 hours. This is a real trial-and-error process. It is very important not to overfeed, because this can lead to pest infestations, something covered in the next section of this thread.

Pests in your shrimp tank: Sadly, pests are very common in shrimp tanks. Pest infestations are many times caused by too much food being present in your tank. As stated in the previous section, you should only feed what is able to be consumed within a 2-3 hour time frame. One way to make sure no extra food particles get in the substrate is to get or make a “shrimp feeding dish.” You place the food in the dish and pull it out after 2-3 hours. This is an easy way to make sure no food particles get in the substrate, giving a food source to those pests. You can buy a glass or plastic shrimp feeding dish from many hobbyists, or you can make your own by using a jar lid or something of the sort. Just as always, make sure it is aquarium safe!

Some common pests that come into your shrimp tank are planaria and hydra. This article covers a shrimp-safe planaria and hydra eradication method: Guide to Planaria and Hydra Elimination - Aquarium Advice

Scuds are another common pest in a shrimp tank. There is no sure way of getting them out, but one way to try to eliminate them is to capitalize on their stupidity. Place a piece of blanched zucchini in to your shrimp tank. Wait a few hours, until you get lots of feasting scuds on it. Then, pull it out. There will be lots of shrimp on that veggie too, but the shrimp will move off of it before you pull it out. The scuds will not.

co2 with Shrimp? One common shrimp question is, "Can I have a high light/co2 injected shrimp tank?" The answer to this is yes, if done correctly. However, the pH swings caused by co2 are many times fatal to shrimp. The co2 needs to be closely monitored to make sure there are no swings. Running an airstone at night is a way to offset the extra co2 not being used by the plants at nighttime. Just be careful. Many people have failed at the shrimp/co2 combo.

Water Re-mineralization: Water Re-mineralization is for shrimpkeepers who use full RO water in their shrimp tank. RO water, while very clean, soft, and acidic, is lacking in many minerals necessary for keeping shrimp. This calls for water re-mineralization. One commonly used remineralizer is “Bee Shrimp GH+.” This can be found from a variety of places including AlphaProBreeders and eBay.

Bacterial Infections in Shrimp: While shrimp are not prone to aquarium parasites such as ich, bacterial infections are still possible. Symptoms of bacterial infections include missing legs, wobbly antennas, holes in the exoskeleton, and frequent shrimp deaths. These infections mainly are caused in the summer, when the temperature of the tanks are warmer, encouraging the growth of these bacteria. There are anti-bacterial medicines out there, but make sure they are invert-safe. Some are not.

Maintenance in a shrimp tank: Maintenance in a shrimp tank should consist of a weekly 25-30% water change. Some think that because shrimp have such a low bioload, weekly water changes aren't needed, but this is untrue. Doing few water changes will probably result in dead shrimp. Some get away with doing one every two weeks when they are keeping very hearty species like RCS, but even this is not advisable.

Breeding: There have been many questions lately about breeding shrimp, such as RCS. To breed shrimp, you want to match their preferred conditions, and keep parameters stable. So for example, if you want to breed CRS, you would want to have softer, more acidic water with a temperature around 75F. With breeding RCS, they are able to breed in a wide range of conditions, from soft and acidic to hard and alkaline. They will also breed in a variety of temperatures, but the lower the temperature is, the slower shrimplet growth will be.

I hope this has answered questions you may have about the setup and maintenance of your shrimp tank. If you have any more questions, feel free to pm me!

[Bettafanatic]

Great guide! It'll be a really great help to anyone looking to start a shrimp tank.

[Sam870o]

Great guide it answered a bunch of questions i had. Thankyou

[bud29]

Originally Posted by Bettafanatic

Great guide! It'll be a really great help to anyone looking to start a shrimp tank.

Originally Posted by Sam870o

Great guide it answered a bunch of questions i had. Thankyou

Thank you all!

I added the "Maintenance" and "Breeding" sections just a minute ago, they were things I wanted to talk about but forgot to.

[Perpetual151]

Great guide! Very helpful. What is the best way to make your aquarium water more acidic?

[bud29]

Originally Posted by Perpetual151

Great guide! Very helpful. What is the best way to make your aquarium water more acidic?

There are a few ways......One way is to use an "Aquasoil" substrate. However, the problem with these is that they of course don't last forever, and so you have to keep switching it out. You can also get an RO/DI unit, which you only have to replace cartridges on, but those are much more expensive, running anywhere from $80-250.

[Salski]

Great thread! This just answered a fair few questions for me!

[That Guy]

Thanks for this guide. I have a 20 gal planted community tank with large gravel areas and sandy beaches and got 3 cherry shrimp who hide most of the time but are my favorite critters. Thanks to guides like this and all the other great info on this forum I get to figure out how to convince the wife to let me set up a five gal planted shrimp only tank. Could I do a sand covered dirted tank? Or will dirt add too many shrimp killing impurities?

[CcJ23]

Do I need a substrate? I was hoping to do a bare bottom tank with lots of moss..

[aluka]

a few things i feel like might be more accurate from my own experience. (shrimps that I keep crs, oebt, cherries, pfr, pumpkins, blue diamond, Halocaridina Rubra, Tibee[oebtxcrs])

Picking the tank: Shrimps has little to no preference in tank size. the size of your tank depends on what kind of experience you as a shrimp keeper has and what kind of time you want to spend on it. The reason sensitive shrimps (like crs or taiwan bee shrimps) tends to breed more readily in bigger tanks is that its easier to keep stable and clean water parameters than smaller tanks. The optional amount of shrimps you want to keep is 10/gallon, but you can easily keep more than that, IF you can continue to keep the parameters stable and in range. (i have over 300 cherries in a 2.5 gallon tank, a bunch are still berried)

Substrate: Expensive substrate is not needed if you can maintain the preferred water parameters. But sometimes it will save you alot of money to use a buffering substrate, especially if your tap does not sit in the correct ph and you are not using r/o water.

Inhabitants: Shrimp Crossbreeding Chart
heres a shrimp cross breeding chart you can link in your guide.

there are exceptions to keeping more than one type of Neocaridina shrimps. Like you can keep red and blue rili together, they will not go back to while type and will spawn a mix of red and blue rillis. Same as if you keep pfr with red rilli. It will strengthen the red in the rili, but weaken the red in the pfr, but will not go back to while type. You can also keep yellow and pumpkins together, without it reverting.

you can keep cbs and crs together, they are pretty much the same shrimp, but cbs is dominate and crs is recessive.

"What fish can I keep with my shrimp?" any fish that can fit a shrimplet in its mouth will eat it. DO NOT KEEP PLECOS WITH SHRIMPS. plecos are carnivores, and will eat your shrimplets. I think you mean ottos? who are the only 99% shrimp safe fish, because they are herbivores and will not eat any shrimplets. 99% because they freak out easily, and MIGHT (low low chance) injure a shrimp or two when they dash around. (has happened to me)

Feeding your shrimp: Blanch veggies is the best thing you can feed them. Blanched spinach, zucchinis, stinging nettle leaf.


Pests in your shrimp tank: if you tank becomes infested because of over feeding, fish fry is the best natural clean up you can get. Most meds will kill a few of the more sensitive shrimps. Move it in, move it out.




Maintenance in a shrimp tank: It is not advised to do more than 10% water change a week, unless you are keeping cherries. Sensitive shrimps stresses out pretty easily, big water changes will shock them and resulting less healthy and/or dead shrimps. Because even if you are using ro water and doing the exact same thing to the water, the parameters in your new water will be different from the tank water. Most people that keep sensitive shrimps like crs, prl, bees shrimps will tell you, they change water ranging from 5-10% once a week to 10% once a month. Its not about bioload, its about rather or not its necessary to water change. Key to knowing rather or not its time for water change is a tds pen and a nitrate test kit. For example, crs likes to be in tds 100-200. If tds is over 200, water change, if tds is around 150, maybe you can hold off water change for a few days. Same with nitrate, if nitrate is too high, do a water change. If not skip a few days.

Key to shrimp keeping is STABLE water conditions. The less we mess with it the better. If you can keep it in the preferred water condition, with minimal water changes, then your shrimps will be happier.

[aluka]

Originally Posted by Perpetual151

Great guide! Very helpful. What is the best way to make your aquarium water more acidic?

Tanins will lower your ph, so you can add IAL or alder cones.

Or you can use borneowild humic. Add it to your filter, it will buffer your ph for a few months like an active substrate.

Or you can use the new "hip" way to use active substrate. Instead of actually using the ph buffering substrate as your substrate, get a hang on breederbox, fill buffering substrate in the breederbox. The hang on breederbox is powered by an air pump and will allow water to flow between your tank and the breeder box. The active substrate will buffer the ph of your tank, and when it breaks down you can just replace it like filter media. This way you dont have to take apart your tank and uproot your plants to change substrate.

[LadyApril83]

http://www.planetinverts.com/shrimp_species.html
Has pictures associatewith the shrimps. I'm not good with the abbreviations yet.

[Mogurako]

Bud thank you for this guide its a great jumping off point for those who are not familiar with shrimp.

Everyone has varying opinions when it comes to keeping shrimp I'd like to share my experiences as well. Mainly because I feel some of the other information that was contributed by others isn't necessarily accurate but regurgitated facts from online. I ask that you all keep in mind my experiences are with the Neocaridina.

Tank size: I agree you can keep shrimp in just about any size container that holds water but you have to ask yourself "Will the shrimp survive or thrive?". In my experience 10 gallon is really the best minimum size and provides a fairly stable environment. With 15 gallon or 40 breeders being some of the best choices, I plan to switch all my 10 gallons over to 15s.

No matter how large the tank is the colony will eventually need to be split or reset. Tanks will reach what I like to call "critical mass" , the shrimp run out of space and will eventually stop breeding or growing to their full adult potential. I have two 10 gallon tanks that in less than one year has reached this point and that is even with selling off shrimp. So I fail to see how people can claim they have 200+ shrimp in 5 gallons or less.

Food:
Many "shrimp foods" are indeed just rebranded fish foods with calcium added. I feed a algae wafer as a base, high protein food like Hikari Massivore delite, and various balanced veggies. To ensure the shrimp get plenty of calcium I drop in small pieces of cuttlefish bone.

Water changes: I preform one 30-50% water change each week to ensure there is no build of organic waste in the system. Most people say don't exceed 10% a week which I followed in the beginning but once I switched to the 30-50% I noticed a large jump in shrimp activity and breeding.

Pests: Planaria and Hydra are really the only two true pests in a shrimp tank IME. Planaria occur when there's to much organic waste or uneaten food in the system. I switched to the feeding dish method that Bud suggested and haven't had a Planaria issue since. Hydra tend to come in on plants that are added to the tank from sources outside of your collection. In both cases those pests can be taken care of by a great natural product called No Planaria, which is 100% safe for shrimp, fish and plants.

I don't view scuds, cyclops or daphnia as pests but rather a sign that I have a balanced and healthy system. If any of those micro critters get too out of hand I'll put a couple guppy fry in the tank for a week and it resets the balance.

Best tank mates: Short answer is none. If you are serious about breeding the shrimp for fun or profit its best to keep 1 species per tank with nothing that would prey upon the shrimpletts. All my tanks are shrimp only with a couple of snails here and there.

Shrimp do make great additions to community tanks with smaller fish that can not eat the adults but don't expect to see them to much or get allot of baby shrimp.

[aluka]

i guess everyone that does 30-50% water changes doesn't keep taiwan bees... cause that will kill them... and i would cry if i water change to death shrimps that are 75 dollars each...

[Mogurako]

Originally Posted by aluka

i guess everyone that does 30-50% water changes doesn't keep taiwan bees... cause that will kill them... and i would cry if i water change to death shrimps that are 75 dollars each...

That's why I said specificity at the start of my reply I was referring to Neocaradina. Bee shrimp is a whole other monster, I'm slowly working my way up there but it takes allot of space, commitment and money.

[azmodan]

Great info, bud and Mog!

[aluka]

Originally Posted by Mogurako

So I fail to see how people can claim they have 200+ shrimp in 5 gallons or less.

its actually really possible. I keep only nano and pico tanks, and thats where most of my shrimps are. About a month ago i took apart, my filterless low tech 2.5 cherry tank to transfer them into my shrimp rack. I counted 300 shrimps before i stopped counting and just continued to scoop.

I also know other people locally that keeps neos in 3 gallons and under and have populations over 200. one guy acutally had a population of 500+ in his mr aqua 3 gallon, O.o, he traded them to our lfs for store credit, lol.

As long as you have enough food and clean and stable water, they will thrive. 2.5 gallons are small, but you can maximize surface area, using driftwood and moss.

i wouldn't really consider scuds part of a balance tank. but thats just me cause i keep all kinds of moss and they eat moss =(

[Lynx99]

Lots of great info in here-thanks all!

[Mogurako]

Originally Posted by aluka

its actually really possible. I keep only nano and pico tanks, and thats where most of my shrimps are. About a month ago i took apart, my filterless low tech 2.5 cherry tank to transfer them into my shrimp rack. I counted 300 shrimps before i stopped counting and just continued to scoop.

i wouldn't really consider scuds part of a balance tank. but thats just me cause i keep all kinds of moss and they eat moss =(

I'm sorry but I still have a really hard time believing that 200+ ADULT shrimp could live in such a small tank, sure there could be little ones but I wouldn't count those. I'm not saying you're wrong I just have a hard time wrapping my head around that one.

I have maybe 100-150 in my 10 gallons, I feed them well, preform water changes and but I still can't get them all to full size. I believe there's a limit to how many full grown adults can be supported in one system before they can no longer reach full size.

This really has me thinking now, I'm going up have to set up an experiment.


Seed shrimp/scuds are the canary in the coal mine. If I have a ton of seed shrimp then the biology in the shrimp tank is thriving at the micro level. My goal is to try everything known and with the help of a friend invent new things to make an optimum infusoria environment for the shrimp. Joel Salatin said that "He isn't a cow and chicken farmer but rather a grass farmer. If the grass is good then they animals take care of themselves." Shrimp are the same way if you great a great environment for them at the micro level the can be almost self sustaining.

[aluka]

lol not if that canary eats the coal! like i said that is just my opinion, i like my moss. scuds eat moss. I will totally take apart a tank if i find scuds in it!

You totally should do an experiment! =)! I have a shrimp rake with 6 2.5 gallon tanks, lol I am planning on adding one type of neo to each. I only have established colonies of cherrries, pumpkins tho in terms of neos. =/ just recently got blue diamonds, i need to get some yellow and chocolates, and probably rilis.